Scottish Ensemble - Tavener: Tears of the Angels - Tacoma Reporter

There is total technical satisfaction with the recording of Tavener's music, called Tears of the Angels, on the Linn label. But for modernists who insist that a composer's idiom should never look backward, there may be some disappointment.

Tavener, born in 1944, has abandoned his experimental style in favour of a gentle inner spirituality that reflects his religious transition from Presbyterianism to Eastern Orthodoxy.

These compositions, commissioned and recorded by the BT Scottish Ensemble - a 12-member string ensemble- reflects Tavener's recent preoccupation with his father's death, his own mortality, even the suffering by the people in the Balkans.

The writing and playing are gorgeous - especially "Depart in Peace" which features soprano Patricia Rozario, intoning an ecstatic hymn on the word "alleluia" over mysterious Arabic scales. The exotic blend is pure aural aromatherapy.