The Early Music Club (EMC)

[Bogey]

What Erato said....buy with confidence.

[Coopmv]

Thanks! It's on the wishlist then.

Q

And that wishlist never gets shorter ...     

[The new erato]

If Cavalli counts as early, I'm listening
to the new Artemisia on Glossa, and it's minblowingly goog!

[Bogey]

If Cavalli counts as early, I'm listening
to the new Artemisia on Glossa, and it's minblowingly goog!

Great question.  What are the general dates (I am sure that there is PLENTY of grey area) for "early" music?  Does it end post Monteverdi?

A link to that one please, Erato.

[Coopmv]

Great question.  What are the general dates (I am sure that there is PLENTY of grey area) for "early" music?  Does it end post Monteverdi?

A link to that one please, Erato.

For me, any works composed prior to 1600 ...

[Drasko]

Personally I wouldn't count it as early music.

[Que]

 

What a feast is this set!

CD6 with secular and sacred works by another Flemish composer from the Franco-Flemish school: Matthaeus Pipelare (c.1450-c.1515).

A short blurb: Matthaeus Pipelare was a Renaissance-era composer of vocal music in both the sacred and secular realms. He wrote no instrumental works, though he likely played several musical instruments. He is highly regarded by musicologists because of his versatile style: Pipelare was adept at writing both polyphonic and homophonic works and had a knowing grasp of complex structures. He also divulged a strong talent for melody and must be regarded as among the finest composers of his day even if, in the end, he ranks a rung or so below Josquin Desprez (1440 - 1521) and Johannes Ockeghem (1450 - 1495).[Robert Cummings]

What to say about the disc other than I absolutely love this kind of music! And Pipelare's music is of great quality. Despite the fact that much was lost during WWII  eleven masses survived! But where are they? Thanks to Van Nevel at least this composer gets the exposure he deserves, but as far as the discography on Pipelare: apart from few bits on song collections - this is it!

Performances are exquisite: the mass L'homme armé with its deep basses - absolutely wonderfull. This recording won the 1998 Cannes Classical Award for Best Choral Music.

Q

[rickardg]

What a feast is this set!

I just got it and I agree completely (at least for the first few discs I've heard). Only one small quibble --- no notes, and this for repertoire that isn't exactly mainstream. That's why I really enjoy your series of posts here, Que.

[chasmaniac]

 

I agree, especially with regard to the basses. But there's something else here. This music's imitative aspect is made particularly clear, the voices chasing each other, locking and unlocking, in a manner that is almost (dare I say it?) sexual. Great record.

[Que]

 

Back to this marvelous set with a great sample of the riches of Early Music.
Now CD7 with the 12-voice "Missa Et ecce terrae motus" (the "Earthquake Mass") by Antoine Brumel (c.1460 - c.1520), a French member of the Franco-Flemish School and pupil of Josquin Desprez. Extensive notes by Peter Philips on the Missa are found HERE.

The review from Gramphone:
Brumel's 12-part Mass Et ecce terrae mains is a remarkable work, well worth reviving for modern performers and listeners. Paul van Nevel deserves a vote of thanks for recognizing its value, for restoring what was missing in the first Agnus Del and for conducting this splendid performance. It is remarkable, also, that in the sixteenth century, when it was usual to perform exclusively contemporary music, this Mass was recognized for its worth by no less a musician than Lassus. Having ordered a copy of it to be made for performance at the Bavarian Court—and that must have been some 50 years after Brumel's death—Lassus had the names of his singers, many of whom can be identified, inscribed in his massive score; and from this evidence it seems clear that he himself sang with the second tenors. It is a work of great magnificence and one can well imagine the tremendous impression it must have made during a solemn Easter liturgy in the private chapel of a princely household.

The Huelgas Ensemble are expert in sustaining the long flowing lines of the counterpoint, with their rippling rhythms rising and falling like small waves on the surface of an ocean. The extremely slow-moving harmony is carefully managed, so as rarely, if ever, to sound tedious. The dynamics are well under control, and the soft, reedy tonequality is fairly evenly matched throughout the 12 vocal parts, which is quite an achievement.

Paul van Nevel deserves a second vote of thanks for his other 'premiere', the sequence Dies irae from Brumel's Requiem Mass, and for his imaginative interpretation of the alternatim scheme: in addition to the polyphony there are slow, semimetrical chant sections, solemn brass sections and fauxbourdons. I particularly enjoyed the viol-like quality of the voices in the quiet closing phrases of the sequence. Highly recommended. Gramophone [5/1991]

Van Nevel premiered this work on disc, but the Tallis Scholars and the Ensemble Clément Janequin followed suit!

The subsequent Gramophone review of the recording of the Tallis Scholars tells us more about both recordings: [on the Tallis:] the overall effect is one of controlled, if somewhat remote, precision and perfection—the feeling of remoteness arising, perhaps, from my having heard some months ago, the "World Premier" performance of this newly-restored Mass by the Huelgas Ensemble under Paul van Nevel. There is an infectious warmth and sense of involvement in the singing of the Belgian group. [...] The Tallis Scholars sing a semitone higher than the written pitch, which is that chosen by the Huelgas Ensemble. Van Nevel cultivates a rich reedy vocal quality and the lower pitch has the advantage of encouraging deeper and darker sonorities; though the sound is more opaque, lacking the clarity of The Tallis Scholars. Where the two choirs differ most, however, is in the last movement, the Agnus Dei. The Munich source, used by both choirs, is deficient at this point and some reconstruction is needed. Van Nevel has supplied an ingenious canonic solution to the first (and third) Agnus Dei, with its "virtuosic and turbulent" progression of mensural changes. He has, moreover, replaced the missing Agnus Dei II by a section from an independent Danish source, a section rejected by Peter Phillips and Francis Knights on the grounds that it was scored for six voices only and voices using different ranges from those in the rest of the Mass. The net result is that the two choirs present what amounts to two completely different final movements.

I have the version by the Ensemble Clément Janequin and used it for direct comparison:

[asin]B00009EPFF[/asin]

I'm quoting excerpts from the review in Gramophone again, since its very instructive in this case as well:

[...]Dominique Visse likes to linger over particular passages and bring Out some of the inside details. This is most welcome, because the two recordings of the cycle (Paul Van Nevel in 1990 and Peter Phillips in 1992) listed above tend to keep a steady tempo and charge past much of the lovely inner writing Visse makes more audible. Especially in the 'Benedictus' and the Agnus Dci, he reveals new glories in this enormously complicated score. His flexibility of tempo also makes it possible for the singers to give more value to the texts, which is again a welcome change. [...] Whereas Phillips had 24 voices and no instruments, and Van Nevel had four instruments, Visse has 12 voices and 12 instruments. Whether Brumel is likely to have had such forces around 1500 seems unlikely (though the jury is still out on these matters), but it does bring certain advantages: it makes it possible for Visse to pitch the whole thing fairly low (a tone below modern concert pitch) without losing clarity on the crucial bottom lines and to have men singing the top line, led of course by his own marvellously vibrant and expressive singing. The result has a slightly nasal quality that is not at all in line with what we expect here

I've highlighted the IMO important characteristics of the recording. I liked the Ensemble Clément Janequin when I bought it, though it never made the impact the Van Nevel did. It sounds quite different. And now hearing them next to each other, there is really no contest. The decision of Dominique Visse to use more (instrumental) forces really does not work and amounts to some additional fanfare that blures the choral lines and disturbes the balance between the different movements. Also the "flexibility of tempo" is a failure, causing the music to sound disjointed with a blurry effect of intensity coming and going. Instead Van Nevel slowly builds a carefully structured and balanced musical cathedral with sustaining and increasing musical and emotional intensity. The "slightly nasal quality" that is the result of men sining the top lines because of the downward pitching is rather more than "slightly" and enoyes me to no end... To top it off the two partial reconstructions Van Nevel did do work very well. He is the clear winner here!

Q

[chasmaniac]

I will try at whiles to post more items concerning Machaut. He deserves attention. For a start, here's Todd McComb's introduction and homage.

Guillaume de Machaut (d.1377) is one of the undisputed pinnacle geniuses of Western music, and the most famous composer of the Middle Ages. Today his four-voice Mass of Notre Dame is a textbook example for medieval counterpoint, and has served sufficiently to maintain his reputation across shifts in fashion. However Machaut's work is extensive, with his French songs & poetry dominating the fourteenth century by both their quality and volume. A series of carefully prepared illuminated manuscripts, undertaken for members of the French royalty, preserve his complete artistic output. Along with these major sources, various pieces are duplicated in scattered sources throughout Europe. His life and work are thus extremely well-preserved for the period, and his position as the most distinguished composer of the century has never wavered.

Machaut was apparently born in the vicinity of Rheims in Champagne, around the year 1300. He is first known as the secretary of John of Luxembourg in 1323, and used the position to travel extensively for various battles and political events. In approximately 1340, Machaut returned to Rheims to take up the position of canon (he had previously been an absentee office-holder) together with his brother Jean. However, he continued to serve John of Luxembourg until the latter's death at Crécy in 1346, and then served his daughter Bonne, who appears in the Remède de Fortune. The remainder of the fourteenth century was an epic of wars and plagues, and one of the few periods in which the population of Europe declined, but Machaut's reputation continued to rise. He went on to serve two kings of France, and was charged with a task as important as accompanying hostages during the English war. In 1361 the Dauphine was received in Machaut's quarters, an exceptional event. By the 1370s Machaut's name was associated with Pierre de Lusignan, King of Cyprus, thus establishing his fame nearly as far as Asia.

Machaut is frequently portrayed today as an avant garde composer, especially because of his position with regard to the early Ars Nova (a new, more detailed rhythmic notation), but one must also emphasize the masterful continuity with which he employed established forms. While using the same basic formats, he made subtle changes to meter and rhyme scheme, allowing for more personal touches and a more dramatic presentation. Indeed, Machaut's poetry is one of the most impressive French outputs of the medieval era, serving as an example even for Chaucer. The theme of courtly love dominates his writing, becoming heavily symbolized in the guises of such characters as Fortune & Hope, and the personal dramas in which they act. Machaut's poetic output, and by extension the subset of texts he chose to set to music, is both personal and ritualized, lending it a timeless quality. Some of the love themes date to Ovid and beyond, from whom they had been elaborated first by the troubadours of Provence and then by the northern trouvères, and so it is truly a classical tradition to which they belong.

Machaut marks the end of the lineage of the trouvères, and with it the development of the monophonic art song in the West. This aspect of his work is found in the virelais and especially the lengthy lais. He also acted decisively to refine the emerging polyphonic song forms ballade & rondeau, and these were to become the dominant fixed forms for the following generations. What Machaut achieved so eloquently is an idiomatic and natural combination of words with music, forcefully compelling in its lyrical grace and rhythmic sophistication. His songs are immediately enjoyable, because he was able to shape the smallest melodic nuances as well as to conceive of forms on a large scale. The latter is reflected in his poetic-musical creations Le Remède de Fortune and Le Veoir Dit, as well as in his Messe de Notre Dame. One must not lose sight of Machaut's position within the sweep of medieval history, as his great "multimedia" productions had clear precedents in the Roman de la Rose and especially the Roman de Fauvel. It is Machaut's ability to unite cogent and elegant melodic thinking with the new rhythmic possibilities of the Ars Nova which ultimately makes his musical reputation.

Although he wrote music for more than one hundred of his French poems, and even for half a dozen motets in Latin, Machaut remains best-known for his Mass of Notre Dame. This mass was written as part of the commemoration of the Virgin endowed by the Machaut brothers at Rheims, and was intended for performance in a smaller setting by specialized soloists. The most striking aspect of the piece is not simply the high quality of the contrapuntal writing, but the architectural unity of the Ordinary sections as well. Machaut's mass is not the earliest surviving mass cycle (there are two which predate it), but it is the earliest by a single composer and indeed the earliest to display this degree of unity. While the chants used as cantus firmus do vary, opening gestures and motivic figures are used to confirm the cyclical nature of the work. Technique of this magnitude is frequently offered as evidence of Machaut's prescience, given the prominence of such forms a hundred or two hundred years later, but the musical quality of his cycle can be appreciated on its own terms. Indeed, the same can be said for Machaut's oeuvre as a whole. ~ Todd McComb, 4/98

[chasmaniac]

 

As I have the box and thus lack this album's notes, I must ask whether the Desprez and Ockeghem tracks are related. Is the second based on the first? Together, they sound a diptych that could have been written yesterday.

[Todd]

Looks like Archiv will release a big ol' honkin' box of works by Victoria this summer.  I'm thinking these are new recordings as Michael Noone doesn't appear to have recorded for Archiv before, though I could be wrong about that.  (Perhaps it's a reissue of micro-label recordings, for instance.)  Do I need ten discs of Victoria's music all at once?  Hmm . . .

[jlaurson]

Do I need ten discs of Victoria's music all at once?  Hmm . . .

No. Of course not. But is that really the question and/or issue that would/will keep you from purchasing it?

That said, Victoria is absolute top-of-the-line Renaissance music... and any musical omnivore will want at least some T.L.d.Victoria.

[Todd]

No. Of course not. But is that really the question and/or issue that would/will keep you from purchasing it?

That said, Victoria is absolute top-of-the-line Renaissance music... and any musical omnivore will want at least some T.L.d.Victoria.

Oh, I do have some, and I rather enjoy Victoria (though I enjoy Morales even more).  Do I need 10 more discs, though?  Well, if the price is right, I'm leaning toward 'yes' . . . 

(Michael Noone and company are rather good in this arena, so that helps matters a bit.)

[Que]

Looks like Archiv will release a big ol' honkin' box of works by Victoria this summer.  I'm thinking these are new recordings as Michael Noone doesn't appear to have recorded for Archiv before, though I could be wrong about that.  (Perhaps it's a reissue of micro-label recordings, for instance.)  Do I need ten discs of Victoria's music all at once?  Hmm . . .

Very interesting! Noone and his ensemble recorded for Glossa before. As it turns out, these will not be reissues but new recordings:

In celebration of our 10th birthday and the 400th anniversary of the death of the finest of Spain's Renaissance composers, Ensemble Plus Ultra is releasing a series of ten CDs of the works of Tomás Luis de Victoria (c. 1548—1611). With an emphasis on works composed by Victoria in Madrid, and versions of works that have never before been recorded, the project features Andrés Cea Galan playing the historic organs of Lerma and Tordesillas, and collaborations with Spanish plainsong specialists Schola Antiqua (dir. Juan Carlos Asensio) and the specialist historical wind players of His Majesty Sagbutts & Cornetts (dir. Jeremy West).

The series of recordings is a project of the Fundación Caja Madrid, and the CDs will appear on the DGG Archiv label.

MORE HERE

Q

[chasmaniac]

Fine set of madrigals here. Less moaning and exclaiming than sometimes in this repertory, solid 5-part music.

[Que]

As I have the box and thus lack this album's notes, I must ask whether the Desprez and Ockeghem tracks are related. Is the second based on the first? Together, they sound a diptych that could have been written yesterday.

I can't tell. The authorship of either piece is allegedly doubtfull. I'm not very familair with Ockeghem, but on the Desprez I'm inclined to go along wit that.

Still, whoever composed them did a great job IMO.

Fine set of madrigals here. Less moaning and exclaiming than sometimes in this repertory, solid 5-part music.

He seems to be interesting Italian based (Franco-)Flemish composer! (Wiki on Giaches de Wert (1535 – 1596)) And quite productive too.

Q

[Drasko]

As I have the box and thus lack this album's notes, I must ask whether the Desprez and Ockeghem tracks are related. Is the second based on the first? Together, they sound a diptych that could have been written yesterday.

Booklet doesn't mention any particular relation between the two pieces.

[Que]

A terrific disc that should have been included in the Secret Labyrinth set. Besides the performances, the value and significance of this disc is first and foremost due to the music and its composer. Matteo da Pergia aka Mattheus de Perusio wrote as an Italian composer in late Ars Nova/ Ars Subtilior style. (An interesting read about the use of Ars Nova in Italy HERE)

An introduction on the composer:
Italian composer from the beginning of the 15th century, deceased problably in the first days of January 1418. Very little is known of his life. Surely, a native from Perugia, he seems to have made most of his career at the service of Pietro Filargos Candia (1340-1410), archbishop of Milan since 1402 and promoted to cardinal in 1405. Pietro had studied in Paris, before teaching theology at the Sorbonne; he was an enthusiastic francophile, something which in part explains the predominance of french style in Matteo's music. In 1406, Matteo accompanies Pietro to Pistoia and Bologne, to be elected anti-pope: Alexander V. He remains in Milan to the service of Pietro's successor, John XXIII, returning to Milan after the deposition of the later in 1414. Matteo becomes then the first magister capellæ — chapel master — of the Milan Cathedral, by the time still under construction.

Matteo bequeathed us a significant number of works, all contained in the Modena manuscript, which presumably was written under his guidance. His works are both religious and profanes. He is a composer midway between the italian and french tradition, employing techniques from both. His music crosses not only geographical borders, but also temporal borders: some works are written in a style reminiscent of the 14th century; other incorporate the stylistic innovations of the 15th century, such as the greater attention given to the intelligibility of the text being sung, and a more harmonic conception of the polyphonic texture.

I'm very much into the quixotic Ars Subtilior and revelled in Van Nevel "Febus Avant!" disc (included in the box set and previously discussed HERE and HERE.) My impression of Matteo da Perugia is that he was a brilliant composer who went is own way and was one of a kind. His music has a free, willful feel to it with unusual treatment of melody using rhythmic imperfections and quite edgy harmonies. A true original. Van Nevel, an idiosyncratic himself, is perfect for the job. My only regret is that thee is so little of Perugia's 30 surviving works available on record - the blooming Early Music bussiness has its work cut out!  

The disc has been OP for a while, but I noticed that there are still a few copies floating around. And perhaps Sony (France) will decide to do a reissue?

The review from Gramophone:

Matteo da Perugia is one of the oddly neglected composers of the years around 1400. Though evidently Italian, he wrote largely in the French manner, even when setting Italian texts; so neither national tradition adopts him today. Until recently his music was known only from one manuscript and a related tiny fragment, so he was considered to have had no impact, though the discovery of two new manuscripts containing his work may call for a revision of that view. Most seriously, after the initial flurry of excitement when Willi Apel first published Perugia's astonishingly complicated music in 1950, scholars began to say there was nothing innovative about his music (though without being able to date any of it). But his known output of over 30 pieces is extraordinarily varied in style and inspiration: he seems to have tried everything, often with stunning success.

Paul Van Nevel's collection of nine pieces does ample justice to the variety of his output: French songs, Mass movements, motets and an Italian song; from the most chromatic and angular to the most harmonious; from the energetic to the gentle. As usual, he is occasionally headstrong in his choice of scoring, from the use of a female chorus in He/as April to transposing the middle stanza (only) of Puisque la mart up a fourth. But everything is done to serve the music, and everything is with an eye to revealing the wayward beauty of this fascinating composer. He helps you to hear inside the music. The sound is good and clear; the singers are excellent; and he contributes a characteristically challenging booklet-note that explains his approach. DF

Q