In fulfillment of a commission from the BBC for a work in commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the BBC Symphony Chorus, Mark-Anthony Turnage produced Calmo, an untypically quiet and gentle work for chorus with handbells – and, what has become something of a signature instrument for him, desk bells. The text of the work consists of the words ‘Dona nobis pacem’ and their translations in several languages. It is dedicated to the memory of Turnage's friend Sue Knussen. Calmo's intense eloquence was enhanced by its brevity, and, both despite and because of it, stood out in a program of music for chorus, harp, and organ by an assortment of older and newer Czech and British Composers, including Janáček, MacMillan, Holst, and Eben, presented by the BBC Symphony Chorus, conducted by Stephen Jackson.

KLEMPERER: Symphony No. 1 (Symphony in Two Movements); Symphony No. 2; Marcia funèbre; Scherzo; Recollections; Merry Waltz. Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz c. Alun Francis. CPO 999 987-2.

The Birmingham Contemporary Music Group opened their 2004–05 season on 19 September 2004 in typically adventurous, innovatory style with an evening of music — including no less than four world premieres — all centred on Italo Calvino's 1972 book Invisible Cities, in which traveller Marco Polo describes, in imaginary dialogues with Kublai Khan, fifty amazing cities, all of which turn out to be Venice.

With Tippett and Rawsthorne centenaries this year, Mátyás Seiber's (1905–60) might have been overlooked, but Morley College, prompted by the composer's daughter Julia, made sure it was not with a well-devised festival comprising four concerts, two lectures (by Michael Graubart and Hugh Wood – both names familiar to Tempo readers, and the latter currently especially featured) and an exhibition. Seiber was one of a number of continental arrivals, the others including Gerhard and Reizenstein, who remained here to our considerable benefit, in Seiber's case becoming a much sought-after teacher of composition. Morley was a fitting focus for the celebrations, having welcomed him onto the staff in 1942 after more august, and blinkered, institutions had shown no interest. The subtitle of the festival – ‘From blue notes to twelve notes’ – neatly encapsulated his wide ambit. As Robert Hanson pointed out in his notes, ‘his refusal to accept the mutual exclusiveness of different types of musical study and practice, first shown publicly in his jazz course at Frankfurt, came to typify the man’. This is in direct line with the Morley philosophy since the days of Dr Hanson's reforming predecessor Gustav Holst, who is reported in the College's magazine of December 1917 to have insisted that the terms ‘classical’ and ‘popular’ were misleading: there was only ‘good’ and ‘bad’ music. (The danger now, as Wood pertinently observed, is that students reluctant to accept the authority of the teacher prefer to think their own opinions equally valid. Seiber would have had no truck with such self-deception. Ruthlessly honest yet tactful in discussing a student's work, he adopted the Socratic approach by indicating a passage and asking ‘why did you do that?’ After listening patiently to the reply, he would quietly explain the fault and request a revision for the next lesson.) Sadly, older pupils like Fricker, Milner and Banks are not around to discuss how he would see an extended piece through to completion. But more recent ones were present at the festival, including Graubart and Anthony Gilbert (also featured in Tempo recently), who can corroborate Wood's testimony to Seiber's belief that composition should be taught as a discipline grounded in tradition and the classics, backed up by thorough analysis and imitation of Bach inventions and Haydn minuets.

The Vasari Singers, now well established as a much-acclaimed London-based chamber choir, celebrated their 25th Anniversary this year with a concert at St John's Smith Square on 15 May featuring short specially commissioned works by ten notable British composers. As conductor Jeremy Backhouse described to me, a private preview of the works, all on sacred themes, took place at Tonbridge School Chapel in February, in the presence of the composers, thus setting up a ‘dialogue’ on interpretation. Although strictly speaking of amateur status, the choir has achieved much critical success, winning the Sainsbury's Choir of the Year Competition, appearing on BBC Radio 3 and at major venues, and has shown a distinct interest in commissioning new choral works in recent years.

Ancient Song Recovered: The Life and Music of Veljo Tormis, by Mimi S. Daitz. Pendragon Press, $54.00/£36.00.

The Works of Eduard Tubin: Thematic-Bibliographical Catalogue of Works by Vardo Rumessen. International Eduard Tubin Society/Gehrmans Musikförlag, E.57.

TORMIS: ‘Vision of Estonia’ II. The Ballad of Mary's Land; Reflections with Hando Runnel; Days of Outlawry; God Protect Us from War; Journey of the War Messenger; Let the Sun Shine!; Voices from Tammsaare's Herdboy Days; Forget-me-not; Mens' Songs. Estonian National Male Choir c. Ants Soots. Alba NCD 20.

TORMIS: ‘Vision of Estonia’ III. The Singer; Songs of the Ancient Sea; Plague Memory; Bridge of Song; Going to War; Dialectical Aphorisms; Song about a Level Land; We Are Given; An Aboriginal Song; The Estonians' Political Parties Game; Song about Keeping Together; Martinmas Songs; Shrovetide Songs; Three I Had Those Words of Beauty. Estonian National Male Choir c. Ants Soots. Alba NCD 23.

TAMBERG: Cyrano de Bergerac. Soloists, Orchestra and Chorus of Estonian National Opera c. Paul Mägi. CPO 999 832-2 (2-CD set).

ROSENVALD: Violin Concerto Nos. 11 and 2, Quasi una fantasia2; Two Pastorales3; Sonata capricciosa4; Symphony No. 35; Nocturne6. 1,2Lemmo Erendi (vln), Tallinn CO c. Neeme Järvi, 2Estonian State SO c. Jüri Alperten; 3Estonian State SO c. Vello Pähn; 4Valentina Gontšarova (vln); 56Estonian State SO c. Neeme Järvi. Antes BM-CD 31.9197.

DEAN: Winter Songs. TÜÜR: Architectonics I. VASKS: Music for a Deceased Friend. PÄRT: Quintettino. NIELSEN: Wind Quintet. Berlin Philharmonic Wind Quintet, with Daniel Norman (tenor), c. Hermann Bäumer. BIS-CD–1332.

TULEV: Quella sera; Gare de l'Est; Adiós/Œri Ráma in memoriam; Isopo; Be Lost in the Call. NYYD Ensemble c. Olari Elts. Eesti Raadio ERCD047.

ESTONIAN COMPOSERS I: MÄGI: Vesper.1 KANGRO: Display IX.2 SUMERA: Shakespeare's Sonnets Nos. 8 & 90.3TAMBERG: Desiderium Concordiae.4 TULEV: String Quartet No. 1.5 EESPERE: Glorificatio.6 TORMIS: Kevade: Suite.71Estonian National SO c. Aivo Välja; 24NYYD Ensemble c. Olari Elts; 3Pirjo Levadi (soprano), Mikk Mikiver (narrator), Estonian National Boys' Choir, Estonian National SO c. Paul Mägi; 5Tallinn String Quartet; 6Kaia Urb (sop), Academic Male Choir of Tallinn Technical University c. Arvo Volmer; 7Estonian National SO c. Paul Mägi Eesti Raadio ERCD 031.

ESTONIAN COMPOSERS II: TULVE: Traces.1 TALLY: Swinburne.2 KÕRVITS: Stream.3 STEINER: Descendants of Cain.4 KAUMANN: Long Play.5 LILL: Le Rite de Passage.6 SIMMER: Water of Life.71,5,6NYYD Ensemble c. Olari Elts; 2Ardo-Ran Varres (narrator), Iris Oja (sop), Alar Pintsaar (bar), Vambola Krigul (perc), Külli Möls (accordion), Robert Jürjendal (elec guitar); 3Virgo Veldi (sax), Madis Metsamart (perc); 4The Bowed Piano Ensemble c. Timo Steiner; 7Teet Järvi (vlc), Monika Mattieson (fl). Eesti Raadio ERCD032.

ESTONIAN COMPOSERS III: GRIGORJEVA: Con misterio;1On Leaving. SUMERA: Pantomime; The Child of Dracula and Zombie. 1Tui Hirv (sop), 1Iris Oja (mezzo), 1Joosep Vahermägi (ten), 1Jaan Arder (bar), Hortus Musicus c. Andres Mustonen. Eeesti Raadio ERCD 045

ESTONIAN COMPOSERS IV: KRIGUL: Walls.1 JÜRGENS: Redblueyellow.2 KÕRVER: Pre.3 KOTTA: Variations.4 SIIMER: Two Pieces.5 KAUMANN: Ausgewählte Salonstücke.6 AINTS: Trope.7 STEINER: In memoriam.81,6New Tallinn Trio; 2Liis Jürgens (harp); 3,8Voces Musicales Ensemble c. Risto Joost; 4Mati Mikalai (pno); 5Mikk Murdvee (vln), Tarmo Johannes (fl), Toomas Vavilov (cl), Mart Siimer (organ); 7Tarmo Johannes (fl). Eeesti Raadio ERCD 046.

BALTIC VOICES 2: SISASK: Five songs from Gloria Patri. TULEV: And then in silence there with me be only You. NØRGÅRD: Winter Hymn. GRIGORJEVA: On Leaving (1999). SCHNITTKE: Three Sacred Hymns. Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir c. Paul Hillier. Harmonia Mundi HMU 907331.

SCHNITTKE: Concerto for Chorus; Voices of Nature. PÄRT: Dopo la vittoria; Bogoróditse Djévo; I am the True Vine. Swedish Radio Choir c. Tõnu Kaljuste. BIS-CD-1157.

PÄRT: Es sang vor langen Jahren; Stabat Mater; Magnificat; Nunc Dimittis; My Heart's in the Highlands; Zwei Sonatinen; Spiegel im Spiegel. Chamber Domaine; Stephen de Pledge (pno), Stephen Wallace (counter-ten), Choir of St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh c. Matthew Owens. Black Box BBM1071.

1. Purcell Room: Charles Hart

2. Manoukian Cultural Centre, St Yegiche's Armenian Church, Cranley Gardens: Mikhail Pletnev

3. Purcell Room: Roxanna Panufnik

4. Leighton House and The Warehouse: Jonathan Powell, ‘Finland Piano Suomi’

5. Leighton House: Richard Dubugnon's ‘Mikroncerto III’

The Immortal by the Chinese-American Zhou Long (b. 1953) – commissioned by the BBC World Service (apparently its first-even Proms commission) and premièred by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under its out-going chief conductor, Leonard Slatkin, on 20 July – is a tribute ‘to the influence of Chinese artists and intellectuals in the twentieth century’, as the composer notes in the score. He adds: ‘Having grown up in an artistic family during the time of the Cultural Revolution, I know from personal experience the struggles and hardships that past generations have endured to remain true to these eternal ideals’. Past generations? Zhou himself was sent to labour in the fields; a back injury had him re-allocated to a song-and-dance troupe, where he encountered notionally prohibited western instruments among the Chinese ones – a stylistic integration he maintains even when writing exclusively for the modern symphony orchestra.

Commissioned by the Three Choirs Festival and performed there for the first time on 13 August by the Philharmonia Orchestra under Martyn Brabbins, these variations on Vaughan Williams's hymn tune ‘Down Ampney’ (so named after the village of the composer's birth), were surprising individual successes. The overall shape of the work, arch-like with a slow-fast-slow-fast-slow structure, was suggested by John McCabe, celebrating his 65th birthday year and featured composer at this year's Three Choirs. McCabe, joined in this collaborative effort by Robert Saxton, James Francis Brown, David Matthews and Judith Bingham, also sensibly requested that the orchestration be limited to double woodwind, modest brass and percussion sections, harp and the usual strings.

The Russian National Orchestra and Moscow State Chamber Choir conducted by Mikhail Pletnev presented two unusually distinctive concerts at London's Barbican Hall at the end of March,3 starting with John of Damascus of 1884 – Taneyev called it Cantata No 1 – and ending the following evening with his tumultuous Cantata No 2, On the Reading of a Psalm (Po prochtenii psalma), from 30 years later. Although not claimed as such, the latter was surely a British première: not even that champion of the choral festival, Sir Henry Wood, seems to have done it.

‘I haven't heard my piece yet, none of us have’, confided thirtysomething composer Will Todd as he arrived to take his place in the audience at the Purcell Room on 13 July. He spoke as one of the twenty British composers, all alive and well, commissioned by artists Alison Smart (soprano) and Katharine Durran (piano) to set a French poem for them to perform. Unusually, the composers had to submit their scores as if ‘tablets from on high’, without rehearsal input. Although this worked well as they all entered into the spirit, and the artists seemed particularly adept at interpretation over a wide range of genres – from Graham Fitkin's mimimalist-style ‘Les Aliments Blancs’ (Satie: ‘je ne mange que des aliments blancs’), to John Casken's impressionistic ‘Colloque Sentimental’, with its shades of Debussy – having such a swift succession of 20 short ‘soundbites’ made for a rather over intense programme overall. Perhaps, on another occasion, a concentration on no more than ten composers, would allow for rehearsal time with each to assist in conveying more in-depth interpretation of the text, and give the audience more time to absorb each contribution.

It has been three years since the last Hugh Wood première (his Fifth String Quartet), and in that time his music has disgracefully become an endangered species – practically extinct – in concert programmes. Therefore, his Cantilena and Fugue op. 47, given its first performance on 7 July as part of the City of London Festival, was doubly welcome. And, as if to compensate for the wait, a second new work followed just two days later, with the première of Wood's Tribute to Michael Berkeley, one of 20 short works commissioned to mark Berkeley's final year as artistic director of the Cheltenham Festival.