Sheffield Cathedral Choir, Neil Taylor, Anthony Gowing - Patrick Gowers: Choral & Organ Music (2010)

Better known for his film and television scores for Smiley's People, the Granada Sherlock Holmes series, and Marat/Sade, Patrick Gowers is also a composer of organ pieces and sacred choral music, as this 2007 album from Griffin Records reveals. The bracingly modern style of Gowers' organ music is fairly reminiscent of French keyboard writing, such as the virtuosic toccatas of Maurice Duruflé and Jehan Alain, though his approach to choral writing is more predictably English in its quasi-modal tonality and added-note harmonies, in a manner close to that of William Mathias. This disc presents Gowers' flamboyant Toccata and Fugue and An Occasional Trumpet Voluntary (a sly dual variation on the Trumpet Voluntary by Jeremiah Clarke and the Toccata from Charles-Marie Widor's Fifth Organ Symphony) in exciting performances by Anthony Gowing; and in spite of the slightly fuzzy recording of the latter, these pieces are the most enjoyable tracks of the album. The choral works, however, suffer from inferior recording and insecure singing by a rather unbalanced and muddy-sounding Choir of Sheffield Cathedral. Directed by Neil Taylor and featuring a top-heavy ensemble made up of a girls choir and a smaller group of male voices, the performances are earnest and obviously carefully rehearsed, but some singers stand out too much -- notably the tenors, who use too much vibrato -- and the choir seldom seems to blend well. Add to this the strangely uneven recording quality, which ranges from crystal clear to excessively hissy, and it becomes apparent that this CD is not an ideal presentation of Gowers' work. Yet his music has enough value to warrant further study, and perhaps better recordings of these pieces will emerge over time.