If you’re familiar with European medieval and renaissance vocal and instrumental music, you’ll find yourself on completely friendly territory no matter where you begin your listening to these three discs. Still, the material covers a fairly wide range, from Italy to the Netherlands, from Provençal to England and Ireland. And there’s quite a variety of styles, too, from instrumental dances to solo-voice ballads, from Flemish love songs to songs about animals, sung by troubadours. This specially packaged boxed set (offered at three-for-the-price-of-two) consists of three separately produced recordings made in Italy, Belgium, and France during the 1990s. Together they make a handsome collection that provides both newcomers and specialists a generous, colorful, and consistently entertaining survey of secular music of this particular place and period (predominantly the 14th-16th centuries).
The disc titled Vous ou la mort (you or death) features “Flemish courtly love songs of the 15th century”, and these range from solo to multi-part works by composers such as Josquin, Dufay, Binchois, Isaac, de la Rue–in other words, if there had been a “greatest hits” list back then, some of these songs would have been on it. The singing by the six vocalists has a nice secular edge to it, and even though these aren’t the warmest, most refined voices we’ve ever heard in this repertoire, the performers are always mindful of good ensemble technique, blend, and intonation. What’s more, they seem perfectly at home in the style. My only reservation is the sometimes wavering voice of Guillemette Laurens, whose quality is more like a poor countertenor than a soprano, thus the enchanting melancholy of a solo song like “Ma bouche rit” (my mouth laughs but inside I am weeping) is less effective than if sung by one with greater expressive control. This is not a major quibble; it must be taken in the context of the whole 25-song program, which is loaded with beautiful, beguiling works like Isaac’s four-part tenorlied “Ach, was will doch” and Josquin’s deliciously sorrowful, two-part “Plusieurs regretz” and solo “Je ne me puis tenir d’aimer”. Instrumental accompaniments are informed, sonorous, and well-balanced, and occasionally the vocal pieces are separated by instruments-only selections. One further caution: although discs with 75-plus minutes of playing time are common these days, my copy of Vous ou la mort (77:31) showed some tracking/data errors during the last half of the final track.
La Reverdie, a female quartet that both sings and plays a variety of early period instruments, offers the set’s most unusual, often surprising repertoire. Titled Bestiarium–Animals and Nature in Medieval Music, this disc focuses on songs with texts reflecting medieval ideas and beliefs about the place and purposes of animals in the world. In the arts of the 12th-14th centuries animals had various meanings relative to behavioral traits, spirituality, and morality, and were used to symbolize certain aspects of the supernatural and even as predictors of personal or even universal events. These songs, which come from all over Europe and primarily are anonymous troubadour texts and tunes involving subjects such as lambs and wolves, hounds and hawks (and an occasional fair maiden!), are both serious and fun, risqué and thoughtful–and offer many gorgeous melodies. One of the more familiar is also one of the few 13th-century songs to survive with an English text: “Bryd one brere” (bird on briar). It’s performed here in a lovely arrangement for solo voice, harp, and rebec. Then there’s the very odd–jerky rhythms and jumpy vocal effects–“Oseletto selvagio” whose text begins “A woodbird in season sings sweet verses in elegant style, but some squawk so loud I cannot praise them. . .” Although this is a strong program and it’s generally well sung and played with lots of energy and expression, the recording could use more warmth–a feature that’s been a consistent part of the ensemble’s more recent recordings for its own label Arcana (see reviews).
The best-sounding of the three discs is the one that was recorded most recently, Musica Antiqua’s 1997 collection of Italian Renaissance dances, titled Schiarazula Marazula. These 14 musicians play about three times that many instruments, and they really do know how to find appropriate combinations that both sound well together and lend themselves to the mood of the piece at hand. They also have spent some time studying just what dance in the Renaissance meant, not only socially but choreographically speaking, and they’ve tried to apply this knowledge, I think very successfully, to the performances. To its credit, Cantus puts recording information on the outside of the box so a prospective buyer can tell when and where the recordings were made and obtain more than a passing idea of the repertoire. This is a serious–and seriously fun–collection that will enhance anyone’s existing early music library, and makes a good foundation for novice listeners who wish to start one. The packaging is uniformly excellent, with lots of useful and very readable information in the notes. Full texts and translations are included–and the period illustrations throughout the booklets are a nice touch.
