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DiscountDelight - Sacred Treasures III: Choral Masterworks from Russia
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List Price: $15.98
Our Price: $11.38
Your Save: $ 4.60 ( 29% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Hearts of Space
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Average Customer Rating: 
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Binding: Audio CD
EAN: 0025041111423
Label: Hearts of Space
Manufacturer: Hearts of Space
Number Of Discs: 1
Publisher: Hearts of Space
Release Date: 2000-02-22
Studio: Hearts of Space
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Inspired Beauty
Comment: Another elegant presentation in the Sacred Treasures series. In Sacred Treasures III, Ellen Holmes has artfully combined some of the best recordings of Russian choral music from the orthodox liturgy (many by Rachmaninov) with uniquely beautiful arrangements such as Gunnar Eriksson's arrangement of Bach's "Komm Susser Tod" and less familiar pieces like the wordless "Chorale" by Georgian composer Josif Kechakmadze, which I found to be engaging. The inspired beauty of this music reaches into the soul and instills a sense of peace, as only music can.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Wonderful
Comment: This is a very beautiful choral CD. Track 2, "Sourp, Sourp" which is from the Armenian Orthodox Divine Liturgy, is one of my favorite songs, and this is a stunning version of it.
If you like choral music or early music or even new age music, this is a great CD for you.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Classic Rachmaninoff Recording
Comment: This CD reminds me once again why Russian liturgical music is one of the treasures of the world: beautiful, profound, awe-inspiring, uplifting.
For the most part, the pieces are well chosen and the performances excellent. I am delighted to see that many of the tracks are from the classic recording of the Rachmaninoff Vespers made in the early 1970s by the USSR Ministry of Culture Chamber Choir directed by Valery Polyansky, and released in the USA by Angel-Melodiya. I wore out my copy of the LP years ago; although it has been reissued on CD, it's out of print and very hard to find. So it is wonderful to see a generous selection from that recording available on this disk.
Listen to track 11, "Praise the Lord O My Soul", sung by the chamber choir and mezzo Irina Arkhipova. You would have to have a heart of stone not to be moved as she sings "Slava Ghospidin" (Praise to the Lord). And listen to how the basses descend to B-flat at end. It just doesn't get any better than this.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Very beautiful but too much Rachmaninoff I'm familiar with
Comment: I'd like to remind potential buyers that about a third of the chants on this cd are from Rachmaninoff's Vespers and Divine Liturgy. If you already have those cds, maybe you should think twice before buying Sacred Treasures III, which is definitely inferior to Sacred Treasures I, although still very beautiful (especially the first and second tracks).
Customer Rating:
Summary: Wonderful
Comment: This is among my most favorite collections of music I have ever owned. I can't say enough good things about it, everything about it is simply beautiful. If you enjoy this type of music, this CD has a wonderful variety of sounds, melodies and moods.
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Editorial Reviews:
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What could be more sublime than a wall of dark, rotund Russian voices shimmering against the rising, ornate walls of a great cathedral? Not much, and this compilation of absolutely magnificent music proves it. The label Hearts of Space returns on this third choral collection to the ominous Slavic chant of their first choral album, Sacred Treasures I, which gathered together recordings of stunning Bulgarian and Russian choirs portraying the sacred works of Rachmaninov, Tchaikovsky, and other composers. Whereas Treasures I pulled from varied sections of sacred liturgies, including solo passages, Treasures III most often stays in harmonic chant with select voices occasionally rising and rolling in polyphonic heavenly calls. The collective voice draws the emotive tension taut here, as on Rimsky-Korsakov's "Our Father," which uses the absence of darkness to later juxtapose bold, rising drama. The Kiev chant "Blessed Art Thou O Lord" sends chills down the spine as the whispering consonants of the Russian language skip across the ancient repetition like sand skitters over a stormy beach. This is a collection as breathtakingly beautiful as the Cathedral of the Dormition itself. Not to be missed. --Karen K. Hugg
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