The Golden Renaissance: Josquin des Prez
£12.83
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Label: Decca
Cat No: 4851340
Format: CD
Number of Discs: 1
Genre: Vocal/Choral
Release Date: 29th January 2021
Contents
Works
Pange lingua (plainchant)Ave Maria...Virgo serena
El grillo
Inviolata integra et casta es Maria
Missa Pange lingua
Salve Regina
Virgo salutiferi
Vivrai je tousjours
Dum vastos Adriae fluctus
O mors inevitabilis
Artists
Stile AnticoAbout
The heavenly music of Josquin des Prez is performed by one of the world’s greatest early music ensembles, celebrating the composer’s 500th anniversary in 2021.
The tracklist is structured around one of the composer’s most famous mass settings, and likely his last, the Missa Pange lingua, and also includes the world-premiere recording of a newly-discovered chanson, Vivrai je tousjours. Also featured are two fascinating rarities inspired by Josquin composed by his contemporaries.
The rest of the series will include the 400th anniversary of William Byrd (2023) and the 500th anniversary of Palestrina (2025).
Sound/Video
Paused
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101 Salve Regina a5 (Josquin)
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202 Pange lingua gloriosi (chant)
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303 Missa Pange lingua I. Kyrie (Josq
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404 Ave Maria - Virgo serena (Josquin
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505 Missa Pange lingua II. Gloria (Jo
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606 Inviolata, integra et casta es (J
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707 Missa Pange lingua III. Credo (Jo
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808 Vivrai je tousjours (Josquin)
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909 El grillo (Josquin)
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1010 Missa Pange lingua IV. Sanctus &
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1111 Virgo salutiferis (Josquin)
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1212 Missa Pange lingua V. Agnus Dei (
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1313 O mors inevitabilis (Vinders)
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1414 Dum vastos Adriae fluctus (De Man
Europadisc Review
In the first of three discs on Decca marking significant anniversaries of great Renaissance composers, the British a cappella ensemble Stile Antico (hitherto familiar from its releases on the Harmonia Mundi label) commemorates 500 years since Josquin’s death with an enthralling programme of some of his greatest music. It combines the sacred and secular, as well as including two posthumous tributes to the composer, but its backbone is his last and most-recorded Mass, the Missa Pange lingua. Based on the plainchant ‘Pange lingua, gloriosi corpori mysterium’, this is a ‘paraphrase’ Mass of extraordinary inventiveness, effectively a musical fantasia on the chant melody, and Stile Antico’s 12 voices respond glowingly to Josquin’s music, the female upper voices in particular bringing a welcome focus to the music’s lines. Speeds are spacious without losing momentum (try the exquisitite ‘Et incarnatus est’ of the Credo), well-suited to the warm acoustics of All Hallows’, Gospel Oak in London.
Similar strengths characterise the motets, including the celebrated Ave Maria ... Virgo serena (whose wide fame has made it one of Josquin’s quintessential works), and the later Virgo salutifieri and Inviolata, integra et casta es, both of which demonstrate Josquin’s predilection for canonic devices (something he shared with another mighty figure from over two centuries later, JS Bach). There’s nothing drily ‘academic’ about these performances, however, which allow the music to bloom gloriously, anticipating the soundworld of the late Renaissance rather than harking back to Josquin’s origins in the music of Dufay and Ockeghem.
The two secular items are the introspective chanson Vivrai je tousjours (which may not be by Josquin at all) and the ever-popular frottola El grillo, a humorous tribute to the call of the cricket, who ‘sings all the time’, even ‘when the heat is very fierce’ – a less pacy performance than some on disc, but one which relishes both text and texture. Placed oddly between the Credo and Sanctus sections of the Mass, these are nevertheless welcome items on the disc, as are the two tributes to Josquin, Vinders’s magnificent, richly-scored lament O mors inevitabilis and Jacquet de Mantua’s motet Dum vastos Adriae, whose classically-themed text amply illustrates the high esteem in which the composer was held by the time of his death.
Also out this week, in what will hopefully be a bumper year for Josquin releases, is a collection of motets and Mass movements from the Brabant Ensemble and Stephen Rice on the Hyperion label. This delves deeper into the composer’s corpus of works, with some rarely-recorded items receiving welcome performances, and three six-voice works sounding particularly impressive. For the more general listener, however, the sweetness of Stile Antico's performances on Decca provide an ideal illustration of why this remarkable music still demands our attention, accompanied by concise but useful notes by Bonnie Blackburn. Both are worthy salutes to one of western music’s greatest figures.
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