Fans of Orlando Gibbons’ church music will be pleased with this generously filled program, which purports to contain “all of the hymn melodies ascribed to Gibbons” and included in George Wither’s 1623 collection Hymns and Songs of the Church. The English chamber vocal ensemble Tonus Peregrinus and its director Antony Pitts have made a fine impression in several earlier recordings (particularly their ambitious Naxos Book of Carols project–type Q8359 in Search Reviews–and their award-winning version of Arvo Pärt’s Passio–Q6995), and they offer the same high standard of performance here. This is uniformly well-balanced ensemble singing, tonally rich, vibrant, and clearly articulated, and the straightforward style perfectly suits Gibbons’ functional, easily singable tunes.
Throughout, Gibbons’ original melodies and bass lines are fully realized by contributions of inner parts by various arrangers–primarily director Pitts. Sometimes these settings are strictly traditional, but often Pitts and his colleagues take us into entirely new (for Gibbons), strikingly modern harmonic territory. There are a half dozen or so original pieces by Pitts and others among the 42 tracks, most of which have some direct textual or thematic link to Gibbons and the celebrations of the church year. In addition, the program is very intelligently organized with an ear toward key transitions from one track to the next–and with a sense of how to hold interest with so much “block-harmony” style.
Both chamber organ and double bass are used now and then (although I can’t figure out the rationale for the latter in this context), and the program’s eight sections are separated by “Amen” interludes apparently arising from a Pitts family mealtime tradition. Besides the various settings of Gibbons’ beloved hymn known as “Song 1”, highlights include the delightfully jazzy hymn by Alexander L’Estrange “As now the sun’s declining rays” and the subsequent “Amen”. And, hooray(!), Naxos handily displays track listings on the back cover of the CD booklet!
