Reviews for the Dmitri Ensemble 2009 Naxos release of James Macmillan:
BBC Music Magazine
Stephen Johnson
June 2009
macmillan
Seven Last Words From The Cross
Dmitri Ensemble/Graham Ross
Naxos 8.570719 70:29 mins
The work of the youth-based Dmitri Ensemble comes with a ringing endorsement from James MacMillan himself, and within a few seconds of Seven Last Words from the Cross it becomes clear why. Singing and playing are polished, focused and alert; but it‘s the controlled intensity that’s most striking here.
The first movement’s lamenting string figure – like the hushed breathing of the sea – carries an emotional charge out of all proportion to its apparent means. Above it the chorus’s chanting, keening figures grow steadily in power: the sense of a strong sustained line behind the men’s overlapping speech-like comments is potent. The massive block-like chords of ‘Woman Behold Thy Son!’ are impressive enough, but the silences between them are still more gripping. And the contrast between the sweet Celtic-inflected lyricism of ‘Verily, I say unto you’ and the uncompromising non-tonal harshness of ‘Eli, Eli, lama sabachtani?’ has never been made quite so forcefully in my experience. Nor has the journey of Seven Last Words ever seemed to be over so quickly – at the same time urging one to reflect on why these words (and those of the three shorter pieces) can still mean something even to faithless ears.
Until now I’ve been happy enough with the Polyphony version on Hyperion, but in comparison with the Dmitri Ensemble’s contained heat it now sounds just a little cool. The Naxos recording too is outstanding, with the church acoustic savoured but never allowed to swamp details.
performance *****
recording *****
Lead Choral & Song review, June 2009
-
The Telegraph
Geoffrey Norris
21 April 2009
MacMillan: Seven Last Words from the Cross
Dmitri Ensemble, cond Graham Ross
Naxos 8.570719, £5.86
Haydn: Seven Last Words of Christ on the Cross
Orchestra of the 18th Century, cond Frans Brüggen
Glossa GCD 921109, £13.70
Composed two centuries apart, these meditations on Christ's Seven Last Words are nevertheless comparable in their intensity of impact. James MacMillan deploys a rich palette of harmony in evoking both anguish and consolation. It ranges from the chordal outbursts of "Woman, Behold thy Son!" to the dense chromatic string clashes of "Eli, Eli, lama sabachtani?" But the variety of means is underpinned by the music's seamless strand of emotional sincerity, establishing, in this radiant performance, a profoundly affecting balance between awe and dramatic, human narrative.
In Haydn's original orchestral version of his Seven Last Words, Frans Brüggen has taken the unusual step of interspersing the seven adagio movements with brief, astringent "intermezzi" by the modern Dutch-American composer Ron Ford. If they can be irksome, the performance of the Haydn itself is deeply felt.
Telegraph rating, MACMILLAN: * * * * *
Telegraph rating, HAYDN: * * *
Classic FM Magazine
CG
June 2009
One of the composer’s most striking and uplifting works, Seven Last Words from the Cross, is given an inspiring performance from a young British ensemble of admirable contemplation and commitment.
The French composer Arthur Honegger expressed an aim to ‘write a music which would be understandable to the great majority of listeners and at the same time sufficiently free of banality to interest the connoisseurs’. Today, that description easily applied to the music of Scottish composer James MacMillan, celebrating his fiftieth birthday this year, and this recording is a fitting birthday present. Vocal tone and diction are sonorously clear, textures transparent, and the passion of the cross almost palpably evident. The addition of a previously unrecorded motet, the contemplative Nemo te condemnavit, is a special treat. I didn’t want this to end.
4.5/*****
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BBC Radio 3 CD Review
Geoffrey Smith
It’s very effective hearing it pulled together like this as a work across all the seven last words. There is no holding back in The Dmitri Ensemble’s performance: it’s full-throated. I don’t know if MacMillan was actually present for the recording but he likes them a lot and sponsors them in the sense of encouraging their recordings. They manage to get this extraordinary feeling of drama, which I think is one of the most MacMillan-manian virtues.
The Soldier's Tale - in which a soldier returning from war sells his violin to the devil and, with it, his soul - is one of Stravinsky's most endearing scores. Its colourful atmosphere was well captured here with the rhythmic verve of successive dances underlined ... Cerys Jones's strongly projected violin devilry helped ...
Sinfonia Cymru does sterling work on two fronts in Wales: it gives vital experience to young professionals, and it also brings seminal repertoire to audiences who might otherwise never get the live experience. This programme of Stravinsky, Berio and Schoenberg had just the sort of panache that makes their chamber ensemble so valuable
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All praise to Sinfonia Cymru ... The Soldier's Tale, Stravinsky's expressively rhythmic take on the Faust story, is sometimes told by different actors in the parts of the narrator, the soldier, the devil and the princess, but in this version all were assumed by opera star Donald Maxwell in speaking mode. Its virtue lay in maintaining focus on the music, in which Cerys Jones' eloquent violin part stood out. A captivating performance.
Sinfonia Cymru -The Riverfront, Newport
Nigel Jarrett, South Wales Argus - Monday 14th January 2008
Phillip Worth
‘…a late night recital of Shostakovich given by German soprano Christine Bracher. The Five Satires
(op. 109) and Seven Romances on Alexander Blok (op. 127) are frightening, cruel pieces originally
performed in inimitable music-hall-diva style by Galina Vichnevsky… In the Seven Romances,
Joseph Middleton’s edgy piano was joined by cellist Rebecca Knight and violinist Cerys Jones.
All the instrumentalists rendered difficult parts with great style, their intense voices of equal
importance to Bracher’s brilliantly gutteral Russian..’
Oxford Lieder Festival 2006, New College Oxford
Late-night Shostakovich Recital
Opera Now, Julia Hollander
Surrey Advertiser 2nd March 2007
Sense of the ethereal in chamber music concert
Sheila Blow's enterprising group Chamber Music for Charities performed a top quality concert at the United Reform church in Guildford last Saturday. Sheila was joined by the talented violinist Cerys Jones and skilled cello player Christopher Jepson in a rare performance of Mozart's last piano trio in G major. Here is a work that looks forward to Beethoven, in it's melody, harmony and equal importance of the three instrumentalists.
The lovely Adagio from JS Bach Sonata in G minor BWV 1001 followed, played with great sensitivity by Cerys Jones. Schumann's Adagio and Allegro received an ebullient performance from Christopher Jepson, again superbly accompanied by Sheila Blow.
Mendelssohn's trio in D minor is a tour de force of virtuosity and a piece of many varying moods. It's passionate opening movement found the performers on top form, while the second movement found some wonderful singing tone from the violin and cello. The scherzo raced along effortlessly, and the finale brought the whole evening to an exuberent and satisfying conclusion.
Shelagh Godwin
CLASSICAL music lovers should head to the Riverfront
next week for a high-class evening of pieces by two of the great composers.
The young and brilliantly-gifted players of Sinfonia Cymru will be
fresh from performing with international opera star Bryn Terfel
at their tenth-anniversary show at St David's Hall in April.
Mozart's The Magic Flute and Sinfonia Concertante for Violin and Viola
are included in the programme, along with Schumann's Symphony No 4 in D Minor.
Conductor Gareth Jones will be leading the line, while soloists
include the celebrated Welsh violinist Cerys Jones, from Cardiff and Rebecca Jones on viola.
Since forming in 1996, Sinfonia Cymru has cemented its position
as one of the top orchestras in Wales and beyond.
The show is at the Riverfront Arts Centre, Newport, at 7.30pm, on Thursday.
Tickets are available for £8 or £6 for concessions on 01633 656757
11:05am Friday 7th July 2006
Classical Music
When you hear that up-and-coming violinist Cerys Jones will be playing works
by Beethoven, Richard Strauss and Ravel in
will be a rather conservative affair. Don’t. “Ravel’s Sonata was written after a trip to
she says. “This type of music had never been played before in a formal setting in
It is, to coin a phrase, a really cool piece.” Strauss’ piece is equally passionate, and e
qually difficult to play. “Strauss was a big opera fan and in his Sonata he translated this sound
into the violin creating the huge roaring melodies of opera. It is not often attempted.”
Jones is a star in the making, with a string of scholarships and honours, currently studying
at the prestigious
ooking for comforting pieces they already know. They want something that will rouse
other senses,” she says. Accompanied by Sholto Kynoch on the piano she will also
be playing Beethoven’s C minor Sonata, another challenging piece. “It’s a very moody, dark piece,”
she says, “and like the other two was ground-breaking in its time.” 
www.classicalsource.com
Bliss -
Reviewed by: Edward Clark
"Britten’s Violin Concerto used to be dismissed as an early work of little merit
or consequence. It lacked virtuoso champions and was neglected.
Times have now changed.
Champions such as Ida Haendel and Tasmin Little have transformed
this ugly duckling into a swan. It is one of Britten’s pre-“Peter Grimes” works
and is now recognised as having real quality and possessing all the
hallmarks of Britten’s genius for poetic nuance and melodic
fecundity.
Cerys Jones played with genuine feeling and not a little virtuosity; throughout she was
able to turn all the technical hurdles into opportunities for purely musical display.
The lead into the passacaglia finale was stirring in its simple solemnity;
this movement contains some of Britten’s most sublime music,
full of genuine grandeur and heartfelt emotion.
Both soloist and orchestra played the work’s closing bars exquisitely,
with its possible illusion to Berg’s homage to Bach.
Butcher ensured his players
were attentive and accurate in their support for the very talented Cerys Jones".
Dacorum Symphony Orchestra
November 2005
Commissioned by a self-publicizing virtuoso but dedicated to a boyhood friend
the Violin Concerto in D Major remains one of Beethoven's most gracious and masterful works.
Here it received an inspired performance by the rising young violinist Cerys Jones,
who played with youthful zest but also with impressive maturity.
En Rapport from the first bars to the last, both soloist and orchestra combined
to provide an outstanding musical experience.
And let us acknowledge the fine work of the Countess of Munster in promoting
brilliant young musicians for precisely this kind of occasion.
In all, this was a musical event, which convinced one, yet again, of how richly
Tom Loten and his orchestra have, over the years, contributed to the cultural life
of this community.
Philip Worth
Cerys Jones may live in
time to spend in the captial, making her appearance with the Surrey Philharmonic this
week all the more of a treat. The young violinist will join the orchestra at Epsom Play-house
for Saint-Saens' third violin concerto, in a programme that also includes Elgar's Froissart overture
and Rach-maninov's Symphony No 1.
Sponsored by the Countess of Munster Recital Scheme, Jones divides her training between
"My sleep patterns are quite erratic," she says of her hectic schedule. "Everyone wants to
know what it is like to train in such an exciting city, but I haven't had a chance to explore it yet."
"I get off the plane at JFK, catch a taxi to my apartment and start practising. Then it's off to the
Juilliard for lessons, which does not leave much time for anything else."
Jones does make the most of the vibrant classical music scene, however, which she
believes is more central to the cultural life of the average New Yorker than it is to Londoners.
"There are the same international artists appearing but I think that in
regular community who go to these concerts," she says. The different approaches of her tutors
- Rodney Friend and Lewis Kaplan - have improved her technique immeasurably."To have
the different approaches to music can only make you better if you are open-minded," Jones says.
Surrey Philharmonic has a long-established reputation for nurturing young soloists,
including such luminarires as Jacqueline du Pre, Paul Tortelier and John Ogden.
Judging by her recent success in concerts across
name is added to that list.
By Nancy Groves
