Eye-watering, but not tears: Fernand Laloux – O salutaris hostia, Tantum ergo

i’m an occasional listener to BBC Radio 3’s broadcasts of Choral Evensong. Only occasional because Evensong, it seems, has got itself stuck – or is deliberately kept – in a rut, where it has languished for at least 50 years (this suspicion was proved some time ago, when a 50-year old recording of Choral Evensong was broadcast, the music being identical to that typical of today’s broadcasts). It’s not just that the choices of music are predictably dull, the music itself is often so weak, that i tend only to tune in when a more discerning taste is being demonstrated, or when the broadcast comes from a Catholic cathedral, when the standard and selection of music is usually exceptional.

As it was in September 1999, when the broadcast came from the Brompton Oratory in London, celebrating Second Vespers for the feast of the Birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The service was extraordinary, including music by Dupré, Poulenc and Tournemire, with the Benediction hymns, O salutaris hostia and Tantum ergo, by a composer named Laloux. These settings were remarkably beautiful, but the name was new to me, and a quick search through various musical dictionaries proved fruitless. Keen to explore the pieces with a church choir i was directing at the time, i telephoned the Oratory’s director of music, Patrick Russill, to find out more about this mysterious composer. i forget exactly what he told me, but the essence of it was that this music had only recently come to light, and hadn’t even been properly published yet, hence the lack of information. Russill claimed that, at that time, only the Oratory had permission to perform the music, so i was unable to get hold of any scores. Fortunately, however, i had recorded the broadcast and so, inspired by Mozart’s transcription of Allegri’s Miserere in similar circumstances, i was able to transcribe the Tantum ergo completely (not, sadly, enough of the O salutaris hostia, due to insufficient clarity of the inner voices), which we performed on a number of occasions. In the intervening years, Belgian composer Fernand Laloux has begun to become more widely known, his scores are now more generally available, and Patrick Russill has recorded the pieces with the Oratory choir.

From that original service, here are the hymns O salutaris hostia and Tantum ergo; i assume, if Patrick Russill’s story is to be believed, that they must have been among the first ever performances of these pieces. There was a fair bit of interference during the recording, but i’ve managed to remove the worst of it; also, being part of a service, the noises of the thurifer can be heard at times. Both hymns, for the most part, treat the choir as a homophonic unit, though with a lightness of touch that is particularly effective. Both, too, are imbued with the rich harmonic palette beloved of the French, particularly the Tantum ergo, which features a second verse descant causing the harmonies to become eye-wateringly lovely. Watering eyes may be common in Holy Week, but this time, they’re not tears.

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