Conspirare’s new House of Belonging recording is the featured October 2023 release in Textura Magazine!

“Many of the performances on this latest collection by Conspirare are so powerful, one can’t help but be awed by their beauty. That starts with its haunting opening work, Reaching, featuring music by the choral group’s founder and leader Craig Hella Johnson and words by Welsh-Scottish poet/librettist Euan Tait, which, especially when elevated by the majestic singing of tenor Haitham Haidar and baritone Simon Barrad (and with the composer on piano), is so stirring it’s almost overwhelming. The spell is cast the moment hushed voices intone “Oh, we are far away from home / We are turning away,” but that’s hardly the only time music so moving and emotionally rich appears on a release that showcases the splendour of Conspirare’s vocal artistry time and time again. Lustrous and ethereal, the singing by the Austin, Texas-based ensemble captivates, whether voiced by the full ensemble or by its exceptional soloists. … Among other things, the album content emphasizes the need for human connection and to feel at home in the world, themes that have inspired the composers to create musical material that dovetails seamlessly with texts by Tait, John Muir, William Stafford, Kiara Skye, Wendell Berry, Rabindranath Tagore, David Whyte, Langston Hughes, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Hildegard of Bingen. Such content is always relevant but perhaps never more so than today when refugees are regularly trying to escape war-torn countries and civilians are at this moment being displaced by fighting in the Middle East. And of course the need for human connection was never felt more desperately than during recent pandemic-related lockdowns.”

—Ron Schepper, Textura

See the full rave review on Textura.org!