Welcome Surprise
J. M. Middleton | Auckland, NZ | 01/31/2008
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Don't let the unfamiliar names of the composer and vocal group put you off - this is a wonderful CD. From beginning to end the sumptuous sounds overwhelm and captivate the listener. Within the group, Cinquecento, there are five different nationalities and thus discussion must have taken place regarding Latin pronunciation, but the resulting music-making is truly unified and refreshing.
Apparently there were five musical Regnart brothers, but Jacob was presumably the best in composition. Here's hoping that more of his beautiful music comes to light.
I can't imagine anyone with an interest in the sacred music of the Renaissance being disappointed with this disc in any way."
Two Wonders for the Price of One...
Giordano Bruno | Wherever I am, I am. | 12/14/2009
(5 out of 5 stars)
""Cinquecento" is Wonder #1 -- an all-male vocal ensemble, founded in 2004, singing "lesser known sixteenth century choral repertoire" and making a go of it. That they sing it very well perhaps wouldn't be enough to guarantee an audience, so one has to presume that they have 'charisma' on stage. I can't say; I haven't heard them live. On this CD, singing strictly one-on-a-part, they have all the power and grandeur one hopes to hear (and rarely does) from a larger choir, two or three voices on a part. Yet they also have the unity of attacks and diction, the transparency of tuning, and the rhythmic independence of 'lines' that characterize the best vocal ensembles like The Orlando Consort or the Hilliards. Some part of their robust sonority must come from the acoustics of Kloster Pernegg in Austria, where this recording was made, and I strongly suspect that another part comes from skilled engineering and mixing. In any case, the sound quality is superb; there's absolutely no 'white-noise' burr or distortion, even when all six voices are cadencing richly. If you like your vocal music to be "resonant", Cinquecento is the group for you.
The 2nd Wonder is the music itself. Jacob Regnart is scarcely a household name, even among choir directors. I've known of his simple but charming German dances and Lieder for decades; you know, the sort of pieces that are slipped into concert programs or onto CDs as fillers. I had no idea what a masterful composer of larger forms he was, of the polyphonic masses and motets that were the chief glory of 16th C music in Europe. There are only two CDs available of such compositions by Regnart, and the other is out of circulation.
Regnart was a contemporary of Orlando di Lasso. The two composers knew each other and each other's work. Their lives were parallel in several ways; both studied in Italy, both were boy singers, both held secure and important musical positions in the Hapsburg courts for much of their lives, and both managed to get large amounts of their music published and thus preserved. Stylistically, however, they are not so similar. Regnart was a surprisingly intellectual polyphonist - a conservative, you might say, just as Bach would be - whose musical density reminds me more of Gombert or Victoria than of Lasso. But Regnart was bolder than the others in his use of modal polyphony, particularly of the highly 'affective' Phrygian mode. His cross-relations and dissonances are positively startling, closer to the lush madrigals of Gesualdo than what one expects to hear in Latin spiritual motets. The eight motets on this CD are all massively polyphonic, in four, five, or six voices with few 'thin' patches of duet or trio. Regnart clearly intended an imposing, imperial performance, a kind of 'rolling thunder' of resonance, made fascinating by its contrapuntal complexity. That's the sound 'Cinquecento' produces.
And here's a bonus: there's a lot of Regnart's music still waiting to be recorded. Get to work, guys!"
Track Listings (13) - Disc #1