Sylvia McNair, John Eliot Gardiner - Exsultate Jubilate, Works by Handel and Mozart (1993)

This is a quite exceptional record and contains some of the best singing I have heard in years. The matching trills between Sylvia McNair and the orchestra towards the end of the Alleluia from Handel’s Silete venti have to be heard to be believed. As usual, Gardiner conducts the music with stylistic authority, vigour and finesse. It is an excellent combination. The recording was made in All Hallows, Gospel Oak, in London and is in an acoustically broad space, but has all the details of choir and soloist in place. My only quibble is that I think it a pity to have included the vastly over-recorded Exsultate, jubilate (25 recordings listed in the current catalogue) when it would have been nice to have had another Handel cantata instead; but obviously there were strong commercial pressures to put in the Mozart. A brilliant achievement.