Duruflé • Martin Duruflé: Requiem; Martin: Mass for Double Choir Juliette Mey (mezzo-soprano), Alain Buet (baritone), Jérôme Cuvillier (cello); La Maîtrise de Toulouse; Conservatoire de Toulouse/Mark Opstad; William Fielding (organ) Regent REGCD 557 67:08 mins
Founded within the Toulouse Conservatoire in 2006, La Maîtrise de Toulouse is a choir of children and young adults, who offer fresh voices and sing Latin texts with French vowels – as is entirely appropriate, of course, for this repertoire. The child singers, unlike those of English cathedral choirs, take both the treble and alto lines, which again is appropriate for both the works programmed here, particularly the Martin in which those upper two voices are often musically closely related.
Under their founder-director, Mark Opstad, the choristers give a fleet performance of Martin’s Mass for Double Choir, the trebles relishing their moments of coloratura figuration for the ‘cum sancto spirito’ of the Gloria, or their joyous proclamation of the Resurrection in the Credo. Yet the choir’s performance doesn’t quite sweep the board. Listeners may miss a certain gravitas, more readily found in Westminster Cathedral Choir’s acclaimed recording under James O’Donnell (Hyperion), who also offers a slight but significant improvement in vocal clarity and precision in tuning.
The emotionally less complex Duruflé Requiem is perhaps an even better fit for La Maîtrise, albeit they sing the oft-recorded reduced version with organ accompaniment (the composer himself preferred the original full orchestral version) plus cello solo for the Pie Jesu. The mezzo soloist is a remarkably fine match for the choir, and the baritone almost as good, though forgivably he shows some strain at the high tessitura of his solo in ‘Domine, Jesu Christe’.
Daniel Jaffé
