John Tavener: The Protecting Veil

This was the first recording of John Tavener's phenomenally successful "Protecting Veil," which made him something of a household name (once again in his career) through the world premiere at the BBC Proms, 1989. The work has provoked both acclaim and controversy amongst contemporary composers and music networks, but it remains one of the prime choices of all Tavener devotees, as well as attracting him new listeners year by year as they discover through it a remarkably expressive yet calm sound world. 　　At the time he wrote it, Tavener had been an Orthodox Convert for barely a decade. His choral music of the time shows that he had absorbed the ethos of Russian and Greek Orthodox music and blended it with certain traits of his earlier, modernist leanings (particularly fundamental traits of serial composition, such as note-rows in inversion and retrograde). He also appeared determined at the time that his music would only consist of vocal writing - hence it took a telephone call from Steven Isserlis, virtuosic 'cellist and lover of Russian music, to convince Tavener to try writing something for instruments rather than voices. Isserlis expected a concerto of some description; what he got was a 40-minute meditation for 'cello and string orchestra in which his solo part is unceasing, representing as it does the Voice of the Mother of God. With the orchestra as an atmospheric backdrop, the 'cello solo winds its way through various chants and melodies pertaining to the Orthodox Feast of the Protecting Veil, which commemorates a vision of the Mother of God during an ancient war - a vision that mysteriously enabled an otherwise outmatched army to defeat their enemy.