Carols After A Plague (NEW FOCUS RECORDINGS FCR357), performed by The Crossing and conducted by Donald Nally, is a set of vocal/choral works by 12 new composers (Shara Nova, Tyshawn Sorey, L J White and many others). The group are based in Philadelphia and the work was premiered in venues in Maryland and Philadelphia over Christmas 2021.
As you may have guessed, it’s another “pandemic” album, but the stated aim here is to present something about “our collective experience” during lockdown, and also highlight some of the “fraught issues of our time”. When they say “our experience” and “our time”, they’re actually talking about the American experience – one piece here explicitly references the George Floyd case, another cites Walt Whitman, and the entire set of carols is underpinned by a very upbeat can-do mood of optimism which our American cousins do so well, filled with a bright-eyed hope for fostering a sense of community and togetherness. How better to do this than through the massed voices of a choir – and indeed the music manages to create a vague impression of religious devotion, without once referring to any specific biblical text, hymn, psalm, or tune, let alone allude to any known faith system. (Admittedly, one of the premieres was recorded in a Presbyterian Church).
The Crossing group are certainly very able – often showing they can perform remarkable vocal acrobatics almost effortlessly – and there’s much harmonic density and invention in a lot of these compositions. What’s interesting to me is how the music feels like a very American take on European forms, derived from works already successfully deployed decades ago by Ligeti, Stockhausen, Schoenberg and Webern, and now “sweetened” by the addition of jazz-inflected modes, scat-singing, flattened fifths, and other devices from the American vernacular. The other aspect I find off-putting is the sentimentality of this record; it’s fuelled by a simplistic belief that we can rehabilitate all our problems by smothering them with love, that everything in the world can be put right by positive thinking, cheer in the community, and a group hug. (03/01/2023)