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Sacred Music

Box Set

Various Artists (Artist) Format: Audio CD
4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars (59)
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MP3 Download, 3 Nov 2009
£12.98
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Audio CD, 1 April 2002
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£13.99 £13.82
Audio CD, Box set, 19 July 2012
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— £51.00

Track Listings

1 Requiem Gregorienne
2 Christmas Oratorio, BWV248
3 Mass in F Major, BWV233
4 Missa Solemnis, Op. 123 III Credo
5 Mass
6 Stabat Mater
7 Ein Deutsches Requiem, Op. 45
8 Mass for Four Voices
9 Te Deum, H146
10 Lecons De Tenebres De Mercredi Saint
11 Trois Lecons De Tenebres
12 Missa Pange Lingua
13 Requiem, Op. 9
14 Requiem, Op. 48
15 Messiah
16 La Bataille
17 Missa Tous Les Regretz
18 Messe De Nostre Dame
19 Paulus, Op. 36
20 Vespro Della Beata Vergine
21 Requiem in D Minor, K 626
22 Missa Viri Galilaei
23 Stabat Mater
24 Mass in G Major
25 Motets
26 Vepres, Op. 37
27 Stabat Mater
28 Vespro Solenne
29 Cain, Overo Il Primo Omicidio
30 Concert in Form Einer Teutschen Begrabnis
31 Tunes for Archbishop Parker's Psalter
32 Stabat Mater, RV621

Product description

This limited edition box set features a vast array of critically acclaimed recordings of more than 70 cornerstone works, ranging from the earliest Christian chants to gospel songs and Gershwin's blues. The performers include some of today's finest artists, including Rene Jacobs, Philippe Herreweghe, Paul Hillier and William Christie. This box set is offered at the low price of 29 CDs (with an extra PDF of the texts) for the price of 5 in a luxury clamshell style box.

Product details

  • Is discontinued by manufacturer ‏ : ‎ No
  • Product Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 13.69 x 13.59 x 13.31 cm; 90.72 g
  • Manufacturer ‏ : ‎ EU Import
  • Label ‏ : ‎ EU Import
  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B002HNA9LS
  • Country of origin ‏ : ‎ United Kingdom
  • Number of discs ‏ : ‎ 1
  • Customer reviews:
    4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 59 ratings

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Top reviews from United Kingdom

  • music-to-my-ears
    5.0 out of 5 stars Contents and some reviews!
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 3 October 2009
    Verified Purchase
    Sacred Music - Harmonia Mundi - 30CD Box Set

    CD1 Early Christian Chant (5th -13th Century)
    Chant, chant, chant! You won't want to listen to this many times unless you are a chant specialist.
    CD2 Gregorian Chant
    Includes Messe de Requiem gregorienne, Cistercian Chant and Magnus liber organi More chant...
    CD3 Birth of Polyphony (1100-1300)
    Includes music from Notre-Dame School, hockets from the Bamberg Manuscript, etc., etc. Now it's getting more interesting!
    CD4 Polyphonic Motet from Ars Antiqua to the Renaissance
    Includes 14th Century English music (Hilliard Ensemble), Dufay, Dunstable, Plummer, and from the Renaissance Desprez, Janequin, Byrd, Gesualdo and Hassler
    CD5&6 Polyphonic Mass from Middle Ages to the Renaissance
    Machaut - Messe de Notre Dame, Desprez - Missa Pange Lingua, Janequin - Messe `La Bataille'
    Lassus - Missa `Tous les regretz', Palestrina - Missa `Viri Galilaei, Byrd - Mass for 4 Voices
    CD7 French `Petit Motet' and `Grand Motet'
    Dumont, Lully, Delalande and Charpentier Te Deum.
    CD8 Lamentations & Tenebrae
    Music by Massaino, Lassus, Charpentier, Couperin, and Krenek
    CD9/10 Monteverdi Vespro della beata Vergine - Herreweghe
    In my opinion not such a good recording as the one by Rene Jacobs, but nice to have to compare.
    Also Vespro Solenne by G Rovetta (1596-1668) from Cantus Colln and Konrad Junghanel. This is beautiful!
    CD11/12 Alessandro Scarlatti - Cain overo Il Primo Omicidio - Rene Jacobs
    A great recording of Scarlatti's oratorio of the story of Cain and Abel. Good orchestral playing, excellent soloists.
    CD13/14 Handel - Messiah - Les Arts Florissants, William Christie
    A very creditable Messiah. It certainly beats both my Huddersfield Choral Society and my Bernstein version, and comes pretty close to the more exciting Rene Jacobs version. The soloists here are good - Barbara Schlick, Sandrine Piau, Andreas Scholl (excellent), Mark Padmore and Nathan Berg.
    CD15/16 Mendelssohn - Paulus - Herreweghe
    This work was new to me, and on a single hearing is beautifully performed, if perhaps a little understated.
    CD17 Music for the Reformed Church
    Music by Sermisy, L'Estocart, Tallis, Purcell, Schutz, Bruhns and a Missa brevis in F by Bach.
    The Bruhns cantata made me want to investigate his music further.
    CD18&19 Bach - Christmas Oratorio - Rene Jacobs
    A simply stunning recording. Soloists are Dorothea Roschmann, Andreas Scholl, Werner Gura and Klaus Hager.
    CD20&21 Stabat Mater
    On these CDs we get Stabat Maters by Pergolesi (the well known Rene Jacobs/Sebastian Hennig performance), Boccherini (Agnes Mellon/Ensemble 415/Chiara Banchini), Vivaldi (Scholl/Ensemble 415/Chiara Banchini) and Rossini (RIAS Kammerchor/Creed). The Rossini work was new to me, and particularly appealed.
    CD22/23/24 Requiem
    On three CDs we get the Requiems by Mozart (Herreweghe), Brahms (Herreweghe), Faure (1893 version) (also Herreweghe), and Durufle (Magdalen College Oxford)
    CD25/26/27/28 19th & 20th Centuries
    Beethoven - Missa Solemnis (Herreweghe), Mendelssohn - various motets, Bruckner - motets
    Poulenc - 8 motets & Messe en Sol majeur, Bernstein - Mass - what a gloriously mixed up work - bass guitar meets marching band with a bit of West Side Story and Jesus Christ Superstar thrown in for good measure!
    CD29 Orthodox Church Music - 80mins
    Various pieces from the 17th & 18th century and Rachmaninov - All Night Vigil Op37 Vespers all superbly sung by the Estonian Chamber Choir.
    CD30 PDF file of all the texts

    The set is packed in a sturdy box, like previous Harmonia Mundi compilations, and comes with a booklet with 53 pages in English, (as well as French and German) giving historical background to the pieces.

    Clearly great value for money if you haven't already got a large number of these recordings, and if you are prepared to lose the satisfaction of having individual CDs to go on your shelf in alphabetical order. To make up for this, if you lay out all these CDs on the floor they combine to make a jigsaw of the 15th Century painting La Passion by Hans Memling! A fairly comprehensive selection of sacred music from the archives of Harmonia Mundi. Some may question their method of recycling their catalogue like this, but with results like this who can complain? Nearly 35 hours of music. A real bargain!
    167 people found this helpful
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  • Davey
    5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful...
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 19 February 2011
    Verified Purchase
    .... literally - it is full of wonders.

    There's so much here; I'm trying to listen "historically"; at the moment I've gone from the evolution of plainchant (from Jewish musical traditions?) to polyphony - but whatever floats your boat!

    Other reviewers more expert than me have described the details of this box set; all I'll add is...

    If you have any interest in choral or sacred music, buy it when it is available.

    (Oh, and thank you Harmonia Mundi)
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  • J. A. Ancliffe
    5.0 out of 5 stars Absolutely wonderful. What can I say
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 21 March 2016
    Verified Purchase
    Absolutely wonderful. What can I say, other than I was unsure of what I would receive. I was searching for a history of, but in turn found some real gemstones and classics that are hard to find on there own. This is a wonderful collection that is very much recommend.
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  • Robert Gardiner
    4.0 out of 5 stars wonderful value for money - but a few cornerstones missing!
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 31 October 2014
    Verified Purchase
    Any box of cds which purports to contain cornerstone works is setting itself up to be criticised as much for what it omits as for what it contains: there is no Verdi, no Berlioz, no Haydn, nothing at all from the Anglican choral tradition (except for 3 minutes of Purcell!) no Britten or Elgar, nothing at all since 1955 except for Bernstein's mass and even he himself would never have claimed his mass was a cornerstone of the choral tradition. Bach is well represented but not by his most mighty works: neither of the great passions nor the Mass in b minor is present.

    There are nevertheless 29 well filled cds of generally well sung and well recorded music. Other reviewers have commented on the bias in the set towards very old music: it begins with chant purporting to go back to Ambrose himself in the fifth century and doesn't even get to any named composer until well into the 4th disc. I would have valued a little tighter editing here to make room for some of the excellent choral music of our own time.

    I have to admit to not having listened to the whole collection yet, but already some discs are shining out as stars. Disc 7 of what was to me largely unfamiliar French music from the seventeenth century is magnificent. On this disc there is the well known Te Deum by Charpentier superbly performed by William Christie and les arts florissants, but there is also a dramatic dies irae by Lully and 2 interesting works by Delalande a composer I had never heard of.

    Christie's performance of the Messiah included here is arguably one of the best available, though I marginally prefer that by Butt and the Dunedin ensemble. There are, too, many fine performances by Herreweghe including Mendelssohn's Paulus (but surely not a cornerstone - not even an Elijah) and Faure's Requiem. I was less taken by his Brahms Requiem - it is nothing like as powerful as Klemperer's majestic performance in his box Klemperer in Concert. But it is beautifully sung with Gerald Finlay's baritone solos beautifully taken. And the orchestral detail is very well revealed (particularly the horns) by the well balanced recording.

    The other conductor who is well represented is Rene Jacobs who conducts among other things Bach's christmas oratorio. This has long been acknowledged a fine performance with the matchless Andreas Scholl singing the alto solos. Jacobs also conducts with distinction the rarely performed but intriguing Cain by Scarlatti that takes up 2 cds.

    Perhaps the best singing of all comes on the final disc in the set - of music from the orthodox tradition performed with complete authority and the richest bass I have ever heard on disc by the Estonian Philharmonic choir. This music deserved more than 1 cd. Indeed one more cd would have enabled them to include the whole of Rachmaninov's vespers. When this work finished early in a performance as wonderful as this
    I really felt bereaved.

    This box is currently selling for around £27 or less than £1 a disc (the 30th disc has the texts on it). Even at twice that price it would represent superb value. I suggest you buy it not so much for the cornerstones but for very interesting structures that surround them. There is a lot to explore here.
    10 people found this helpful
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  • footprint5@hotmail.com
    5.0 out of 5 stars A fantastic introduction and overview - a box of choral treasure...
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 15 January 2016
    Verified Purchase
    A fantastic introduction to sacred music and how it evolved from early ambrosial chants onwards. The accompanying booklet has handy facts to get one interested in searching for more info on the genre, the recordings are excellent quality.
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  • Southern Nomad
    3.0 out of 5 stars Good value but hoping for more inspiration
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 6 January 2010
    Verified Purchase
    Basics all spot on, fast and secure delivery. Internal packaging a bit dull and flimsy, although there is the bit of fun making the picture. Other reviewers have covered the detailed content so I will aim my comments at non-specialists tempted by the value offered. There is indeed a large and wide ranging selection of music in this clever box, making it good value at the price, especially if you are new to sacred and ancient music or are just wanting an overview. But I am finding the recording quality a bit 'flat', and taking a step back from my own technical interest, there is a lot of what will sound like similar material to the less keen on the first few disks, not just the first one.
    10 people found this helpful
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  • Paolo56
    5.0 out of 5 stars Raccolta con ottime esecuzioni
    Reviewed in Italy on 24 June 2017
    Verified Purchase
    Un cofanetto da non perdere per gli amanti della musica sacra, alcune esecuzioni sono veramente eccellenti, consigliato anche per l'ottima presentazione grafica.
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  • Alban
    5.0 out of 5 stars Un grand merci !
    Reviewed in France on 30 November 2017
    Verified Purchase
    29 CDs (le 30e contenant les textes en PDF) de cette qualité pour 41€ représente la plus belle affaire parmi mes achats. Parfait pour ceux qui cherchent de quoi améliorer leur culture musicale ou pour ceux qui veulent une formule bien complète en faisant une affaire formidable. Un grand merci à Harmonia Mundi et à ÍøÆغÚÁÏ qui détient l’offre la moins chère !
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  • FTS
    5.0 out of 5 stars Exquisite Music
    Reviewed in the United States on 29 July 2016
    Verified Purchase
    An absolutely exquisite set of music for those interested in hearing the development of Western music. I'll never have to look for another one. By the way, the booklet offers extensive commentary on each CD, perfect for the novice.
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  • Dr. Tim Parker
    5.0 out of 5 stars For scared music through the ages, this is a wonderful survey
    Reviewed in Canada on 7 March 2015
    Verified Purchase
    Let's start with the packaging, the one aspect of this HM box that was disappointing. When you open the (attractive) box lid, there's a big chunk of cardboard padding out the box, wasting about one third of the case. The cardboard easily collapses, meaning there's nothing keeping the rest of the CDs upright. Quite honestly, it just looked cheap and as though the manufacturer didn't care enough. They could have made a smaller box, or put something more sturdy in as a spacer (or, even better, added more CDs!). OK, there's another complaint too: all the CD envelopes (which are really cheap products themselves) are slit at the top, not the side as traditionally done. I guess this makes it easier for some fingers to whip out the CD while leaving the envelopes in place, but I like the whole process of removing a sleeve, extracting the CD and going from there. It looks kinda ugly to see all the CD tops poking out. Right, so two very minor (to most people) complaints. Now for the good, which is the actual music in the box.

    When I ordered this box I expected to have most of the CDs in my collection already, and in truth I have most of them in one way or another, but having these 30 CDs together in a reasonably priced box is a nice offering. And there's enough content here that I didn't have to make me feel this was a good buy, regardless of duplicates. The focus is obviously on sacred music over the centuries. The CDs are arranged in order from early to late, mostly, and cover a huge swath of music and style. It's almost suitable for a music survey across the years, starting with plainchant all the way through to large works. For early and renaissance music lovers, there's a considerable number of CDs devoted to these areas. Most collectors will have many of these pieces of music already. Yet most, like me, will find music here that I haven't encountered often (if at all).

    All this is accompanied by a lovely booklet that covers the music, the era, the performances in quite good detail and was actually interesting to read. On the whole, this is a nice box of music, and while I ws tempted to dropped a star for the presentation issues (picky, I know), the music itself is excellent. I just wish HM had spent the extra money on nice packaging! I would gladly have paid a couple of extra dollars for it!
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  • Angelika Meyer Haerri
    5.0 out of 5 stars Sacred Music
    Reviewed in Germany on 18 April 2013
    Verified Purchase
    Wunderbare hochinteressante Zusammenstellung in einer einzigen Box, weshalb ich sie Freunden weiterempfohlen und andern Liebhabern verschenkt habe.
    Mit reundlichen Grüssen
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