MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


CD REVIEW

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger

alternatively
CD: Crotchet AmazonUK AmazonUS

 

JOSQUIN (Des Pres) (c.1440–1521)
Missa Sine Nomine [27.39]
Missa Ad fugam [31.30]
Missa Ad Fugam (revised): Sanctus and Benedictus [4.47]; Agnus Dei [2.55]
The Tallis Scholars/Peter Phillips
rec. Church of Satin Peter and Saint Paul, Salle, Norfolk, England, no date given
GIMELL CDGIM039 [68.50]
Experience Classicsonline

This disc from the Tallis Scholars is promised as the first in a new series of Josquin masses. Here Peter Phillips and his group present two Josquin masses which would seem to come from opposite ends of Josquin’s career. Both masses are entirely based on canons.
 
Missa Ad Fugam is an early work. In it the canon is always between the top part and the third part down, and always a fifth apart. All five movements start with the same material, so all start with the same canonic opening. Josquin’s writing is easy to follow and transparent, with the non-canonic lines - the second and fourth parts - often hardly joining in at all. Dating of the mass owes something to stylistic concerns as the canonic writing is far stiffer than would have happened in Josquin’s later examples. But there also exists an original source in the library of Jena University in which someone, possibly Josquin, has re-worked the canon in the Sanctus and Agnus. These changes owe rather more to Josquin’s later style, the revisions providing tauter thinking which contrasts with the long lines of the original. On this disc, the Tallis Scholars rather usefully record both the original and the revisions, which allows us a rare glimpse into a composer’s revisions from the medieval period.
 
By contrast the Missa Sine Nomine is a prime example of Josquin’s later mature style. The work comes just before his last mass setting, the Missa Pange lingua. In his article in the CD booklet Peter Phillips suggests that this may have been written by Josquin as a deliberate foil to the earlier mass, to show what he was now capable of. If, as is presumed, Josquin studied with Ockeghem then the quote from Ockeghem’s Nymphes des bois in the Credo (at the words et incarnatus est) may be Josquin’s tribute to his late master’s famed dexterity with the canonic form.
 
Missa Sine Nomine is a far denser, less transparent work than its predecessor. The canons are distributed all over the score, rather than being confined to particular voices, and Josquin makes things more complex by introducing canonic imitation as well as pure canon. Of course none of this really matters; the mass can be listened to without any knowledge of its construction. That is part of Josquin’s genius and probably his way of showing off; to construct something so fine and so complex and to disguise the construction mechanism so perfectly.
 
The Tallis Scholars recorded both works with choirs of eight singers, two per part. No recording date is provided, but given that both Philip Cave and James Gilchrist are included in the line-up points to a recording date rather earlier than 2008, the year of publication.
 
The masses are performed in the Tallis Scholars familiar and inimitable style. Lines are beautifully shaped and delineated, the interplay between the different voices is shaded perfectly and the polyphony is beautifully transparent and easy to follow. The performance is well modulated; vibrato is sparing which means that each line has strength and integrity. A detractor could describe these performances as coolly English, verging on icy perfection. To which you might reply that all the passion is in the nuances and phrasing.
 
I could imagine these masses sung by one of the more recent choral groups, performed intensely and vibrantly with, perhaps, one to a part. That would be an entirely different performance and just as valid. After all we know little of the performance practices of the choirs for which Josquin wrote these pieces.
 
Admirers of the Tallis Scholars will definitely want these discs. Admirers of Josquin masses can buy them in the secure knowledge that they will be getting near perfection of execution.
 
Robert Hugill

see also review by Brian Wilson

 

 


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools




Return to Review Index

Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.