Music : Jenkins: The Armed Man - A Mass For Peace

Rating: - Armed Man Review
This piece is amazing! I recently went to a concert of it in London and was bowled over by it's awesome force and texture. It is VERY exciting, and would reccomend it to anyone - even if you do not like classical music.

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Rating: - Cliched, bland and repetitive
I had the misfortune to perform this recently - I played trumpet in the orchestra. I had heard bits of it on Classic FM but had never before heard the piece in its entirety. I was not impressed. The writing shows no imagination, and almost all the work is bland in the extreme.

We perfomed Orff's Carmina Burana in the second half, and it blew Jenkins' piece off the stage. In my view, Carmina Burana is an excellent example of a piece that, whilst popular and highly accessible, contains interesting sounds and effects and does not patronise the listener.

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Rating: - Karl, never mind the bedgrudgers
I didn't plan on writing a review for this but reading over the comments of the contemporary music intelligentsia such as Adam Durwacz(?) made me change my mind.

I cannot emphasis too much how widely these people are missing the point. They are following a dangerous trend for classical music by equating "listenability" with populism and laziness. I want to walk up to Adam and his cohorts and bang their heads repeatedly together, or perhaps force-feed them Schoenberg's Moses and Aaron, which would amount to the same thing. That is the direction in which they want to lead classical music.

Do they really think that when Bach or Mozart were writing fugal music that they did not want to convey something to their listeners as well as show off their brilliant musicological skills? Listen again to the high A on the oboe at the beginning of the second Brandenburg concerto as it breaks into a melody that is taken up by the strings and then broken out into counterpoint. Listen to Mozart's Fugue in C minor for Two Pianos, which loses nothing in emotional intensity by being a difficult work.

Conveying emotion must always, always, always come first. The greatest composers knew that more than anyone - their genius made them humble, not arrogant. That is what music is for. And it is hard to convey something emotionally authentic when you are constantly veering off key, wandering around twelve-tone scales. If Karl Jenkins wants to create powerful, memorable melodies, then fair play to him.

I have a bias here: I have sung parts of L'Homme Armee. The energy during the rehearsals and performance, the sheer emotional spark in the air, was unbelievable. This is a VERY powerful work if performed live, make no mistake. This is because it bypasses the irony and contextual awareness so beloved by Adam et al and goes straight to the heart. Yes, the sound is mostly monophonic but it is very rich and when the basses kick in on the Agnus Dei, for example, it really is one of those sublime musical moments when you feel that the united energy about the choir is about more than just the music. There is dramatic tension and release, which is crucial for a long work. It reminds me of Yeats worrying if a play he wrote sent out "certain men the English shot".

Speaking as someone who has played two musical instruments to Grade 6 level, scored close to full marks on a musical theory exam and who finished the counterpoint and harmony sections early on in the school certificate - so *might* have a claim to knowing something about the rudiments of musical harmony - I think l'Homme Armee rocks. So there.

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Rating: - The Harmed Man : Amassing the Pieces
Whilst nowhere near the complexity or composition quality of works like Britten's "War Requiem" nor earning the same level of respect, this is still a powerful anti-war message about the crippling effect of armed conflict on mankind expressed in music. Yes, some parts of it are frankly repetitive and a bit banal even (how many slow crotchet movements can one have?) but, whatever your opinion of Jenkins' writing in general, this is a very accessible work for singers of all ages and capabilities and that's where I think he's been very clever in his composition.

I've sung the whole work three times now and it is exciting to perform given the right resources - especially good percussion. One occasion was in partnership with a school and it proved to be a huge hit with both the boys in rehearsal and their parents at the concert. With 300 singers, the impact of the Charge movement was impressive as was the final chorale. The fact it continues to be performed live all over the country says it all.

Whether the original commissioning brief included taking texts from a wide variety of sources (not just the Christian Mass) or it was Jenkins' idea, it's the accumulation of these pieces that makes the whole composition work so well and delivers its message. You get a good live performance, the impact on the audience is marked.

Anyone planning a performance will no doubt buy this recording first. Not having any other recording against which to compare makes reviewing this one a little pointless unless you have actually performed the work. On the whole, this is a good recording with a strong performance from the National Youth Choir and LPO but I do find it lacking in conveying a lot of the percussive nature of some of the movements, from both the orchestra and choir. The choir also sounds a bit thin in delivery at times, especially the higher voices. Those movements using haunting and slow moving string sections are far better, especially where backing the solo singers. Guy Johnston's cello solo is beautiful and Tristan Hambleton's treble voice is just right for the Kyrie.

Is it a mishmash of unconnected music ideas? No, it's a mass of different ideas all with the same underlying message about the harm that man inflicts upon himself in war. Is it Britten? Heck, no, but that was never the objective and it's far more accessible than the War Requiem. Jenkins can be rather inconsistent in his compositions (I think his Requiem is very disappointing) but this one scores points as far as I'm concerned.

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Rating: - Not as good as live
Having performed with a choir, conducted by the composer himself, I found that the recording is a bit disappointing. I actually bought it two years after I performed it. I have good experience in performing the work and the privilege to be conducted by the composer, thinking the recording must be better. Well, I suspect that there has been a lot of improvements in terms of interpretation and expressions since it was first performed.

One of the features I think is the percussion, although it is there but not coming out nicely in the recording, so the effect of the warring match and manace are not highlighted in the recording.

Some of the movement seemed 'rushing', maybe in live, we have benefit of time, whereas there is a time limit in the recording.

However, this recording is in high quality and original. I really like despite the comparison to the live performance I had.