Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

For its new Glossa release of Josquin, Cantica Symphonia (which has given us recordings of Dufay, Isaac and Busnois in recent years) reflect modern performance thinking for one of the greatest composers in music. Giuseppe Maletto has united a strong group of Italian singers to provide distinctive accounts of motets including the Stabat Mater, the five-part Salve Regina, the seven-sectioned Vultum tuum cycle as well as the Ave Maria… virgo serena. To leaven this vocal density a team of organ, harp, fiddle, slide trumpet and sackbut add instrumental versions of a group of Josquin’s secular compositions, as well as selectively combining with the voices in the polyphony. Marco Bizzarini’s booklet essay traces Josquin’s elusive career path, which included Rome, Ferrara and possibly also Milan, and the importance in his output of sacred compositions of Marian works.

JOSQUIN DES PREZ De profundis. In exitu Israel. Domine ne in furore tuo. Miserere mei. Memor esto verbi tui. Qui habitat in adjutorio. Misericordias Domini • Manfred Cordes, dir; Wester-Renaissance Bremen • CPO 777 588-2 (70:26 Text and Translation)


This is a good selection of motets because it hardly duplicates the last two such discs. On Orlando Consort’s collection of Josquin’s motets ( Fanfare 34:1), only De profundis is heard, and none of them are on David Skinner’s more varied disc (33:1). It follows another Josquin disc by Cordes (35:6), though it was recorded a year later, a fine offering that unfortunately had to compete with an excellent recording of a Mass in Peter Phillips’s ongoing series. The unusual aspect of this program is its concentration on psalm settings, Psalms 129, 113, 37, 50, 118, and 90, respectively; the final piece is a compilation of texts mostly from six other psalms. The predominant sentiment that runs through these texts is repentance, most notably in the Miserere mei , one of the composer’s greatest works and the most familiar of these on disc. Standing apart from the rest is In exitu Israel , a psalm that simply narrates the passage of the Israelites out of Egypt and celebrates the glory of the one true God, mocking the idols who “have mouths, but speak not.” This psalm concludes Vespers every Sunday. Another familiar psalm is Qui habitat in adjutorio , which is sung every night at Compline, the concluding Office of the day, expressing not so much repentance as trust in God’s mercy.


The two psalms just cited seem to be first recordings, and the remaining four are poorly represented on disc ( Memor esto verbi tui is on Jeremy Summerly’s Ockeghem disc, 22:1), so this collection is not only well focused but also desirable, for Cordes shows a fine grasp of the style, and the voices are warm and well blended. It may be noted that De profundis is on Andrew Kirkman’s interesting collection (25:4) with attributions to Champion as well as Josquin, but the authenticity of the Josquin attribution, like all of these pieces, is validated by Helmuth Osthoff, Jeremy Noble, and both old and new editions of the complete works. The performances by Cordes’s ensemble of eight singers are uniformly fine. Again Franz Vitzthum is a distinguished member of the group, but all the voices blend effectively. Let us have more like this, for there has never been a systematic survey of Josquin’s motets on disc.


FANFARE: J. F. Weber

A composer admired by his contemporaries, Josquin Desprez (ca 1450-1521) was a solitary artist who sublimated in his chansons the melancholy character and the elegance emblematic of the Renaissance. For their first recording, Dulces Exuviae explore the intimacy of these chansons in a fresh light: the sweet melodies are embellished by ornaments and accompanied on the lute, leaving ample room for improvisation, and thus allowing music to come out all the more alive, delicate and filled with emotion. The ensemble Dulces Exuviae is baritone Romain Bockler and lutenist Bor Zuljan.

Classical Music

"Two decades following his first album of lute intabulations by the renaissance composer Josquin des Prez (the first album of its kind), celebrated lutenist Jacob Heringman returns to this rich but largely neglected part of the repertoire to present a new recording of intabulations for lute and vihuela. In celebration of his 500th anniversary, Josquin is once more the composer behind these fascinating and compelling arrangements, and this programme explores further vocal music by this most revered of early music names, including Marian motets and realisations from his Missa de Beata Virgine. As well as employing sources of various sixteenth-century lutenist-composers, Jacob has included several of his own intabulations in this captivating programme."

Classical Music

Choral Music (Sacred) - PALESTRINA, G.P. da / JOSQUIN DES PR

Simplicity, purity and clarity.

This music was composed early in Josquin’s career when he was singing in the Sistine Chapel and while the cult of devotion to the Blessed Mother was at its height.

The simplicity, purity and clarity of the singing here is immediately apparent from the opening track, in which four of the eight singers used throughout sing the Vespers motet “Ave Maria” from which the themes of this paraphrase Mass are derived. Tuning is exquisite and the blend of voices unimpeachable. The difference in texture between the motets, when four or five singers are employed to sing each part, and the Ordinary of the Mass when two voices double up each of the four lines, creates a welcome variety in the density of sound. Special mention must be made of the lead Diskant (countertenor) Franz Vitzthum who soars without strain. If I have any criticism of the singing here, it is that the bass Ulfried Staber has a touch of the groaner - I could do with a little more sap in his tone - but in general Manfred Cordes has gathered here some of the finest exponents of European Early Music.

I usually prefer a deployment of voices currently frowned upon by the purists such as the Tallis Scholars employ, whereby there are more voices, some women, per part, singing at a higher pitch - but in this case, the warmth, phrasing and musicality of the vocalists here entirely convinces me.

The musical forms employed by Josquin are surprisingly varied: there are homophonic passages of stark simplicity alternating with complex polyrhythmic patterns and intricate melismata. Despite this complexity, the singers’ exemplary diction permits the liturgical text to emerge clearly. Cordes’ direction is free, flexible and fluid; no heavy-handed bar-beating here.

Lovely though the Mass is, my favourite track here remains the first motet: the upward sweep of the opening phrase and the ensuing canon are enchanting in their simplicity, then the heavenly Ur-melody is sustained right through to the transcendent close, “O mater Dei, memento mei. Amen”.

The sound engineering is admirable; just the right amount of air and space around the voices. The gold packaging is very attractive. The booklet provides Latin texts with German and English translations and a code to permit identification of which singers are singing what; unfortunately the notes tell you nothing about the music, only about the history and development of the Marian cult.

-- Ralph Moore, MusicWeb International

Classical Music

The Chanson L'Homme armé has been the fundament for numerous Renaissance composers to realise aesthetic mass compositions. One of the most outstanding versions is coined by Josquin Desprez which is conclusively combined with chansons on this recording. The production received several awards in France.

During the sixteenth century in Italy, the motto ‘i galli cantano’ (the Gauls are singing) circulated, acknowledging the supremacy of the Franco-Flemish ‘transalpine’ musicians who were summoned to the peninsula to serve princes and prelates in the techniques of composing and performing vocal polyphony. Josquin Desprez, ‘Giosquino’ to the Italians, was the emblematic figure: in addition to France, he was in the service of Cardinal Ascanio Sforza in both Milan and Rome (1484, 1498) and of the papal (1489-95) and Este chapels (1503-4). On the fifth centenary of the composer’s death (1521), the Odhecaton ensemble proposes to retrace Josquin’s Italian itinerary with the Missa Hercules dux Ferrariæ, composed for the Duke of Ferrara Ercole I d’Este, and a selection of motets commissioned by Italian patrons. The contribution of The Gesualdo Six in the more solemn pieces brings the vocal ensemble to 22 singers, a number that is close to the forces of the Rome and Ferrara chapels and yields new sonic results in our quest to recreate how polyphony sounded in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.