Suzi Digby and her choir ORA believe that “we are in a second golden age of choral music”. Their new CD repeats the pattern of their first. Music spawns music. The works of great English masters, first Byrd now Tallis, are interwoven with specially commissioned contemporary works inspired by them.
ORA’s singing of Tallis is almost the opposite of what you might call English Cathedral chaste. The approach is assertive, the relish of moments of dissonance unmistakable.
The new works — by Steven Stucky, Frank Ferko, Richard Allain, Ken Burton, Harry Escott, Alec Roth, Kerry Andrew and Bob Chilcott — pursue their goals with the commitment of food-industry researchers, seeking out the musical equivalents of addictive sensory mouth feel and bliss points.
