Teach Me Thy Statutes

GRAMMY NOMINATION - Best Choral Performance (2019)

“Intensely beautiful singing and sound; quite simply, choral albums don’t come much better than this.” —Dan Morgan, MusicWeb Internationa

In June of 2016, an extraordinary Orthodox men’s choir was assembled by PaTRAM (the Patriarch Tikhon Russian-American Music Institute) in the Russian city of Saratov, comprised of 40 professional church singers from Moscow, Saratov, and North America, under the fine leadership of Moscow Choirmaster Vladimir Gorbik, already well-known to our customers. With the blessing His Eminence Longin, Metropolitan of Saratov, and thanks to his gracious hosting, this choir proceeded to spend a week recording an album of seldom heard works by Pavel Chesnokov, one of the most preeminent and prolific Russian Orthodox composers of the early 20th century. The result of this labor is a magnificent SuperAudio CD featuring male chorus singing of a caliber and quality seldom heard anywhere in the world. While exemplifying extraordinary levels of technical excellence—tuning, ensemble, and a vast range of subtle nuances—the singing goes far beyond these externals, using these musical devices to focus the listener’s attention upon the liturgical texts and the profound spiritual depth of their sacred content. In this regard, the CD serves as a model both for Orthodox church choirs—demonstrating how to avoid superficiality and routineness in the singing of Divine Services, and for other choirs who would undertake to perform this repertoire on a concert stage—how to circumvent the outward emotionalism and drama characteristic of a purely Romantic approach. In short, this is a high model of genuine sacred musical art, which uplifts and sanctifies this world. The time you spend listening to this beauty will certainly enrich, uplift, and inspire you. —V. M.