Schoendorff: Complete Works

... is enough! Two so-so voices on a part are two too many, at least for a recording rather than an evening at ones' own fireside. But how about several fine voices on a part? Would that sound better, the same, or not as good as "one really fine voice on a part"? This turns out to be a more contentious issue than I would ever have imagined, and I've borne the brunt of that contention in reviews of large vocal ensembles like The Sixteen and the Westminster Cathedral Choir. I really truly honestly don't think it's at all "dogmatic' of me to say that RECORDINGS of many-voices-per-part polyphony are almost never as good as those by OVPP ensembles like "Cinquecento".And here's another magnificent recorded performance by the six singers of "Cinquecento"! Many of the compositions on this CD were written in six parts, and it's indisputable that the most common performances of such music in the 16th C would have been sung by exactly six men. On "state" occasions and in other rare circumstances, more singers would have participated; if those singers happened all to be top-notch, I'm quite sure the performance would have been glorious. But on those occasions, "musical" values were likely to be subordinate to pomp.Philippe de Monte(1521-1603) and Philipp Schoendorff (1565-1617?) were both Liégóis employed in the court of the Habsburg Rudolf II in Prague. They were, of course, employed as singers; so were all of the several musicians now known as composers with whom they sang. All composers of that era were trained principally as singers, and that shows very plainly in the music they composed first and foremost for their own use in ensembles. De Monte's reputation was wider and remained grander for the century after his death. There are accordingly many more recordings of his works than of those by Schoendorff. Frankly, I'd be hard pressed to explain why. The hazards of the game, I suppose. Schoendorff's Missa Usquequo Domine, based on De Monte's motet of that Latin text, is a flawless example of post-Josquin polyphony, more eloquent to my ears that the too-dense six-part works of the much more famous Nicolas Gombert.But it's the extraordinary vocal control of Cinquecento that I want to highlight in this review. Listen to their "ensemble", that is, to their attacks and releases, to their cadences, to their prolations and other changes of rhythm, to their rubatos and pauses. That's how polyphony becomes Music! Listen to their tuning, both vertical in chords and horizontal in melodic rhetoric. That's how choral singing becomes Music. And listen to the individual beauty of each voice, each with its own characteristic timbres! That's how singing becomes Music!Now, anyone who wants to denounce me for vigorously maintaining the superiority of OVPP performance of polyphony, let me demand of you that you acknowledge whether you've really HEARD CDs by groups of the artistry of "Cinquecento"?Vaet: Missa Ego flos campiOR:Sacred Vocal WorksDes Prez: MoteteFortune Helas ...: Thomas Crecquillon ChansonsLa Rue: Missa De FeriaFrancisco Guerrero: Motetes, Canciones y VillanescasIf you don't know those ensembles and haven't heard their performances, you really have no business proclaiming that OVPP sounds "meagre" or that I'm unfair to big choirs (any choir with three voices on a part or more) when I criticize them for muddiness, imprecision and 'tuning by committee'.

This is probably the weakest disc of the seven recordings by Cinquecento. The complete works of Philipp Schoendorff comprise two masses (based respectively on a motet and madrigal of Philippe de Monte also performed here along with a magnificat from his pen), two motets and a magnificat.In comparison to other contemporary works recorded by Cinquecento, Schoendorff's work 'suffers' a little too much from adherence to Tridentine strictures concerning textual clarity. The masses, presumably at the insistence of royal employers who would rather be spending more time repressing peasants and the like than at worship, are verging towards missa brevis style, employing some doubling up (or more) of voices, especially in the longer Gloria and Credo sections, to rattle through them more quickly.Given Schoendorff's compliance with both Trent and his paymaster, it may be thoroughly unfair to compare against other composers on such a small sample, but on this evidence I can't quite rank him alongside Monte, Regnart, Vaet, Richafort & Willaert. Sorry Philipp.But we do have six of the finest singers of Renaissance repertoire there are around right now, and this is enough to scrape into the five star category alongside all their other discs. Like that Pokey Man thing kids were into a few years ago, you gotta catch 'em all.