Album: Daniel Reuss, Frank Martin: Golgotha (Harmonia Mundi)

Following last year's fine recordings of Ligeti and Swaelinck, it was perhaps hoping too much for three successes in a row from Daniel Reuss and the Cappella Amsterdam.

But Swiss composer Frank Martin's postwar oratorio Golgotha, in which stylistically, Bach faces off with Schoenberg, is too murky even for them to illuminate. Golgotha presents the Easter story in 10 passages, drawn from the four gospels and Augustine's Confessions, culminating in a Resurrection featuring a "night that is more clear than the day... darkness is glowing with light, and it shines on my joy". But joy is in short supply in Golgotha, as the detail and doctrine smother it.

Download this Jésus devant Pilate; La Résurrection