Huelgas Ensemble: dos noticias, dos

   Echando un vistazo a la página web del Huelgas Ensemble -algo que suelo hacer con bastante asiduidad-, me encuentro hoy con un par de novedades, noticias de alcance que me alegraron y que creo conveniente compartir con los lectores de este ||:doblebarra:||, y que estoy seguro serán motivo de regocijo para todos aquellos que siguen con pasión las andanzas del que es uno de los mejores conjuntos vocales del planeta.

   La primera de ellas hace referencia a una novedad discográfica. Se trata del último disco que el conjunto belga ha grabado bajo la dirección de Paul Van Nevel, un disco monográfico con repertorio inglés, centrado en obras del Eton Choirbook. La novedad, ya de un enorme interés per se -pues cualquier nuevo disco de este grupo supone todo un evento-, lo es todavía más si tenemos en cuenta que se trata del primer disco que el conjunto graba íntegramente con repertorio proveniente de las islas británicas. Solamente se habían acercado a piezas de este territorio en momentos muy puntuales, como recordarmos con la grabación de la Missa Ave Maria, de Thomas Ashewell, para el disco La Quinta essentia.

Estamos, por lo tanto, ante un documento sonoro único y que habrá de hacer las delicias de todo aquel amante de la polifonía renacentista más elegante, además de los miles de seguidores del conjunto.

Esperemos, pues, ese 16 de noviembre, fecha en la que podremos hacernos con una copia.

   La segunda noticia tiene relación con el papel de Van Nevel como maestro, como sabio que traspasará sus cientos de conocimientos sobre el repertorio medieval y renacentista a aquellos que quieras recibirlos. Se ha programado la "Huelgas Academy 2013", un academia dedicada a formar a los asistentes sobre los entresijos de estos repertorios tan apasionantes. A lo largo de cinco fines de semana -entre enero y febrero-, el maestro belga irá centrándose en cuestiones puntuales del repertorio.

Toda la información necesaria de este suculento curso puede leerse a continuación [en inglés]:

HUELGAS ACADEMY 2013

In January and February 2013 the Huelgas Ensemble is organizing five weekend courses covering various aspects of music between 1200 and 1600.
The weekends are a sequel to the successful course on the subject of notation which took place in July 2012.
The courses will be given by Paul Van Nevel. Each one will begin on Saturday at 14.00 and end on Sunday at 21.00,
and will take place in Brussels.
The themes per weekend are as follows:

1. Saturday 12 & Sunday 13 January:
– the notation of polyphonic music 1200-1600: types of score, layout of the manuscripts   
– the evolution of the notation: from modal notation up to and  including open mensural rules of notation
– a thorough study of French black notation
– an in-depth exploration of the systems of coloration and proportion
This course in part recapitulates material dealt with on 7-8 July 2012.
However,  those who participated then could also find this reiteration and supplementation most useful.

2. Saturday 19 & Sunday 20 January:
–    musical forms in medieval polyphony:  organum, the clausula, the motet, the conductus, the isorhythmic motet, the cyclic mass,
the ballade, the ballatà, the virelai, the rondeau and the trecento madrigal: sources, notation, transcription, interpretation

3. Saturday 26 & Sunday 27 January:
–    musical forms in Renaissance vocal polyphony: the cantus firmus mass, the parody mass, the motet and related forms,
the chanson (song, lied), the madrigal, the lamentation, the villançico, the Tenorlied : sources, notation, transcription, interpretation

4. Saturday 2 & Sunday 3 February :
–    the tradition of text placement: the evolution of the rules 1350-1600 for singers and composers; examples and exercises
–    the musica ficta rules in the light of the laws of counterpoint and of the hexachord system
–    chiavette and transposition

5. Saturday 9 & Sunday 10 February :
– study of an important manuscript: its history, content, concordances, notation, different transcriptions and part assignments,
plus singing from the original notation.
The choice of the manuscript will depend on the number of participants and on their own preferences.

The courses are open to all interested parties. Singing experience is an advantage, but not a necessity.

Each weekend a comprehensive file of documentation will be provided, including illustrations of original documents in colour and black and white.

Course 1 is compulsory for those wishing to attend courses 2, 3, 4 and/or 5, unless they are capable of reading mensural notation quickly.

Weekends 2 up to and including 5 are separate entities. You can sign up for one, for several or for all the weekends.

For all further details concerning the cost of the courses, their location, the signing up terms and conditions etc., email to this address: dubrouillard@gmail.com

   Realmente se trata de una oportunidad maravillosa para poder del maestro, lo que supone una experiencia completamente inolvidable -de la que, afortunadamente, puedo dar fe-.

   El Huelgas y Van Nevel siguen vivos, así pues regocijémonos por ello y disfrutemos de todo lo que tienen para ofrecernos.

The Choir Project al día [06-X-2012]

Robert Parsons (c.1535-1572): Ave Maria a 5.
The Sixteen - Harry Christophers.
The marvellous english lines.

   Andrew Carwood says about Parsons and this piece:
"Lack of information about a composer is a common problem for the researcher of early music, especially in sixteenth-century England where so many records have been lost. Add to this a seemingly early and unusual death and a mournful personal note from a contemporary collector of sacred music and Robert Parsons proves to be even more fascinating than most of his contemporaries.

    Robert Parsons is first found in a Teller’s Roll for 1560/1 which refers to him co-ordinating payments to Richard Bower, Master of the Children of the Chapel Royal. The Cheque Book of the Chapel Royal records Parsons’ appointment as a Gentleman on 17 October 1563:

Merton died 22nd of September, and Roberte Parsons sworne in his place the 17th October, Ao 5to.

    Unusually there is no note of the place where he had previously been employed and this, together with the references in the Teller’s Roll, suggests that Parsons was connected with the Chapel before he became a Gentleman. On 30 May 1567 he was granted a Crown lease for twenty-one years on three rectories near Lincoln (‘Sturton, Randbie and Staynton’) and in 1571 an annual tax certificate issued to court servants confirms his residence as being in Greenwich. The next mention is a further emotionless reference in the Cheque Book of the Chapel Royal:

Robt. Parsons was drowned at Newark uppon Trent the 25th of Januarie, and Wm. Bird sworne gentleman in his place at the first the 22d of Februarie followinge, Ao 14o Lincolne.

    Quite why he was travelling near Newark is unclear. He may have been visiting his rectories or attending to other business but it is clear that he died in 1572, the fourteenth regnal year of Queen Elizabeth I. His only epitaph is a couplet found in the partbooks prepared by the copyist Robert Dow in the 1580s which suggests that Parsons was highly esteemed and suffered an early death:

Qui tantus primo Parsone in flore fuisti
Quantus in autumno ni morere fores.

[Parsons, you who were so great in the springtime of life,
how great you would have been in the autumn, had death not come.]

    Parsons lived through some of the most tumultuous years of the sixteenth century as the four religious settlements loosely termed the English Reformation tore society apart. After Henry VIII’s break with Rome and his relatively conservative reforms, the baton was then passed in 1549 to his son Edward VI who, steered by his Protestant advisors and then later developing his own agenda, pursued a more radical path. This course was halted by Edward’s half-sister, Mary I, eldest daughter of Henry VIII and devout Catholic, in 1553. She returned England to communion with Rome and met with much support for her policies until the economic downturn of the late 1550s and her own increasing personal instability. Then in turn her death in 1558 and the accession of Elizabeth I, her half-sister and Henry’s second daughter, led to a new English settlement which drew on Edward’s reforms but with considerably more artistic and liturgical sensitivity than had been allowed by the young king.

    The surviving music by Parsons consists of nine pieces in Latin, two Services in English, two anthems in English, a handful of secular songs and some instrumental pieces including five In nomines. The lack of small-scale English sacred music seems to suggest that Parsons was not active as a composer during the reign of Edward VI. His earliest work is probably the opulent setting of the Magnificat which harkens back to a tradition seen clearly in the Eton Choirbook and which was developed by Robert Fayrfax, Nicholas Ludford and John Taverner. Five Magnificats in the Forrest-Heyther Partbooks and the Office Hymns by Tallis and Sheppard seem to suggest that Mary was keen to reinstate large-scale music at the Office of Vespers. The lack of accompanying Nunc dimittis settings suggest these Magnificats were designed specifically for Vespers rather than the reformed Evensong when both Canticles would be required.

    Parsons’ setting uses a traditional alternation of plainsong and polyphony and is scored for six voices, sometimes with lengthy divisions or gimells, but this is no mere exercise by a young composer trying to find his feet. That Parsons has a sophisticated grasp of compositional techniques is seen most clearly in his use of canon (where one or more parts will repeat exactly a melody sung by an opening voice). These can be found in the sections Quia fecit mihi magna (at the octave between triplex and contratenor II), et sanctum nomen eius (at the ninth between tenor and medius), et semini eius in saecula (at the tenth between bassus and medius) and at Sicut erat in principio (a three-part canon at the unison between the two contratenors and at the octave with the triplex). Although Parsons is obviously drawing on older models, his setting seems less archaic than that by Robert White. There is no reliance on cantus firmus and the plainchant melody is given only slight attention in the polyphonic verses. Parsons does however preserve the use of melismatic writing for the solo lines and contrasts these with more massive full-choir sections.

    Ave Maria has become Parsons’ most famous and well-loved motet since it was included in the Oxford Book of Tudor Anthems in 1978. Settings of the Ave Maria are not frequent in England—even William Byrd only set them as required by the liturgy in his two books of Gradualia (1605 and 1607) rather than as stand-alone pieces. Parsons simply sets the lines found in the Gospel of St Luke and has no invocation for the dead (authorized by Pope Pius V in 1568). This is a magical setting and it is not surprising that there is a beautiful Amen coda. Initially the piece gives the impression of using a cantus firmus in the top part but it is in fact free-composed throughout. Parsons starts each medius phrase one note higher than the previous one, beginning on F and then moving up to D with long slow notes before reaching benedicta tu when it joins the other voices in equal importance. Paul Doe has suggested that this piece might have been prompted by the early promise or subsequent plight of Mary, Queen of Scots. There is no direct evidence for this but it is not unreasonable to consider Parsons and indeed most of the mid-sixteenth-century writers—Sheppard, Tallis, White, Mundy and Tye—as Catholic sympathizers. They seem more free, more expressive, more expansive and more brave in their Latin compositions and it is tempting to speculate that in setting words from Psalms 15 and 119, the Lamentations and the Funeral Responds, they were consciously producing music with a Catholic slant. In comparison their English works tend to be shorter and less virtuosic and even the fledgling Great Services are short on excellent material, but then these mid-sixteenth-century composers were creating a new genre not previously explored and were probably writing to fulfil a set of rules which were not entirely clear. England had to wait for another generation—headed by William Byrd, Thomas Weelkes and Thomas Morley—before writing in English could achieve greatness."

    For me, this is one of the most beautiful pieces in the Renaissance music. Its evocative power is simply wonderful.
Here are some of the most beautiful lines ever written. In addition, the amazing "amen" is one of the most melismatic and overwhelming parts of all English Renaissance repertoire.

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The Choir Project al día [08-IX-2012]

Tiburtio Massaino (c.1550-1609): Musica super Threnos Ieremiae prophete in maiori hebdomada decantadas a 5 (Venezia, 1599). Feria V. In coena Domini. Lectio prima.
Huelgas-Ensemble - Paul Van Nevel.
Music to express.

In words of the great Paul Van Nevel:

“The Lamentations (Thrênoi, Threni, Lamentationes) of the Prophet Jeremiah were written in connection with the destruction of Jerusalem and the fall of Judah in 586 B.C. The text was written by eyewitnesses and definitively compiled during the Babylonian captivity. Jeremiah was therefore certainly not the sole author of the Lamentations, and some authorities even think that he had no hand at all in the writing of the text.

The Lamentations consist of five chapters, or rather songs or cantos. The structure of the first, second and fourth chapters is identical. Each of them comprises 22 verses, corresponding to the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet. The Latin Vulgate wished to preserve the reminiscence of this alphabet and therefore begins each verse with the first Hebrew letter of the verse. So the first verses of Chapters I, I1 and IV begin with the letter ALEPH followed by the Latin text, the second verse begins with BETH, the third with GHIMEL, and so on. In addition, the first Lamentation starts with the heading Incipit Lamentatio Hieremiae Prophetae, which, however, is not always sung.

The structure of the third Lamentation differs from that of I, II and IV. The shorter verses (I and II consist of verses in three sections, IV of verses in two sections) are linked in groups of three in the third Lamentation. Each of these grouped verses begins with the same Hebrew letter, so that the chapter comprises not 22 but 66 verses. The Vuigate, too, always repeats this letter. The structnre of Song III is therefore: ALEPH   (. . .), ALEPH (. . .), ALEPH, (...) BETH (...), BETH (...), BETH (...), etc. The fifth and last chapter differs from the others in various ways. In the first place this chapter has the character of a prayer (the Vulgate begins with the title Oratio…). Moreover, there is no mention of the letter at the beginning of each verse. Finally, they are very simply structured in two distinct sections.

The text of Lamentations is highly emotional, rich in imagery and in a language replete with rhetorical turns of phrase. It is a text which, as has been mentioned, was written by eyewitnesses and therefore manifests - how could it not? - an intimate relationship with the sorrow, helplessness, bitterness and supplications of the population of Jerusalem.
It is precisely this aspect of the combination of dramatic elements and meditative fragments, together with the incantatory citation of the Hebrew letters that undoubtedly attracted the attention of medieval and particularly of Renaissance composers. Otherwise how can it be explained why a text that - unlike the Mass, for instance - was used only once a year (during Holy Week) inspired so many composers? (1).

From the Middle Ages on parts of the Lamentations were used in one specific instant of the Divine Office, i.e. during matins on Maundy, Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday. Matins, a prayer and sung service that took place before dawn, consisted successively of three psalms and three lessons (lectio). It was for the first nocturne of matins on the last three days of Holy Week that the Lamentations were used for the three lessons. A total of nine lessons were therefore devoted to the Lamentations. The use of the Lamentations during matins had another peculiarity. At the end of the verses each lesson was concluded with the verse Jerusalem, Jerusalem, convertere ad dominum Deum tuum. This was not a Biblical text, but it served as a kind of refrain that was repeated after each lesson.

The selection of the Lamentations for the lessons varied greatly from region to region until the Council of Trent (1545-1563). The choice, number and order of the verses were determined by local preferences. After the Council of Trent, that had attempted to impose certain rules on ecclesiastical music, there seems still to have been room for local discretion, as may be observe in listening to the four Lamentations on this CD. The liturgical monophonic repertoire comprises at least several hundred melodies among which Spanish manuscripts are particularly prevalent. Many polyphonic compositions have as their cantus firmus the best know pslm tone on F (F-G-A…), with the formula A-G-F-G-F for the Hebrew letters. The use of a different cantus firmus was, however, common (as, for instance, in the compositions of Robert White).

Because of the somber character of the text and its position in the liturgy (at night, before dawn, during the most sorrowful days in the liturgical calendar), it goes without saying that these polyphonic compositions create a very particular mood. Shorn of all festive ornament, these Lamentations go back to the very essence of polyphony, while the tiniest detail, the slightest emotional turn can create a wondrous effect. And thought the exordium - like Hebrew letters (without substantive “meaning”) were composed in an entreating melismatic style, and though many composers used a sturdy harmonic idiom in particularly inviting passages (e.g. plorans ploravit and o vos omnes), Nicola Vicentino (1511-1576) writes in his treatise L’Antica Musica ridotta alla moderna prattica (Roma, 1555) that “… Every singer must take care that when singing lamentations he does not sing a single ornament (diminution), lest the sorrowful character turn into a joyful mood…” (Book IV, Ch. 42).

(1). As late as the 19th century the Holy Week matins (called the Tenebrae were still very popular because of their powerful musical attractiveness. When Franz List was asked was particularly worth hearing in Rome -opera, symphonic or chamber music - he emphatically replied, “No, certainly not that. That sort of thing can be heard anywhere else, and better. Musically there is one thing that is unique and incomparable: the Tenebrae in the great basilicas”.

Van Nevel continues:
“Tiburtio Massaino (c.1550-1609 was an Augustine monk and composer-singer in Cremona, Innsbruck (at the court of Archduke Ferdinand III) and Salzburg where he was arrested on suspicion of homosexuality. He subsequently fled to Praha where he became a singer in the court chapel of the Emperor Rudolph. From 1594 he was back in Italy as Maestro di Cappella in Lodi and Piacenza. His 5-part Lamentations were published in 1599 and were dedicated to the monastery of Monte Oliveti in Piacenza.
So Massaino wrote his Lamentations for the surroundings where they belong: the closed monastic community. The music is in a polyphonic idiom, but mostly syllabic. The structure is supported by a rich harmonic tone palette that does not shun the occasional surprise, as on the text … et lachrime of the BETH verse. The melismatic “acclamations” of the Hebrew letters are, compared to those of his comtemporaries, short (five to six breves). The “Hierusalem”, that uses a slow-moving falling motive in the voices on the word “convertere”, is particularly beautiful”.

I think the music for Lamentations is probably the most expressive in the Renaissance polyphony, as well as the music of Requiem. This album is absolutely fantastic. Pure “Huelgas sound”, with an expressive power that drags you to deeper insight of the life. Highly recommended; absolutely essential.

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Novedades discográficas: septiembre 2012

Agostino Steffani (1654-1728).
Mission.

Cecilia Bartoli & I Barocchisti - Diego Fasolis.

Decca Classics 4784721.

   Estamos ante el que es, con total seguridad, uno de los lanzamientos más esperados del año, porque Cecilia Bartoli mueve auténticas legiones de seguidores -entre los que me incluyo-. Siguiendo con el repertorio barroco, se centra ahora en la figura del enigmático y polifacético Agostino Steffani. Se prometen grandes sorpresas y un éxito asegurado. Se anuncia, además, una gran gira mundial con este programa e intérpretes.

Existe más información disponibles en estas dos entradas de este mismo blog: La "Mission" de Bartoli y Bartoli ya no tiene "Mission" secreta.

Johann Sebastian BACH (1685-1750).

Missa 1733.

Pygmalion - Raphaël Pichon.

Alpha (Outhere-Music) ALPHA188.

   Uno de los lanzamiento que personalmente me suscita mayor interés es este, del joven conjunto francés Pygmalion, centrado, como la totalidad de su dicografía hasta el momento, el la figura del Kantor. Se trata de una versión más de la celebérrima H-Moll Messe BWV 232, en la llamada "versión de Dresden", que en 1733 fuera dedicada por BACH al Príncipe Elector de Sajonia, primero como una misa luterana, que posteriormente sería utilizada y completada como misa católica. La anuncian como la "versión original" de la pieza. Con un quintento vocal de lujo, el coro y orquesta barroca de Pygamlion parecen interpretar una versión fresca, que personalmente me parece sonar muy "herreweghiana" y realmente fantástica.

Alpha aún no aporta información sobre este disco en su página, pero sí podemos ver ese clip promocinal en el que se aportan datos sobre la grabación, aunque en francés.

Conductus, Vol. I. (Music & Poetry from Thirteenth Century France).

John Potter (tenor), Christopher O'Gorman (tenor), Rogers Covey-Crump (tenor).

Hyperion CDA6794.

   Dos de los clásicos miembros del Hilliard Ensemble -el que fuer su fundador, John Potter, y el tenor agudo, Rogers Covey-Crump, que aún hoy es miembro- se vuelven a juntar, junto a la participación de un tercer tenor, para realizar la grabación de la que parece será una serie de discos dedicados al repertorio vocal sacro de la Edad Media, no sé si centrados únicamente en Francia, o también en otros territorios europeos. Conociendo el desenvolvimiento de estos intérpretes en estos repertorios, creo que debemos celebrar mucho este reciente lanzamiento y la aparente intención de continuidad de la serie.

La Monarcha (17th-century music from the Spanish territories).

Cordevento.

Brilliant Classics 94352.

    Parece que un nuevo conjunto irrumpe de nuevo en escena, y traen un repertorio muy interesante y bastante novedoso, con varias piezas como primeras grabaciones mundiales. Con la particpación de flautas de pico, guitarra barroca y clave, nos traen músicas danzables de los territorios hispánicos en el siglo XVII, un muy sugerente programa, que al precio al que nos tiene acostumbrado Brilliant, hace de esta compra algo casi absolutamente ineludible.


Johann Sebastian BACH (1685-1750).
Trio Sonatas.
Florilegium - Ashley Solomon.
Channel Classics CCSSA2701.

   El conjunto británico Florilegium nos presenta esta adapatción para diversos instrumentos de las sonatas en trío, originariamente compuestas para órgano. Encontramos en ellas, traverso barroco, viola da gamba, láud barroco, clave, violín barroco, viola barroca y cello barroco. Un universo tímbrico fascinante para unas obras que suponen un auténtico monumento para el instrumento rey. Veremos qué tal funcionan estos arreglos.


Nordic Sounds 2.
Swedish Radio Choir - Peter Dijkstra.
Channel Classics CCSSA32812.

   Segundo volumen de esa serie que Dijkstra y el excepcional coro de la radio sueca están llevando a cabo, interpretando piezas de compositores nórdicos contemporáneos. Una música que se caracteriza por la búsqueda de sonoridades etéreas y de ambientes sonoros fascinantes. La labor de este coro sueco es bien conocida por todos los amantes de la música coral, y Peter Dijkstra es uno de los grandes cantores y directores de la zona belga-holandesa. Un acierto asegurado.

Josquin Desprez (c.1440-1521).

De profundis. Motets.

Weser-Renaissance - Manfred Cordes. 

cpo.

   Aunque salido a finales de agosto, traigo ahora este disco por su alto interés. Motetes del gran Josquin, interpretados por uno de los cojuntos con mayor tradición en la interpretación de polifonía renacentista en Europa, a pesar de que su fama todavía no se puede comparar con la de los grandes conjuntos que transitan también por estos repertorios y que nos vienen a todos a la cabeza. Aún así, la calidad de este conjunto es contrastada y con este repetorio suelen ser una garantia de disfrute.

Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1756).

La Dirindina. Sinfonias & Sonatas.

L'Arte dell'Arco - Federico Guglielmo.

cpo.

   Siempre es bueno cuando se resctan piezas poco transitadas y mejor aún si se trata de obras inéditas. Si además se trata de un compositor cuya fama es generada apenas por una serie de obras concretas, el regocijo debe ser aún mucho mayor. El caso de Scarlatti hijo es este, pues su fama se debe casi en exclusiva a sus 555 sonatas para clave, por lo que cuando se graban piezas vocales y orquestales siempre me alegro tremendamente. La Dirindina es un intermezzo vocal de carácter cómico, una farsetta que versa sobre la relación de una supuesta diva de la ópera y su maestro. Se cuenta con el concurso de tres cantantes, de los cuales al menos dos sonorán al melómanos más avezado. Se completa el disco con algunas sinfonías orquestales y sonatas camerísticas que hacen aún de mayor interés este registro.

Georg Phillip Telemann (1681-1767).

Wind Concertos, Vol. 8.

Camerata Köln & La Stagione Frankfurt - Michael Schnerider.

cpo.

    Estos conjutos alemanes continúan con la integral de los conciertos para instrumentos de viento de Telemann, el compositor más prolífico de la historia, lo que hace que esta empresa, a pesar de tratarse solo de un repertorio muy específico dentro del inmenso corpus compositivo del mismo, suponga todo un hito. La calidad de los intérpretes está sobradamente demostrada, tanto en otros repertorios, como en los siete anteriores volúmenes de esta integral. A tiro fijo.

Domenico Sarri (1679-1744).

Dixit Dominus. Missa.

Sächsisches Vocalensemble & Batzdorfer Hofkapelle - Matthias Jung.

cpo.

   Domenico Sarri (o Sarro) es uno de esos compositores napolitanos muy poco conocidos, de los que ayudó a desarrollar y catapultar la ópera barroca en Napoli a las cotas más altas. Aquí se nos trae una muestra de su producción sacra, en la que se denota su estilo marcadamente napolitano. La interpretación, sin parecer excesivamente maravillosa, hace buena justicia a esta música, que solo por su carácter ignoto, ya hace que merezca la pena todo el disco.

¡Disfruten!

The Choir Project al día [01-IX-2012]

Jacob Regnart (c.1540-1599): Quare tristis es, anima mea? a 4

Cinquecento (Reniassance Vokal).

Franco-flemish master around Europe.

   Stephen Rice, musicologist and conductor of The Brabant Ensemble, says about Regnart and his music:

"In contrast to the dearth of information we have about many of even the best-known Renaissance composers, the life and activities of Jacob Regnart are comparatively well documented. The reason for this is his long and almost continuous employment in the service of the Imperial Habsburg family, the running of whose chapel establishments was meticulously noted. Regnart was also the composer of several popular collections of German songs in three parts, and the wide dissemination of his music also contributes to our knowledge of his life and works.

It is not uncommon in early modern Europe for more than one family member to join the same trade or profession: among composers one thinks of the brothers Arnold and Hugo de Lantins in the early fifteenth century, and Antoine and Robert Févin around 1500. Jacob Regnart is unusual, however, in being one of no fewer than five brothers who were all ecclesiastical musicians. Two, Charles and Pascasius, were employed by the Spanish Habsburg king, Philip II; Augustin was a canon at Lille; and the best-known other than Jacob was François, who worked at Tournai and later for the Austrian Habsburgs, and by whom numerous motets and chansons survive. Augustin published a motet collection by his brothers, to which François contributed twenty-four pieces, and Jacob ten.

   The relative ages of the brothers are not known; Jacob seems likely to have been born in the early 1540s. He entered Habsburg service as early as 1557, presumably as a boy chorister, though by 1564 he was being paid the standard salary for an adult singer. Apart from a spell studying in Italy in the late 1560s, Regnart remained in Habsburg service until his death on 16 October 1599; during that time he worked under the emperors Maximilian II and Rudolf II and the Archduke Ferdinand, in Vienna, Prague and Innsbruck. His publications of secular music appeared at regular intervals from the 1570s onwards, often achieving several reprints. His sacred music also was published in quantity, though some publications are lost and other works survive only in manuscript. Perhaps the most important of Regnart’s publications (in his own eyes, at least) was the series of three books of Mass settings published in 1602/3. Although these emerged posthumously, Regnart himself left an extended dedicatory preface to the emperor Rudolf II in the first volume, so it would appear that he was working on this ‘complete edition’ before his death. In it he describes himself as having served ‘for many years as Vice-Master of the [Imperial] choir’.

   Regnart’s style is not dissimilar to that of his slightly older compatriot, Orlandus Lassus. Regnart and Lassus, indeed, shared numerous biographical details, both having worked as expatriate singers from a young age (Lassus in Naples), both remaining for long periods in the service of one family (Lassus at the Dukes of Bavaria in Munich), and both achieving wide recognition through their publications. The two composers were known to one another, moreover: Lassus recommended Regnart to the Saxon royal court in 1580, though Regnart did not move to Dresden. No contemporary composer matched Lassus’s output of works in different genres, though with his German songs, Italian-style villanelle, and sacred music, Regnart came closer than most. Regnart’s music can be differentiated from that of Lassus, however, by his slightly more conservative approach, showing a greater interest in working out contrapuntal ideas, whereas Lassus was increasingly pithy and concerned with the rhetorical projection of the text.

   Perhaps the most unusual piece on this recording is the setting of Quare tristis es, anima mea? (‘Why are you cast down, O my soul?’—words from Psalm 42). The Psalm text is intended to be reassuring, but Regnart’s setting begins in a highly destabilized tonality, avoiding a full cadence for the first fifteen bars. When the piece does settle down, it nevertheless remains in an anxious Phrygian tonal area, associated with lamenting. Regnart evidently wished to emphasize the heaviness of the soul rather than the comfort of God in this case".

   In my opinion, this piece is really wonderful, especially by the use of chromaticisms and its character tremendously painful, all in a clearly Franco-Flemish style.

   This performance is awesome, precisely because it highlights the plaintive character and the use of "Musica ficta". The voices are fantastic, with fantastic tunning and sonority.

Essential disc for provide insight into the music of this, unfortunately, little known author.

• Composer.
• Album.
• Performer.
• Face page.

The Choir Project al día [27-VIII-2012]

Josquin Desprez (c.1450-1521): Missa L'homme armé sexti toni a 4.
The Tallis Scholars - Peter Phillips.
One of the best masses of the history.

    Peter Phillips say about Josquin, his L'homme armé masses and this mass:
"There were at least 31 Mass-settings based on the L'homme armé melody in the Renaissance period. The two by Josquin des Prés were written about half-way through the spectrum, between those of Dufay and Ockeghem on the one hand and the two each by Morales and Palestrina on the other. It is especially valuable to hear the Josquin settings together, since it is assumed that while writing the earlier of them, Super voces musicales, he conceived new compositional challenges which he confronted in Sexti toni. There is an extra merit in having a performance of Super voces musicales on disc, since I believe that, on account of its length and the tessitura of its voice parts, a concert performance of it complete would be virtually impossible.

    The earliest reliable source of the L'homme armé melody is a late 15th century manuscript in Naples, which contains six anonymous Masses based on the song. The text may be translated 'Fear the armed man; word has gone out that everyone should arm himself with a haubregon (1) of iron', which may refer to a crusade against the Turks (see Lewis Lockwood in the New Grove). This Neapolitan version of L'homme armé poses two unsolved problems: whether it was originally a monophonic song or the tenor of a lost three-voice chanson; and whether it originally had any more verses, as the refrain structure rather suggests. Apart from the composers already mentioned, there were Mass-settings founded on L'homme armé by Busnois (who was said, by Pietro Aaron in 1523, to have been the original composer of the song), Regis, Tinctoris, Obrecht, Brumel, Mouton, de Silva, Carver and several others. The series was finally closed in the 17th century by Carissimi, who crowned the tradition with a 12-voice work.

    At first hearing the two Josquin L'homme armé Masses are worlds apart. One might guess, quite simply, that Super voces musicales was a medieval composition, and Sexti toni a mature Renaissance one. In fact the manuscript evidence is that they were probably both from Josquin's so-called middle period which ended about the year 1500, though it is assumed that Super voces musicales was written first. They were both printed by Petrucci in 1502.

    Josquin's Mass Sexti toni (in the sixth mode) is so called because he has transposed the melody to make F its final (as opposed to the more normal G), giving it a major key tonality. This element of transposition is one of the features borrowed from Super voces musicales, though there, as we have seen, it was turned into a constructional principle. The idea of stating the melody in retrograde has also been transferred from the other Mass, though instead of giving the direct and retrograde forms in consecutive statements as he did before, here in the third Agnus Dei Josquin states them both at the same time. These form the lowest parts in a movement where the number of voice-parts has been increased from four to six, and the upper voices are in two paired canons at the unison. While this shows exceptional compositional virtuosity, the actual sound in this final Agnus is most unfamiliar, suggesting, if anything, the methods of such modern minimalist composers as Philip Glass.

    The remainder of the setting seems more relaxed, though in fact Josquin can be heard constantly to be trying out new speeds, new rhythms and new scorings for the L'homme armé tune, now complete, now with a few notes used as the basis for an ostinato pattern or a canon. The wide overall range of the four voice-parts brings to the writing the kind of sonority which is associated with Palestrina, and Josquin constantly used this to imaginative effect, nowhere more memorably than at Et resurrexit in the Credo. For showing all these different aspects of his extraordinary technique, this Mass must rank as one of the most accomplished productions of a composer long held to be the greatest writer of his time."

    I think this mass is one of the best of history. The "Kyrie" and "Agnus Dei" are simply incredible. Music that lifts the soul.

    For me, the performance of The Tallis Scholars is the best fort these pieces. This album is simply indispensable, a "classic" recording of Josquin music.
Pure "Tallis Scholars" sound: brilliant, perfect pitch, balance and phrasing. A real lesson in how to perform Renaissance polyphony.

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Mertens, ese bajo

   Escuchando hace unos pocos días el primer disco del volumen 16 de la integral de las cantatas bachianas, que Ton Koopman grabara en varios años, con el concurso de los sellos Erato y luego el suyo propio -Antoine Marchand- bajo el auspicio de Challenge Records, caí una vez más en la cuenta de lo unido que ha estado el bajo alemán Klaus Mertens a la figura omnipresente de BACH. Y esta unión es tan absolutamente sólida, que uno se da cuenta de que este bajo, para muchos el bajo bachiano por excelencia, que diría es el único bajo de la historia que ha interpretado todas las partes compuestas por el Kantor para esta voz, es decir, que Mertens ha cantado todas las líneas de las piezas bachianas, incluyendo la integral de las cantatas, las pasiones, oratorios, motetes, la misa en latín...

   Esto convierte a Mertens, además, en el único cantante, incluyendo cualquier tesitura, que ha logrado tan impresionante logro. Debemos recordar, porque parece lo justo, que la figura de este bajo va unida indefectiblemente a la de Ton Koopman y su conjunto barroco, con el que ha grabado prácticamente la totalidad -si no todas- de esas piezas.

   Si uno se siente ínfimo, minúsculo e insignificante ante la inmenso e infinita figura de BACH, creo que Mertens ha logrado algo que encumbra su figura y que le hace estar más cerca del que ha sido su inspiración y al que le ha dedicado toda su vida y su voz. Salve, pues, Klaus Mertens.

The Choir Project al día [20-VIII-2012]

Josquin Desprez (c.1450/55-1521): De profundis clamavi a 4.
The Binchois Consort - Andrew Kirkman.
Semper Josquin.

   Andrew Kirkman says about this piece:

"The four-voice De profundis has conflicting attributions to Josquin and ‘Champion’, presumably one of the brothers Jacques and Nicolas Champion who were employed in the Hapsburg Imperial Chapel in the first third of the sixteenth century. For Glarean, though, there were no doubts either about the authorship of this piece or its quality; for him it was the quintessence of Josquin, in both its beauty of expression and its novelty: ‘Here indeed I should like everyone to observe carefully how the beginning of this song is composed, with how much expression and how much dignity he has brought the phrase De profundis … nor is he alone [in the modal practice of this piece] in a clearly immoderate love of novelty and excessive zeal to snatch a little glory by being unusual, a failing with which the more talented professors of disciplines are almost always afflicted …’ Original and unprecedented though the modal flexibility of this piece may be, in Glarean’s opinion Josquin ‘… has accomplished it learnedly and without giving the slightest offense to the ears’".

   In my opinion, this performance, only with male voices, is intimate with a very delicate and careful sonority. The lines intersect with great clarity and the phrasing is very good. The sound of the bass is absolutely fantastic, the best of the ensemble.

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Bartoli ya no tiene "Mission" secreta

   Aún con la mitad de las pistas por descubrir en ese juego lanzado a través de las redes sociales por el cual Cecilia Bartoli daba los detalles de su próximo disco -y del que se dio buena cuenta ya en una entrada en este blog-, ya se han desvelado todos los detalles de ese futuro lanzamiento, pues Bartoli, a través de un correo electrónico a los miembros de su comunidad virtual, ha presentado ya el contenido del disco y los diversos formatos del mismo, además de poder pedirse ya en una serie de tiendas de venta online de las más habituales para los discófilos. Concretamente, esta es la info proporcionada.

   Una suerte de gran lanzamiento, con diversos formatos digitales, físicos -con una edición en LP de vinilo, otra edición en CD deluxe-, publicación de una novela relacionada con el tema del disco, escrita por la siempre cercana al mundo de la música barroca Donna Leon...

   Para todos los ansiosos, aún queda por esperar un poquito, concreatamente hasta el 24 de septiembre, fecha en la que anuncia el lanzamiento a nivel mundial, aunque ya puede hacerse el pre order en estas tiendas, si es que así consigue calmarse un tanto la ansiedad de algunos. Esperaremos, pues.

The Choir Project al día [11-VIII-2012]

William Byrd (1540-1623): Quomodo cantabimus a 8 / Piilippe de Monte (1521-1603): Super flumina Babylonis a 8.
The Cardinall's Musick - Andrew Carwood (David Skinner) / The Sixteen - Harry Christophers.
Two minds, two motets, two forms, two ideas... but only one thing: music.

   In words of David Skinner:

Philippe de Monte, a Flemish composer who spent much of his early life in ltaly. came to England in 1554 when he served in the houseband chapel choir of Prince of Spain (later to boecome Philip II), husband of Mary Tudor. On Christmas Day of that year a geat festal Mass was celebrated in St. Paul's Cathedral with musicians from Philip's Capilla FLamenca and Mary's Chapel Royal, and it is thought that this was one of the earliest occasions when Philippe de Monte, then 33, met the young Wiiliam Byrd. While it was reponed that de Monte was unhappy in England (he len in 1555). he seems to have maintained same son of contact with William Byrd well into the 1580s when the two composers are known to have exchanged compositions.

   Lbl, Add. Ms 23624, is a collection of motets asembled by the 18th-century musical antiquarian John Aicock, from a set of partbooks of which only two have survived (Ob, Tenbury MS 389 and the Jarnes Ms). Alcock also cooped certain glosses from the some of the now lost books which tell the story. The following appears before de Monte's Super flumlna Babylonls: 'This Piece of Musick was compose'd by Sig': Phillipo de Monte, master of y^e Children of y^e Emperor Maximillan the 2^ds Chapel, & sent by
him, to M^r: Bird - 1583', while at the head of Byrd's Quomodo cantablmus are the words 'This Piece, was made by M^r: W^m: Byrd, to send unto M^r: Phiilip de Monte, 1584'.

   De Monte set the four verses of Psalm 136, while Bvrd set verses four to seven. Super flumina Babylonis, aeemingly harmless biblical text, was a notorius psalms of captivity to the recusant community of Elizabethan England. De Monte pointedly rearranged the verses in order to drive home a political statement to Byrd: 'How shall we [ie. you, the English] sing the Lord song in a strange land?' De Monte suggestion could be construed as a request to Byrd not to waste his talents in a fettered country, but escape to a more religiously tolerant society. In this context 'We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof' seems more to be a suggestion on noncompliance than any call of defeat. Byrd's reply begins with a three-part canon (one of the parts by inversion) within the eight-part texture. His polyphony is dense and structurally sound, as if to show de Monte that his faith still stands strong: 'Remember the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem', says the psalmist. At the destruction of Jerusalem (587 BC), the neighbouring nation of the Edomites joined forces with the besieging army. The prophets denounce them far more bitterly than they denounce the Chaldean invaders. How did Byrd sing the Lord's song in a strange land? With cunning, artfulness and ingenuity.

   For me the performances of these piece are really different: The Cardinall's Musick opt for a more intimate in sound, but more dramatically in the realization, however, The Sixteen perform de Montes' motet with more choral sound but a more relaxed and calm reading.
In two cases, the music is really good and the performance is too fantastic. Franco-flemish-English connection.

• William Byrd.
• Byrd album.
• Philippe de Monte.
• De Monte album.
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• Face page.

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