The Fredösphere

I bought this CD "...Against the Dying of the Light" at Borders downtown last Sunday on impulse.  I didn't know the group but I liked the selection of pieces.

Cantus (whoa, is that a Frank Gehry background in their group photo?) started as a student group at St. Olaf in 1995 and took of from there.  There is no conductor listed anywhere, although the staff includes an executive director (tenor Michael Hanawalt) and an "artistic coordinator" (bass Erick Lichte).  Lots of chamber groups in the instrumental world do without conductors, but for a vocal group, or any group this big (ten performers) it seems an odd choice not to have a dictator running the show artistically.  (I infer the "coordiator" in Mr. Lichte's title indicates reduced authority.)

They sing with a full vibrato which is somewhat out of style in many places but continues to be the norm (I believe) in the Lutheran choral strongholds of the upper midwest.  So no one would mistake them for Chanticleer.  By using vibrato consistently, they give up the kind of creepily precise tuning that Chanticleer achieves.  (I mean creepy in a good way!)  I've heard the dynamic dodectet can even dial in tunings for different styles of music -- pure intervals for Renaissance music, equal temperment in some other cases.

Veljo Tormis is here making another appearance in my CD collection, and they chose two works by Sibelius, who is not the most interesting choral composer.  Randall Thompson's "Alleluia" makes an appearance at a brisk pace.  I've never heard it arranged for male choir; it works well.  Invocation by Debussy comes near the end and marks the only time a piano is heard.