Storyville Records presents Between Then and Now, a new trio album by acclaimed American pianist Christian Sands, joined by Danish bassist Thomas Fonnesbaek and Swedish drummer Rasmus Kihlberg. An international collaboration that captures contemporary jazz at the intersection of American tradition and Nordic musical sensibility. The album features 7 tracks, balancing original compositions by Sands and Fonnesbaek with inspired reinterpretations of jazz standards and classic repertoire by Bobby Timmons, Luiz Bonfa, and John Coltrane. Recorded in the spirit of Copenhagen's jazz tradition it presents jazz as both a living art form of the present and a dialogue with it's past, hence the title Between Then and Now. The collaboration grew from Sands' relationship with the Copenhagen jazz scene, initiated when former Montmartre musical director Christian Brorsen discovered him online and invited him to Denmark. Like earlier generations of American jazz musicians, including Ben Webster and Dexter Gordon, Sands quickly became a compelling presence in Copenhagen, where attentive listening and subtle interplay guide every performance. Over the years, he has been a frequent guest in Denmark and loved by the audience here. Together, the trio represents a truly international jazz language. Sands is celebrated for his virtuosic piano playing, rich harmonic imagination, and improvisational energy. Fonnesbaek, one of Europe's leading bassists, offers melodic clarity and technical brilliance shaped by the Danish jazz tradition, while Kihlberg contributes a refined rhythmic approach marked by elegance, precision and responsiveness. Together they have a compelling sound of openness yet you always feel the classic American jazz tradition in the music. This is modern American/ Scandinavian music, not just jazz. Listen to Sands' inventive arrangement of Giant Leaves, which merges John Coltrane's Giant Steps with Joseph Kosma's Autumn Leaves, served as a tribute to legendary Danish drummer Alex Riel, who influenced both Sands and generations of jazz musicians in Europe. Original compositions such as Sands' Where Children Still Play and Where the Light Settles, and Fonnesbaek's Searching in Sahara reveal the trio's lyrical and exploratory approach. The Nordic hymn Til ungdommen / To the Youth (Kringsatt av Fiender) is another beautiful example of how this trio sound together. Enjoy this contemporary recording with three of the most interesting musicians on the Scandinavian and American jazz scene right now.

Not yet 30, Christian Sands is currently one of the most in-demand pianists working in jazz. In the last few years he has toured around the world as a bandleader and recently appeared as a sideman on records by Christian McBride and Gregory Porter. After the one-two punch of Reach and Reach Further - EP, Sands' dynamic 2017 Mack Avenue debut and his live/unreleased studio tracks EP follow-up released earlier this year, Facing Dragons is Sands' return to the recording studio with an indestructible band and an unwavering allegiance to the groove.

The Missa Cellensis was Haydn' first Mass setting for his new employers at EszterhAza. In common with his Stabat Mater, Haydn draws upon the wealth of musical styles and traditions associated with the Viennese Mass. Scored for strings, oboes, bassoon.

Challenges even the best - a bargain alternative to Trevor Pinnock.

Naxos already had a decent recording of the ‘Nelson’ Mass (8.554416, with the ‘Little Organ’ Mass, Hob.XXII/7) on which soloists, the Hungarian Radio Chorus and the Nikolaus Esterházy Sinfonia were conducted by Béla Drahos. The new recording, Volume 3 of the Naxos series of the Haydn Masses, is also available in an 8-CD.

The Nikolaimesse, recorded in 2002, gets the new recording off to a very good start. The music is lighter, less vintage Haydn than its more familiar companion, with mainly brisk tempi much in the manner of the short early Masses which Mozart composed for his Salzburg patron Archbishop Coloredo. It also receives a fine performance and recording. The soloists don’t merit a listing on the rear insert, but they are named inside the booklet, as they deserve to be. If I select Ann Hoyt, the soprano, for special praise, that should not be at the expense of the others.

To be honest, I had not expected much from this CD - I hadn’t heard of any of the performers and I’d forgotten the warm reception which the complete box had received - but the performance of the Nikolaimesse alone makes it worth the modest price. All concerned convince me that this early work is at least the equal of any of Mozart’s Masses, with the exception of the Coronation (K317) the ‘Great’ Mass (K427)and, of course, the Requiem (K626).

The ‘Nelson’ Mass is, I think, at least the equal of the three best Mozart Masses. I shall continue to give it that name as a kind of shorthand, though it has very little to do with Lord Nelson: Haydn nicknames have a habit of sticking even when they are inappropriate - there is at least enough evidence to doubt that it was at a performance of Symphony No.96 that the heavy chandelier narrowly missed causing serious injury, yet the name ‘Miracle’ continues to be attached to that work. Haydn himself called it Missa in angustiis, Mass in straitened times, but it’s easier and shorter to continue to call it the ‘Nelson’.

The opening Kyrie announces that this is a more serious work than the Nikolaimesse. As Jennifer More Glagov notes in the excellent booklet, the lack of wind players - the Prince had just dismissed them as an economy measure - apart from three (specially hired?) trumpets gives the work an undeniably martial tone.

The performers again give an excellent account of themselves. Only Ann Hoyt remains from the earlier line-up and continues to sing impressively - my wife came in as I was listening and was very surprised to discover that this was the voice of a singer whom neither she nor I had heard before. Naxos and others please note, we want to hear more of her. The other soloists and the choir also step up to the plate and the recording, though thicker than for the earlier work, recorded five years earlier, is more than adequate. The last semi-professional performance of the ‘Nelson’ that I heard was spoiled by a soprano who out-sang everyone else, but that is certainly not the case here. I understand that all the soloists are members of the Trinity Choir, which must make it a formidable place for the musically inclined to worship.

John Sheppard (hereafter JS) complained of Burdick’s habit of slowing at certain points, but some of these are traditional. In the Creed, for example, the slowing at the end of track 16 on the words descendit de cælis prepares for the more marked traditional emphasis on et incarnatus est in the next section, where it used to be expected that all would kneel or bow deeply. In any case, JS soon began to be as untroubled by this practice as I was.

William Hedley (hereafter WH) commented on the reverberant acoustic of the Trinity Church but I really was not troubled by this - different audio systems react differently to reverberant recordings. Nor was I really troubled by the other detailed criticisms which he makes. Rather than repeat these here, I refer you to his review. Whilst I admit the validity of just about all of them, I cannot consider them a serious handicap to an overall recommendation.

WH is more than a little hard on the diction - the syllables are frequently chopped up in the wrong places, but the demise of Latin in the school curriculum makes it almost inevitable that a choir’s familiarity with that language can no more be taken for granted than a knowledge of Japanese. (Actually, the latter is a more frequent visitor to the modern UK secondary curriculum). Haydn would have expected to hear the harder Austro-Germanic pronunciation of Latin, with hard ‘g’ in virginis, and ‘c’ in crucifixus, for example; I’m pleased to report that all concerned here take the softer Italianate course.

JS raises the possibility that the set as a whole is superior even to Hickox (Chandos CHAN0599, also available separately) or Guest (Argo/Decca). I’m not quite sure that I would go that far, but I was impressed enough by the single CD under consideration to wish to sample more of the set via the Naxos Music Library.

I’ve already praised the quality of the Naxos notes. One small complaint concerns the absence of texts, but the Tridentine Latin Mass is pretty well known and the texts and translations are available online, as indicated above: they can be yours even without buying the CD.

Overall, I think that WH is right to prefer John Eliot Gardiner (Philips 470 2862, with the Theresienmesse) and Trevor Pinnock (DG Archiv 423 0972, with the Te Deum). I recommended the Pinnock version of the ‘Nelson’ Mass as Download of the Month in my May 2009 Download Roundup) and thoroughly agree with WH that it offers a life-enhancing experience, but I can’t imagine purchasers of the present CD being disappointed with J Owen Burdick’s performances. Having heard the recording right through once, I couldn’t wait to hear it all again, instead of taking the usual time out to gather my impressions. Go for Pinnock for the best - even at full price and rather short value - but the new Naxos makes a very fine and less expensive alternative.

-- Brian Wilson, MusicWeb International

On June 19, Storyville Records releases Between Then and Now, a new trio album by acclaimed American pianist Christian Sands, joined by Danish bassist Thomas Fonnesbæk and Swedish drummer Rasmus Kihlberg. An international collaboration that captures contemporary jazz at the intersection of American tradition and Nordic musical sensibility. The album features nine tracks, balancing original compositions by Sands and Fonnesbæk with inspired reinterpretations of jazz standards and classic repertoire by Bobby Timmons, Richard Rodgers, Luiz Bonfá, and John Coltrane. Recorded in the spirit of Copenhagen's jazz tradition, it presents jazz as both a living art form of the present and a dialogue with it's past-hence the title Between Then and Now. The collaboration grew from Sands' relationship with the Copenhagen jazz scene, initiated when former Montmartre musical director Christian Brorsen discovered him online and invited him to Denmark. Like earlier generations of American jazz musicians, including Ben Webster and Dexter Gordon, Sands quickly became a compelling presence in Copenhagen, where attentive listening and subtle interplay guide every performance. Over the years he has been a frequent guest in Denmark and loved by the audience there. Together, the trio represents a truly international jazz language. Sands is celebrated for his virtuosic piano playing, rich harmonic imagination, and improvisational energy. Fonnesbæk, one of Europe's leading bassists, offers melodic clarity and technical brilliance shaped by the Danish jazz tradition, while Kihlberg contributes a refined rhythmic approach marked by elegance, precision, and responsiveness. Together they create a compelling sound of openness, yet you always feel the classic American jazz tradition in the music. This is modern American/Scandinavian music, not just jazz. Listen to Sands' inventive arrangement of "Giant Leaves," which merges John Coltrane's "Giant Steps" with Joseph Kosma's "Autumn Leaves," served as a tribute to legendary Danish drummer Alex Riel, who influenced both Sands and generations of jazz musicians in Europe. Original compositions such as Sands' "Where Children Still Play" and "Where the Light Settles," and Fonnesbæk's "Searching in Sahara" reveal the trio's lyrical and exploratory approach. The Nordic hymn "Til ungdommen (To the Youth / Kringsatt av Fiender)" is another beautiful example of how this trio sounds together. Enjoy this contemporary recording with three of the most interesting musicians on the Scandinavian and American jazz scenes right now.

I’m not sure you could do better than this.

Naxos has collated its Haydn Masses series into a single box [8.508009] so if you fancy having the full works in a single handy collection these performances, conducted by J. Owen Burdick and Jane Glover, may fit your bill, and price bracket. Single discs are still available, and this one is no exception; a 2003 recording of the once-neglected 1767 Stabat Mater.

The forces are familiar ones, given their prominence in the Naxos series. The direction and execution are able, the singing generally good, phrasing attractive. An affirmative spirit courses through the performance and it mitigates the sometimes funereal performances that we used to hear. The orchestral forces, the Rebel Baroque Orchestra, employ period instruments and practice, which gives a not unwelcome astringency to some - but by no means all - of the playing. The balance between solo voices, orchestral solos and the choir is a just one.

There is, in fact, little with which to cross swords in a performance as attractive as this. Comparing older, conventional performances with one such as this is not comparing like-with-like, but if one were to do so, one should point out that the famous old Laszlo Heltay recording, with a stellar vocal line up of Augér, Hodgson, Rolfe-Johnson and Howell, is invariably a minute slower in all the more extensive movements, which adds considerably to the total timing, and also the sense of incipient gravity and contemplation generated by such tempos.

Here we find articulation is bright and tight. Stephen Sands has a quite light tenor, but it’s mobile and relatively flexible. He starts the work, soloistically, with the Stabat mater dolorosa and when he follows bass Richard Lippold in the Virgo virginum praeclara - and before the other two voices enter - he blends well with his colleagues. Luthien Brackett has an attractive, well focused alto, and Ann Hoyt sports a bright, youthful soprano. She makes a fine showing in Quis non posset contristari where spruce winds and a well balanced organ are strongly to the fore. Understandably perhaps she snatches at breaths a touch in the Sancta Mater, istud agas. Lippold is a pleasantly sonorous bass, doing well by Pro peccatis suae gentis. The chorus, which is the Trinity Choir, come into its own in the concluding Paradisi Gloria where the bases don’t over-part the tenors - and indeed all sections sing well.

The acoustic works in favour of the performance, though there is some ambient noise floating about, audible at higher levels. I didn’t find it especially distracting. So if you fancy an original instrument performance with good soloists, band and choir and a brisk, attractive tempo, and all at a bargain price bracket, I’m not sure you could do better than this.

-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International