The Hilliard Ensemble
have had a reputation as an early music
ensemble since the 1980s. In 1988 they
premiered Arvo Pärt’s Passio
and in 1994 they held their own composition
competition. Since then they have been
equally known for their contemporary
performances as well as their various
experiments in combining early and contemporary.
American composer Stephen
Hartke was a Fellow at the American
Academy in Rome in 1993 and during his
time there came up with the idea of
writing a piece based on the Latin texts
of surviving Roman inscriptions, many
of them fragmentary. This developed
into an idea for a work for the Hilliard
Ensemble accompanied by violin and percussion.
Rather than commissioning the work,
the composer approached the ensemble
(through the offices of violinist Michelle
Makarski) and the Hilliard Ensemble
premiered the work in 1999.
The title, Tituli,
refers to the Latin name for the inscriptions.
There are seven movements with texts
from a variety of sources. Some, like
the opening Lapis Niger are profoundly
fragmentary and only odd words are comprehensible.
Others such as Columna rostrata
and Elogium parvuli tell eloquent
stories; Columna rostrata or
Triumphal Column is description of a
Roman triumph in war, Elogium parvuli
or Epitaph for a small boy is a profoundly
moving text for a boy who died at six
years old. The rather laconic fifth
movement consists of the bilingual (Latin
and Greek) inscription from a shop sign,
the shop itself specialising in inscriptions.
The sixth movement consists of an assemblage
of oracular and fortune telling texts,
the final movement is a selection of
inscriptions found on portable objects,
including some lines in Etruscan.
Hartke has set the
work for five man ensemble (Hilliard
Ensemble plus and extra tenor), violin
(Michelle Makarski) and percussion (Lynn
Vartan and Javier Diaz). The opening
movement sets the tone for the whole
piece as the text arises from a quiet
miasma of musical ideas as if the fragments
are appearing out of the mist. Though
some of the texts are narratives, albeit
incomplete ones, Hartke seems to be
exploring the idea of ourselves looking
at and exploring the fragments of Roman
civilisation.
His style is basically
tonal but with a highly chromatic polish.
His basic textual settings are frequently
homophonic, but rendered rather opaque
by the composer’s preference for dark,
dense chords. The texture is lightened
by the alternation between the homophony
of the singers and the sparse textures
of the instrumentalists and solo voices.
The result is to create a distinctive
atmosphere that owes much to the aura
of the words Hartke is setting. In the
more extended texts there are moments
of word painting and Hartke uses polyphonic
textures and multiple rhythms to create
an opacity to match the opaque chords.
But his skill at mixing his resources
means that the result comes over as
elegant and sparsely orchestrated rather
than unpleasantly dense. There are loud
passages, but the overall tenor of the
work is understated and foggy. The instruments
are used to comment on and complement
the vocal material rather than accompany
it.
The Hilliard Ensemble
sing with their accustomed accuracy;
Hartke’s writing needs the sort of pin-point
precision of tuning and tone which an
early music group like the Hilliard
contribute to such contemporary pieces.
Age has not withered the distinctive
tones of David James’s counter-tenor
and his voice lends a familiar aura
to the pieces; this is both an advantage
and disadvantage as his voice is an
acquired taste. Familiar Hilliard devotees
need have no doubts about this record;
those not familiar with their style
might be advised to listen first. But
nothing is done without style and familiarity;
this is a performance of a distinctive
work which shows that the performers
have absorbed the style of Hartke’s
work.
Whilst working on Tituli
the Hilliard Ensemble asked Hartke for
a work for just the four of them; the
result is Cathedral in the Thrashing
Rain - an 18 minute setting of a
poem by the Japanese writer Takamura
Kotaro (1883–1956) in a translation
by Hiroaki Sato. The poem deals with
the effect that the Cathedral of Notre-Dame
de Paris has on a drunken Japanese during
a storm. Using just four voices, Hartke
produces an array of textures and whilst
sticking to the sound-world from Tituli;
the result is an effective, if understated
tour de force which is only marred by
the rather variable diction of the singers.
As they are singing in English, it would
have been nice if I could have followed
the piece without recourse to the printed
text.
These are tricky pieces;
Hartke’s style is one that rewards repeated
listening and the music will not necessarily
appeal to those admirers of the more
sing-along aspects of some of their
early discs such as Officium.
But this one is highly recommended to
anyone who is interested in how a contemporary
composer and an early music group have
produced a pair of works which manage
to remain rooted in the music of today
but explore and evoke past worlds.
Robert Hugill
Hilliard Ensemble (David James (counter-tenor),
Rogers Covey-Crump (tenor), Steven Harrold (tenor),
Gordon Jones (baritone)) 
