My finest moment

Joby Talbot Path of Miracles

Tenebrae/nigel Short Signum SIGCD078 Shortly after we’d sung the world premiere of

Joby Talbot’s Path of Miracles in 2005, Tenebrae embarked on a four-session recording project that was meant to be for Parry’s Songs of Farewell. However, after one session, I realised that we weren’t ready to record it, so we then had three sessions left to fill. I thought, why not go for Path of Miracles as we know it so well? It turned out to be one of the most exciting recordings we’ve done and one that I continue to listen back to with real pleasure. The work was a major addition to the repertoire, so to have been responsible for commissioning it was great. The whole process of taking a new work that is over an hour long and bringing it to life is wonderful – this was a project that all of the Tenebrae singers emotionally invested themselves in. It’s a unique score, and the singers began to make really exciting suggestions as to how we could push the boundaries with our soundworld.