Celestial visions

Two new recordings - one of Haydn's 'Creation', the other of a Messiaen masterpiece - glow with a sense of spiritual awe, says Rob Cowan

Most of the repertory's greatest masterpieces are infused with a sense of awe. Think of "late" Beethoven, the St Matthew Passion, The Ring and Haydn's The Creation where, near the beginning of the oratorio's First Part, a dark and weighted representation of Chaos gives way to a triumphant C major. The passing of two centuries has done nothing to dull its impact and Thomas Hengelbrock's new recording of The Creation for Deutsche Harmonia Mundi (part of the RCA/BMG group) underlines the perennial newness of Haydn's magnificent score. Much of the venture's success is due to vividly characterised singing and playing from the Balthasar-Neumann Chorus and Ensemble. Period instruments guarantee added textural fibre, especially the tangy fortepiano that backs most of the recitatives.

Aside from that first light-flooded fortissimo there's the shadow-banishing first aria, amiably sung by Steve Davislim and a fine demonstration of the orchestra, its keen accents, shapely phrasing, mellow timbre and nicely buoyed rhythms. Gabriel is the soprano Simone Kermes, fresh and boyish in the manner of the late Irmgard Seefried (sample "Mit Staunen sieht das Wunderwerk", CD 1, track 5).

By contrast, the vividly depicted "rolling and foaming billows" of Raphael's stormy aria to the ocean (track 7) benefit from the compassionate command suggested by the baritone Johannes Mannov. A second breathtaking transition from darkness to light greets Haydn's sunrise sequence (track 13), borne initially on a quiet sea of blanched string tone and proudly declaimed by Davislim. And for the fearsome spectre of "creatures numberless... fully grown" try track 21, with its baying brass, dramatically captured here by DHM's engineers, or for the sheer joy of God's pleasure at the creation, the cheery chorus "Vollendet ist das grosse Werk" (track 26). Perhaps most beautiful of all is the wonder-struck duet between Adam (Locky Chung) and Eve (Dorothy Mields) near the start of the third part (CD 2, track 2), three minutes of untroubled musical bliss. Indeed it would be difficult to find any fault with this warmly recorded production, so judicious and sensitive is every detail; Haydn served with consummate skill and innate musicality.

At least one other musical brand of awe resides in the chamber cycle Des canyons aux Ètoiles that Olivier Messiaen wrote as a commission for the 1976 US Bicentennial. His inspiration – the canyons, skies and birds of Utah, all duly universalised – predated the commission. And although the forces called for are – by the standards of say Messiaen's Turangalîla Symphony – fairly modest, the effect of mystery, spaciousness and singing beyond time's borders is never compromised. There are depictions of desert and messages from Heaven, of White-Browed Robin and Mockingbird (piano solos performed by Roger Muraro), red-orange rocks, the interstellar call of a lone horn player (Jean-Jacques Justafré) and the vast amphitheatre of the Cedar Breaks. And there is the culminating grandeur of Zion Park and the Celestial City painted, as is all else in this fascinating score, from a palette of the rarest subtlety and almost tactile timbres (plenty of vivid percussion). The performance by members of the Radio France Philharmonic under Myung-Whun Chung calls for generous plaudits, and so does the work of DG's engineers.

Haydn: 'The Creation' – soloists, Balthasar-Neumann Chorus and Ensemble/Thomas Hengelbrock (Deutsche Harmonia Mundi 05472 77537 2, two discs)

Messiaen: 'Des canyons aux Ètoiles' – soloists, members of the Radio France Philharmonic/Myung-Whun Chung (DG 471 617-2, two discs)