I really like this piece, but the only recordings I can find of it are just a wee tad too “bright”. The scores I have seen call for no more than 70bpm (2/2 time sig), and most take the piece at ~80bpm–or even faster. *meh* Personally, I’d prefer it a very wee bit slower than the tempo marking on the score. Just a very wee tad. *sigh* Oh, well, it’s still a nice piece.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOIhzqutZuQ
You can’t beat a bit of Rutter, formulaic though it may be. I think I agree with you but I think JR was involved with the recording as it is the Cambridge Singers. (Says so at the start)
Yeh, but it’s still faster than he specifies in his score, and that, IMO, is just a “scooch” too fast for the flow of the piece. “Formulaic” works just fine for what this piece was (apparently) intended to do, of course. Heck, the standard carols we’ll all enjoy this time of year mostly DEFINE “formulaic”. *heh*
As to tempos, I can recall a discussion between one of my fav conductors and a songwriter I have enjoyed (I happened to be sitting in the rehearsal orchestra) about tempo on a piece the conductor felt needed a bit more room to “breathe” (as music–not a performers’ breath control issue). *shrugs* All of us, the songwriter included, liked it better at the conductor’s tempo.
Sometimes, what we hear in our heads when we write/arrange just isn’t what a piece really needs when it’s performed. I very much liked hearing a group from St Luke’s Lutheran in NYC perform my lil gag coffee piece as I had changed it (to include the parallelism you once commented on); some other folks modified it to be more normal (the mp3 posted at the piece–more “normal” *heh*). While I had originally written it “according to Bach”. . . suggestions from others swayed me to change it. For the gag piece that it is, I’m glad they did.
I should hope someone, somewhere makes a tempo suggestion to Rutter about this piece before he puts his stamp on another performance.
Just for me. because I’m just THAT important, of course! *ROFL*