From his youth onwards Heinrich Finck
earned his living as a musician. Born
in Bamberg, as a young man he travelled
to Poland and Lithuania - perhaps initially
as a choirboy. As his talents as a composer
developed, he worked by turns in Germany,
in Poland again and in Austria. He spent
some years in Salzburg and died in Vienna.
In his later years his pupils included
Thomas Stoltzer. In the year after his
death, his last master King Ferdinand
I commissioned a striking portrait medal
in his honour – reproduced in the booklet
here from a copy in the British Museum.
Much of Finck’s work has been lost and
some works survive only in an incomplete
condition; most of what does survive
cannot be dated with absolute certainty
or precision. Modern scholarship attributes
to him a total of some 110 works – including
seven Masses (whole or partial), just
under thirty hymns, over forty motets
and roughly the same number of secular
songs.
The Missa Domenicalis
probably dates from the last decade
of Finck’s life. It is unflamboyant,
but often subtle in its effects. It
shows the influence of the Netherlands
school of composers, using imitation
very interestingly. The Sanctus and
(especially) the Agnus Dei contain some
ravishing four-part writing. A number
of the other religious works are impressive
and attractive; ‘Veni redemptor dominum’
beautifully decorates the plainchant
at its core. Here, and elsewhere in
these ecclesiastical compositions, the
dialogue of monophony and polyphony
produces many exquisite moments. One
is left in no doubt as to Finck’s sophisticated
skills as a composer. ‘Natalis Domini
cantica’ is simpler, with a radiant
clarity reminiscent of the finest medieval
carols.
The secular, vernacular
songs celebrate the pains and joys of
love, in idioms which are reminiscent
of both folk-song and courtly melody.
Generally the melody is presented in
the tenor, with the other voices employed
in decoration and imitation. The results
are everywhere very graceful, if not
especially powerful.
Cavalli specialise
in the recording of material not previously
recorded and certainly the music of
Heinrich Finck has hitherto been under-represented
in the catalogue. There are decent notes
and texts (but no translations).
The vocal group Stimmwerk
was founded in Munich in 2001 and this
is their debut CD. It is planned as
the first of a series of CDs devoted
to Renaissance composers from the German-speaking
world. The next will be devoted to the
work of Adam of Fulda. To judge by the
high quality of performance evident
here, future CDs in the series will
be well worth hearing.
Finck’s great-nephew
Hermann Finck (1527-1558) wrote a treatise
called Practica Musica, published
in 1556. In it he complained that some
singers sounded like bleating goats
and advised that in polyphonic music
"the treble and the alto should
not ascend too high, and no voice should
overpower the others and disturb us
by shouting or be so strained that the
singer changes colour, becoming black
in the face or seeming to run out of
breath, such as those basses who buzz
like a hornet inside a boot, or puff
and blow like a burst bellows".
I feel sure that were he able to hear
this recording of his great-uncle’s
music he would have agreed that there
are no goats or trapped hornets on show,
and that no voice overpowers any other.
Rather, Stimmung’s balance of tone and
timbre is well nigh perfect and the
intelligence of their interpretations
is everywhere apparent.
This is music not previously
available on CD; we are lucky that this
first recording should be so accomplished.
Glyn Pursglove
Stimmwerk: Franz Vitzthum (counter-tenor), Klaus
Wenk (tenor), Gerhard Hölzle (tenor), Marcus
Schmidl (bass) 
for
details
