Howells: Requiem; St Paul's & Gloucester Services etc.

Featuring

Stephen Layton
Simon Bland
Jeremy Cole
The Choir of Trinity College Cambridge
Herbert Howells

Did you know?

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Composition History

The Gloucester Service, one of Howells' many settings of evensong canticles, was written in 1946 as his mother lay dying in his hometown.

Composer Biography

Herbert Howells' father's bankruptcy and the family's subsequent loss of prestige and social standing was a formative experience that led to lifelong anxiety about money.

Cultural Impact

The tune for the hymn "All my hope on God is founded" is named 'Michael' in memory of Howells' son, though the hymn was composed before Michael's death.

Composition History

Howells' Salve regina was partly inspired by his student exposure to 15th and 16th-century church music, encouraged by his composition teacher Stanford.

Composer Biography

Howells lost friends and contemporaries in World War I, and was himself exempted from military service due to Graves' Disease, which also forced him to give up his first salaried position.

Composition History

Howells' Requiem for unaccompanied voices was composed in 1932, three years before his son Michael's death, and was modeled on a work by his teacher Walford Davies.

Composer Biography

The death of Howells' nine-year-old son Michael from polio in 1935 was the most traumatic experience of his life, profoundly affecting all his subsequent compositions.