Missa solemnis (2004)

Hummel’s autograph score of the Missa Solemnis in C was completed in March 1806, three months after the Te Deum. Hummel carefully noted on the last page of the autograph that the work had been composed for the wedding of Princess Leopoldina Esterházy (...) The Te Deum is an immensely attractive work. The orchestration blazes with bright primary colours and the choral writing is fluid and attractive. Although relatively short in duration, the Te Deum contains moments of great emotional gravity as well as pure transcendent joy. If indeed Hummel did compose the work to celebrate the Peace of Pressburg, one might argue that the Alliance’s defeat at Austerlitz received a far greater musical memorial than did Wellington’s victory at the Battle of Vittoria a few years later. (Allan Badley)|