Some music commentators have been given to say that England hasn’t had any great composers since Henry Purcell. I often think of this strange sentiment every time I happen upon a new English composer who is fantastic, if not frankly downright great. A more recent discovery of mine is Francis Pott, who is part of a whole movement of composers from that country who are continuing its tradition of choral music, the tradition that introduced the European continent to the major third as a consonance in the fifteenth century.
Here is his setting of Ubi Caritas:
Contemporaries never have the final say on a given work of art, and that’s as it should be. As for Purcell, however, I don’t remember the last time I was in the mood to listen to his music.