The fortieth anniversary of the Marlboro Festival proceeds with the second installment of CD reissues, notably these wind-music recordings which have previously been available only by mail order... The Barber-Nielsen-Hindemith CD is conflated from two more MRS LP/cassette issues: Barber and Hindemith from MR/MRSC-15, Nielsen from MR/MRSC-5, respectively issued in 1983 and 1981, although the Nielsen was recorded as long ago as 1971. Samuel Barber's Summer Music, in this conscientious account, will make its whole effect upon those previous to this composer's music. The Nielsen quintet has its classicism emphasized by a quickish-tempo'd tightly phrased performance, polished and exciting, full as it should be of well-aimed instrumental characterization. Paul Hindemith's 1957-58 octet quite simply gets the best performance in its regrettably exiguous discographic history, muscular and finely focused. No wind music fancier should be without this CD.

-- John Wiser, FANFARE [1/1991]

Richard Marlow's Trinity College Choir of Cambridge has established itself as one of the premier groups of its kind, recording prolifically for Conifer and staking out a swath of repertorial turf that encompasses devotional music from the sixteenth century to the middle of the twentieth. Unlike their better-known counterparts at King's College, the Trinity choristers are an all adult ensemble, using women instead of boy trebles and achieving a more professional sound as a result.
CHORAL MOODS is a well-filled two-disk compilation which offers an excellent survey of sacred choral music, though one might have hoped for a little more J. S. Bach. What is here, above all, is beautiful music, well sung and recorded. There are some substantial pieces, such as the Gregorio Allegri "Miserere," Felix Mendelssohn's anthem "Hear My Prayer" and the complete "Messe Basse" (Low Mass) of Gabriel Fauré, as well as some less frequently encountered works such as Henry Balfour Gardiner's "Evening Hymn" and Camille Saint-Saëns "O Salutaris Hostia." It adds up to make a highly commendable anthology.