Here are some links to various sites that will enable you to hear performances of the pieces we are rehearsing. I’ve simply done a search in Youtube and chosen some of the top results. I assume that whoever posted the item has the copyright but as we are listening for study purposes that should be all right anyway.

Puccini

A search for the Messa di Gloria on Youtube reveals about 5170 full or partial performances! I obviously haven’t had time to review them all. Here are some full recordings:

• A television recording from Spain. Starts properly after the credits
• A commercial audio recording from 1986 posted by a Japanese subscriber. No information about performers but nice recording. Could well be bootleg

Brahms

Only about 3000 versions of this!

1. A television recording of an arrangement for choir and strings by John Eliot Gardiner
2. An audio+scrolling score version by the St Bride’s London Choir
3. An audio recording plus “uplifting” slide show by the St John’s College Choir

Casals

Only about 2500 versions of this!

• 2010 performance by King’s College Cambridge Choir
• A beautiful performance in Buckfast Abbey by chamber choir Antiphon
• A surprisingly effective male voice performance by University of Pittsburgh Mens Glee Club

Mendelssohn

About 2500 versions

• Performance by the Como Conservatory Chamber Choir with a piano reduction
• Commercial recording by La Chapelle Royale, Collegium Vocale, Ensemble Orchestral de Paris and Philippe Herreweghe, conductor
• An unnamed Chinese choir with scrolling score and piano reduction. Their pronunciation is poor.

Rachmaninov

• A recording from a Polish choir (I think). Rolling score in Cyrillic . Nice performance but recording overloaded
• A performance from Sarajevo. Excellent women’s voices
• Rather soupy American performance. Audio with quite nice visuals of appropriate stained glass