Chandos Records released a new recording on Friday 12 January 2024 celebrating the works of the siblings Felix Mendelssohn and Fanny Hensel (née Mendelssohn).

David Temple conducted Crouch End Festival Chorus and London Mozart Players with a formidable group of soloists on this album, recorded in Hampstead in November 2022.

Fanny’s cantata Hiob, based on the Book of Job, is the second of three cantatas composed between February and November 1831, although it remained unpublished until 1992. Later in her short career, encouraged by her brother and her friend Robert von Keudell, Fanny did begin to publish her works. The Gartenlieder, Op. 3 for unaccompanied choir were composed in 1846, and inspired by the gardens and summerhouse at the family’s Leipzigerstraße residence, in Berlin, where she held her choir rehearsals.

Mendelssohn’s Die erste Walpurgisnacht is a secular cantata, a setting of the poem by Goethe, originally performed in 1831. Mendelssohn revised the work extensively in 1843, and it is this later version that is performed here. His Christmas cantata Vom Himmel hoch, based on a Lutheran chorale, was completed in 1831.

The album is be available on all good streaming sites, and to purchase from Chandos Records.

"This new recording is surely the new benchmark."

Malcolm Riley, Gramophone

"A thoroughly enjoyable disc and not just for fans of choral works."

Andrew Palmer, North East Post

"This is stirring music from beginning to end from, maybe, the most famous siblings in nineteenth century musical history. Immaculate sound and presentation are added plusses. Strongly recommended."

Gerald Fenech, Classical Music Daily

"This fine disc at once blows away the cobwebs and shatters those stereotypes."

Richard Hanlon, MusicWeb International

"This is an enjoyable program that brings the listener closer to the way the 19th century heard the Mendelssohns."

James Manheim, All Music

"David Temple’s conducting is both powerful and emotionally exciting."

Lynn René Bayley, Art Music Lounge

"David Temple leads soloists, the Crouch End Festival Chorus and the London Mozart Players. The opening cantata already shows how much energy is used here – with an almost vehement emphasis that puts the otherwise contemplative nature of “Vom Himmel hoch” into a completely different light."

Christoph Vratz, Concerti

See the recording of the album in progress and hear from the soloists, orchestra and David Temple

Crouch End Festival Chorus is grateful for the support of the Ambache Trust