UZ on CD

I've been remiss in welcoming the premiere recording of my "pocket oratorio" In the Land of Uz, which is my take on the biblical Book of Job. It's a 40-minute choral piece written to a Proms commission for the BBC Singers in 2017. Conducting them then was David Hill, and it's he who has achieved this new version (on Hyperion) performed by Yale University's Schola Cantorum, an ensemble which he directed for many years.

The score features a deliberately odd little orchestra (viola, bass, soprano sax, trumpet, tuba and organ) which, over the years, must have taken quite a few phone calls to assemble. I feel particularly grateful that David was able get this not-obvious musical grouping onto disc. The vocal writing includes quite a lot of speech, originally in my mind, the unmistakeable English style of the BBC Singers. So it's interesting to hear it all re-emerge "in American". The choral singing is superb - these are students, after all - and the tricky solos by the instrumentalists are navigated with great aplomb.

This is my big tenor number; the solo singer, who plays the part of Job, is busy all the way through. Previous BBC soloists in 'Uz' have been Adrian Thompson and Mark Padmore. Steven Soph, on this disc, is a fine successor to these English tenor greats.