This new album by the award-winning Latvian Radio Choir conducted by Sigvards Kļava – recently hailed by the New York Times as ‘astonishing’, ‘superlative’ by the BBC Music Magazine, and ‘perhaps the finest chorus singing today’ by NPR – is focused on the sacred choral works by one of the greatest composers of the Romantic era, Felix Mendelssohn (1809–1847).

Although the young Felix Mendelssohn was not brought up in any faith until the age of seven, when he was baptised into the Reform Christian Church in Berlin, Christian traditions were featured large in his creative make-up. Writing sacred choral works was, after all, a very natural choice to Mendelssohn, the man who did so much to champion the works of Johann Sebastian Bach and who had also re-discovered his St Matthew Passion. Already in 1821 – when he was aged just 12 – he embarked on a series of Psalm settings, and the composer’s choral writing would soon outstrip these early, immature efforts on the largest scale with St Paul (1836), Elijah (1846), and Die erste Walpurgisnacht (1831–43). Particularly in the final decade of his life Mendelssohn returned to writing unaccompanied choral works, and it is from the 1840s that most of the works featured in this collection were composed, when the composer was already ailing with what would prove his final, fatal illness. The biggest works in the album are the Sechs Sprüche (1843–46), with each anthem themed to a specific feast day of the year, and the Three Psalms (1843–45). This recording of the Psalms also includes the world-première recording of Ehre sei dem Vater published by Carus Verlag in 1997.

The Latvian Radio Choir (LRC) ranks among the top professional chamber choirs in Europe and its refined taste for musical material, fineness of expression and vocal of unbelievably immense compass have charted it as a noted brand on the world map. The repertoire of LRC ranges from the Renaissance music to the most sophisticated scores by modern composers; and it could be described as a sound laboratory – the singers explore their skills by turning to the mysteries of traditional singing, as well as to the art of quartertone and overtone singing and other sound production techniques. The choir has established a new understanding of the possibilities of a human voice; one could also say that the choir is the creator of a new choral paradigm: every singer is a distinct individual with his or her own vocal signature and roles in performances. The choir’s album of John Cage choral works won a Gramophone award in 2023.

Sigvards Kļava is one of the most outstanding Latvian conductors, also a professor of conducting and producer, music director of the Latvian Radio Choir since 1992. As a result of Sigvards Kļava’s steady efforts, the Latvian Radio Choir has become an internationally recognised, vocally distinctive collective, where each singer possesses a creative individuality. Under Sigvards’ guidance, the choir has recorded a number of choral works by little known or completely forgotten composers of the past, as well as formed a friendly collaboration with a number of notable Latvian composers. Sigvards Kļava is a professor at the Jazeps Vitols Latvian Academy of Music. Kļava is a multiple winner of the Latvian Great Music Award.