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Pu<\/span>rcell\u2019s Funeral Music for Queen Mary, like Albinoni\u2019s Adagio<\/i> and Allegri\u2019s Miserere<\/i><\/a>, belongs to the category of old compositions shaped by modern hands. The scholar Bruce Wood suggests that the piece as generally performed, a compilation of early and late Purcell, is \u2018thoroughly bogus\u2019<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n . His verdict will sound harsh to those moved by its mix of music for solemn brass and choral settings of the Funeral Sentences from the Book of Common Prayer. Yet Wood, after considering opaque reports of Queen Mary\u2019s state funeral at Westminster Abbey on 5 March 1695 and flimsy evidence for the music performed during it, attaches a long list of questions to the work. We know that the March and Canzona were heard by mourners at the funeral, for which Purcell wrote his second setting of Thou knowest, Lord<\/i>. The rest of the resplendent service\u2019s musical contents remains open to debate.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p><\/div> <\/section> (2012)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Ricercar RIC332<\/i><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n WORK ON THE CHURCH of Saint-Jean Baptiste in Belgium began six years after Queen Mary\u2019s burial. The building\u2019s sacred space \u2013 more intimate than Westminster Abbey \u2013 and the clear yet warm sound caught within its acoustics contribute to the intense atmosphere of Lionel Meunier\u2019s recording of the Queen\u2019s funeral music. Meunier creates a convincing survey of works performed on the occasion, embracing Wood\u2019s research and placing Purcell\u2019s funeral music for Queen Mary within the context of pieces associated with earlier English royal funerals. Vox Luminis follow their conductor\u2019s unsentimental lead, sparing in their use of vibrato and eternally wedded to immaculate intonation and articulation. Their unmannered singing allows the harmonic tensions and surface colours of Purcell\u2019s second setting of Thou knowest, Lord<\/i> to emerge naturally; the addition of four \u2018flatt\u2019 or slide trumpets magnifies the anthem\u2019s expressive power. Farewell Marches by James Paisible and Thomas Tollett are used to evoke the procession of \u2018the Queen\u2019s chariot\u2019, a purpose-built hearse, from Whitehall to the Abbey, with Purcell\u2019s March serving as bridge to the funeral service proper. Meunier and his musicians travel far beyond the bounds of studio recording to forge a strong impression of the ritual surrounding a royal burial.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The King\u2019s Consort\/ Robert King (1993)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Hyperion CDA 66677<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n Boy trebles, a quartet of slide trumpets, a crack team of adult male voices and shrewdly judged speeds add to the appeal of Robert King\u2019s recording, part of his set of Purcell\u2019s complete sacred music for Hyperion. King brackets the composer\u2019s three early Funeral Sentences together with his final setting of Thou knowest, Lord<\/i>, framing the four choral pieces with the March and Canzona and two long drum marches. He opens Man that is born of woman<\/i> with a solo quartet, a strategy repaid by fine singing and a degree of textural transparency suited to words about life\u2019s brief span and mankind\u2019s misery. Best of all is the revised version of Purcell\u2019s first setting of Thou knowest<\/i>, sung with great tenderness and graced by exquisite recorded sound.<\/span><\/p>\n New London Consort\/ Martin Neary (1995)<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Sony Classical SK66243<\/i><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Martin Neary and Westminster Abbey Choir, aided and abetted by the New London Consort, marked the tercentenary of Purcell\u2019s death with this recording, a majestic album of the composer\u2019s music for Queen Mary in life and in death. The Funeral Music opens here with Wood\u2019s transcription of the \u2018Old English March\u2019 in procession through Westminster Abbey\u2019s reverberant interior, then in company with the windband marches of Tollet and Paisible and Purcell\u2019s Funeral March. For sense of place, history, and grandeur, nothing beats Neary\u2019s recording. His choir are on peak form in Morley\u2019s Funeral Sentences but hindered by indistinct recorded sound. The Canzona\u2019s deliberate tread, articulated with the care of cat burglars negotiating trip wires, loses its initial appeal with repeated listening.<\/span><\/p>\nThe best recordings of Purcell\u2019s Funeral Music for Queen Mary<\/em><\/h2>\n
Vox Luminis\/<\/span>Lionel Meunier<\/span><\/strong><\/h3>\n
C<\/span>hoir of the King\u2019s Consort; Choir of New College, Oxford<\/span><\/strong><\/h3>\n
Westminster Abbey Choir<\/span><\/h3>\n