Norman Lebrecht's CD of the Week - 3 February

Roman Maciejewski: Requiem (PN Muza) ****

Started in a Swedish hospital bed in January 1945, this Mass for the Dead amounts to one Pole’s attempt to make sense of the century’s savageries. Both text and music are rooted in strict Roman Catholic usage. The tonality is traditional and free of the usual agendas, modernist and nationalist.

Fourteen years in the making, the work is closer in spirit to Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem than to any East European counterpart. Its dedication is ‘to the victims of human ignorance’, a universal community, politically non-aligned. Premiered at the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, Maciejewski’s masterpiece was wildly acclaimed but there have been few performances since – the CD booklet lists only six.

An exile for most of his life, Maciejewski (1910-1998) married a Swedish dancer at Dartington on a 1938 English tour and spent the war years in her country. He worked with Ingmar Bergman before an invitation from the pianist Arthur Rubinstein took him to Hollywood, where he refused to oblige his sponsor with a new concerto and turned down a job as head of music at MGM. For the next 26 years, Maciejewski played organ in two California churches. He was not the kind of composer who pushes himself to the forefront.

This debut recording of his Requiem is taken from an epic Warsaw performance at the end of communism in April 1989, Tadeusz Strugala conducting a tightly structured account with outstanding soloists – Zdzislawa Donat, Jadwiga Rappé, Jerzy Knetig and Januszk Niziolek. The work receives its UK premiere this week at Westminster Abbey, followed by a BBC relay. Once the ear adjusts to its Catholic and aesthetic conservatism, a compelling humanity surges through.

And three for the weekend

Wedding Cake (Onyx) ****

The finest Debussy player of today duets with his new bride in Wedding Cake by Saint-Saens, before working through Fauré’s Dolly suite and Ravel’s La Valse to an exquisite rendition of Debussy’s Petite Suite. Wedding pictures of Pascal and Ami Rogé decorate the booklet and the recital includes a newly composed tribute to the bride by the California composer Paul Chihara. It’s all rather touching, a perfect Valentine’s gift.

From the Heart (Signum) **

If what your life is missing is an a capella version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah, this Kings Singers release might give cause for excitement. Trouble is, the arrangement cannot find its tonal centre and there is an excess of overdubbing. More effective are John Brunning’s Pie Jeus and the bluegrass adaptation, Out of the Woods.