Groot Omroepkoor

'The perfect balance between baroque transparency and romantic rapture,' wrote La Place de l'Opéra. And the Volkskrant: 'Amazing pace and exuberance.' So the  Netherlanda Radio Choir gets great reviews. It sings a very diverse programme. 'Half monk, half rascal,' Frenchman Francis Poulenc called himself.

But this time we hear this more religious side of him in the Lauds of St Anthony of Padua. Mendelssohn, too, was a religious man and often managed to express himself most sincerely especially in his motets. Bruchstücke eines alten Textes is the title of a 1990 work by Dutch composer Robert Heppener: a tribute to Mendelssohn.

This programme also includes the Mass for double choir by Swiss/Dutch Frank Martin. Using two choirs is a practice started in the Renaissance in the San Marco church in Venice. For a long time though, this Mass had a somewhat obscure existence. Composed as early as 1926, the composer kept it back for a long time. But since its return to the public eye, the piece has enjoyed enormous popularity and has appeared dozens of times on CD. Martin himself called the work a private matter, between himself and the Creator.