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Gombert - Missa Media Vita

Hilliard Ensemble | Format: Audio CD
4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
Price: £16.00 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
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Jan Garbarek and the Hilliard Ensemble’s inspired collaboration began in 1993 with the groundbreaking recording Officium and has resulted in consistently inventive music making ever since. At that first meeting Garbarek’s saxophone, soaring as a free-ranging ‘fifth voice’ with the a cappella Ensemble, gave the first indications of the musical scope and emotional power ... Read more in Amazon's Hilliard Ensemble Store

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Product details

  • Audio CD (19 Dec 2008)
  • SPARS Code: DDD
  • Number of Discs: 1
  • Label: ECM New Series
  • ASIN: B000CCBC2G
  • Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 281,791 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

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1. Media Vita In Morte Sumus
2. Missa Media Vita: Kyrie
3. Missa Media Vita: Gloria
4. Salve Regina (Motet)
5. Anima Mea (Motet)
6. Missa Media Vita: Credo
7. O Crux, Splendidior Cunctis (Motet)
8. Missa Media Vita: Sanctus
9. Quam Pulchra Es (Motet)
10. Missa Media Vita: Agnus Dei
11. Musae Lovis (Motet)

Product Description

Product Description

Biographical details on Nicolas Gombert are scant. Born shortly before 1500, probably in southern Flanders, there is some evidence that he was a pupil of Josquin Desprez. As a member of the chapel choir of Charles V in Spain from 1526 onwards he travelled the Empire widely. He seems to have been an unofficial court composer, and contemporaries praised him as one of the most outstanding masters. He bridges the generations between Josquin and the latest masters of renaissance polyphony, Lassus and Palestrina, his remarkable output including masses, motets, chansons and eight sets of Magnificats.

Gombert's six-part motet Media Vita is an undisputed masterwork, showing a characteristic tendency toward dark colours. Most obvious is the elaborate imitation technique relinquishing any unnecessary ornamentation, melodic word-painting or demonstrative structuring. The five-voice Missa Media Vita is based on this motet, each movement beginning with the initial material and borrowing several details from the former piece.

This new recording is The Hilliard Ensemble's 22nd ECM album. The collaboration between the world-famous English a cappella group and ECM began in 1986 with Arvo Pärt's 'Arbos' and led to acclaimed artistic achievements and great successes in old and new music alike, especially their vastly popular projects with improvising saxophonist Jan Garbarek, 'Officium' and 'Mnemosyne'. With the present Gombert disc the Hilliards, augmented by tenor Andreas Hirtreiter and bass Robert Macdonald, continue their comprehensive research into Medieval and Renaissance polyphony that has included works by Perotin, Machaut, Gesualdo, Lassus and others.

Recorded 2002

Personnel:
The Hilliard Ensemble: David James - (countertenor), Rogers Covey-Crump - (tenor), Steven Harrold - (tenor), Andreas Hirtreiter - (tenor), Gordon Jones - (baritone), Robert Macdonald - (bass)

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CD Hilliard Ensemble

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4.8 out of 5 stars
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars As always... 17 Feb 2006
By A Customer
Format:Audio CD
...stunning and flawless performances from the Hilliards ensures that the full depth, complexity and profundity of this music is conveyed in each and every one of its utterly beautiful moments.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Serious and sublime 10 Feb 2011
By Hollis Byfield
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase
I'm not an expert on renaissance vocal music and have only recently begun exploring what's available. I have found the recommendations that other people have posted on Amazon very helpful in steering me towards new and rewarding listening. I bought this cd on the recommendation of Sid Nuncius, whose reviews I generally find very clear and insightful.

I was already familiar with the excellent Hilliard Ensemble [do experience them live if you can] but not with the music of Nicolas Gombert. While some dislike the dissonance and the long, interweaving vocal lines of his compositions and find them heavy-going, I find this music deeply affecting and have played this disc over and over since receiving it.

I can also recommend recordings of Gombert's work by both The Brabant Ensemble and Henry's Eight issued on the Hyperion label, though they lack the impact in the deep register of this recording made by a Hilliard line-up augmented with an additional bass voice.

A truly wonderful, transporting sound.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Another gem from the Hilliards 26 Sep 2008
By Sid Nuncius HALL OF FAME TOP 10 REVIEWER
Format:Audio CD
This is a truly beautiful disc. It consists of a Mass setting by Nicolas Gombert based upon his own motet Media vita in morte summus, interspersed with other motets and beginning with Media vita itself. Gombert was one of "the forgotten generation" of composers who came between the titanic figures of Josquin and Palestrina and who have been overshadowed by them virtually ever since. Well, not any more. The music presented here is rich, involving and incredibly lovely, and shows why much of Gombert's music has been revived and recorded in the last 20 years or so.

The Hilliard Ensemble - one of the world's finest vocal ensembles - do the music proud. Their apparently effortless skill, careful attention to detail and the relationship between text and music, and the sheer beauty of the sound they make produce a truly memorable disc. It's one that I return to again and again, and it moves and uplifts me every time. The Mass and motets are stunning and as a bonus they finish the disc with Musae Iovis, Gombert's fabulously lovely lament on the death of Josquin.

I don't really know how to convey the full greatness of this disc, but it really is one of my absolute favourites in a fairly extensive collection. At this price you've very little to lose and I recommend it in the warmest possible terms. It's a gem.
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