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John
TAVERNER (c.1490-1545) O splendor glorię [10:24] Te Deum [13:06] Alleluia. Veni, electa mea [4:11]
Mass ‘The Western Wynde’ (before 1528, perhaps before 1520) Gloria [6:32] Credo [6:54] Sanctus [4:46] Benedictus [2:42] Agnus Dei [7:27]
The Sixteen (Fiona
Clarke, Ruth Dean, Carys Lane (treble); Rebecca Outram, Caroline
Trevor (mean); Andrew Giles, Michael Lees,
Philip Newton, Christopher Royall (alto); Simon Berridge, Philip
Daggett, Neil Mackenzie, Matthew Vine (tenor); Roger Cleyerdon,
Robert Evans, Michael McCarthy, Francis Steele (bass))/Harry
Christophers
rec. 10-11 June 1991. Venue not stated (St Jude’s Hampstead?).
DDD
Booklet with notes in English, French and German.
Latin texts with English translations HYPERION HELIOS
CDH55056 [56:02]
This review is what is known theologically
as a work of supererogation, since the
recording was reviewed long ago on Musicweb.
My excuse is that I have noticed that
we have been displaying the wrong cover
shot on the website – the equally fine
but completely separate version by the
same forces of Taverner’s Missa Sancti
Wilhelmi (Editor - this will be
corrected). My second excuse is that
it is some time since the original review
appeared and, whilst I agree entirely
with Gerald Fenech’s original
review (he awarded the maximum *****
for performance and recording) a reminder
now of the excellence of the whole series
of Taverner recordings which the Sixteen
under Harry Christophers made would
not come amiss. My third reason is that
it gives me an opportunity to look at
current rival versions – a brief look,
only, since I cannot think of any reason
why anyone would dislike this Hyperion
version.
Each of these Hyperion recordings centres
on a setting of the Mass. The principal
item on this disc is the Mass Western
Wynde in which Taverner effectively
varies a popular secular tune, one which
later attracted other composers, including
Tye and Sheppard, possibly in emulation
of their older contemporary. In the
song the lover yearns for the return
of the western wind and the mild rain
which herald the beginning of Spring;
like the birds in the springtime Prologue
to Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales,
his thoughts turn to love. (I should
add that John Heighway’s excellent notes
cast doubt on whether this song “Westron
wynde when wyll thow blow” in a British
Library manuscript was Taverner’s original.)
At first sight a song in which the lover
wishes that his beloved were in his
arms, “and I in my bed again”, seems
inappropriate as the basis of liturgical
music, but the practice of basing polyphonic
Masses and motets on secular tunes was
common on the continent, though this
may well have been the first English
example. The popular tune L’homme
armé – the armed man who terrorises
everyone – formed the basis of Masses
by several late-medieval composers,
the most famous of them being by Dufay,
as did Se la face ay pale, employed
in another Dufay Mass. In the Western
Wynde Mass, the underlying tune
is unusually prominent from the very
start of the Gloria.
Scores of the Gloria, Credo
and Agnus Dei of the Western
Wynde Mass are available online
as pdf files. Don’t be confused by the
fact that the opening words, “Gloria
in excelsis Deo”, Glory be to God on
high, and “Credo in unum Deum”, I believe
in one God, are omitted from the score,
since these were intoned in plainchant
according to the normal practice.
All Taverner’s music was probably composed
before 1528 when, along with several
students at Cardinal College, Oxford
(later Christ Church) he was charged
with being infected with Lutheranism.
Several of those accused were imprisoned
in a cellar which contained putrid fish,
some of them actually dying because
of the “noisome smell”. Taverner got
off lightly because he was a ‘mere’
musician – “unlearned and not to be
regarded” was the official verdict.
Later Tallis and Byrd (and possibly
Dowland) found themselves in the opposite
position, fairly open recusants in Elizabethan
England, and apparently tolerated because
musicians were not important. After
the 1528 episode Taverner “repented
him much that he had written songs to
Popish Ditties” and, according to one
possibly apocryphal story, when the
tide had swung in the reformers’ favour,
became a government agent to hunt down
Papists and abetted Cromwell in the
dissolution of the monasteries.
Since GF’s review a challenger in the
same, lowest price category has appeared
– and, apparently, fairly promptly been
deleted – in the form of a Classics
for Pleasure reissue of a recording
by St John’s College Choir, Cambridge,
under George Guest. (CDCFP4654, a reissue
of a 1989 EMI Eminence recording, coupled
with a fine performance of Tallis’s
Missa Salve Intemerata Virgo).
CFP recordings have a habit of popping
in and out of the catalogue, so it is
conceivable that this will return in
the near future.
The chief virtue of Guest’s performance
is that he offers the original secular
song first, to help the listener pick
out where it occurs in the Mass setting.
Otherwise, this is a well-sung performance,
decently recorded. If the tone is a
little raw, that makes the St John’s
choristers sound rather less ‘English’
and rather more ‘continental’. We cannot,
of course, know what Taverner’s original
Oxford choristers sounded like. Guest’s
timings are consistently rather slower
than those of Christophers; whilst Guest
never sounds unduly sluggish, I do find
that the music benefits from Christophers’
brisker approach.
The Hyperion recording is also rather
more sharply focused than the CFP, at
least on my copy of the original EMI
issue of this CD; both are all-digital.
The acoustic and recording on the Hyperion
recording never intrude on one’s enjoyment
of the music, though I should have liked
to know where the recording was made.
Otherwise the booklet is in no way inferior
to the original full-price version;
presumably that did not specify the
venue either, since my full-price version
of Taverner’s Missa O Michael
is also silent on this point. I assume
that the venue was, in fact, St Jude’s
Hampstead, as per the sister recording
of Taverner’s Missa Corona Spinea.
Another budget-price challenger comes
from Brilliant Classics in the form
of a 5-CD set of Renaissance music performed
by New College Choir, Oxford, under
Edward Higginbottom. (Brilliant Classics
92433, 5 CDs for around £17 in the UK.)
I have not heard their recording of
the Western Wynde Mass but I
have heard and liked several of their
other Tudor recordings – and they are,
after all, the successors to a tradition
even older than that of Taverner’s own
Cardinal College Choir, which has recorded
his music in its modern guise as Christ
Church. (For Christ Church Choir in
Taverner, watch out for my enthusiastic
review, due to appear shortly, of Nimbus
NI5360 Ave Dei Patris Filia –
no overlap with this Hyperion CD.)
If you want three masses based on the
Western Wynde theme and don’t
mind running to full price, you could
go for CDGIM027, where Peter Phillips
and the Tallis Scholars perform the
Taverner setting as well as later examples
by Tye and Sheppard – a well-filled
CD with excellent performances and recording.
The Tallis Scholars’ version of Taverner’s
Missa Gloria Tibi Trinitas (CDGIM004)
has long been a treasured part of my
CD collection. To the contents of this
CD, which I bought in its original format,
the Western Wynde Mass has now
been added, whilst retaining the original
catalogue number. The Tallis Scholars’
version of this work is, thus, available
on two CDs with different couplings.
(Sorry if that sounds confusing).
One clear advantage of the New College
and St John’s recordings is the employment
of boys’ voices, whereas The Sixteen
has female trebles and means. I can
only say that I never felt that the
female voices on the Christophers version
jarred and, of course, there is the
clear advantage of the greater assurance
of adult singers. The low scoring of
the Te Deum on this CD suggests
that it may have been composed for an
adult choir without boy trebles, making
it particularly suitable for The Sixteen.
If you go for the Brilliant Box or the
Tallis Scholars’ recording, you will
be missing some excellent music on this
Helios CD. The Alleluia may be
small beer but O splendor glorię
and the Te Deum are no mere makeweights;
rather they are fine works in their
own right, especially when they are
well sung as they are here.
O splendor glorię is a votive
antiphon, probably designed to be sung
after Compline, whence arose the Anglican
custom of the anthem (a corruption of
the word ‘antiphon’) at the end of Evensong.
The budding reformer in Taverner would
have welcomed the fact that this antiphon
celebrates Jesus rather than Mary, a
trend which was developing in England
even before the break with Rome. The
notes rightly claim this as in many
ways the finest of Taverner’s larger
antiphons. For the modern listener it
evokes an image of robed choristers
in a glorious gothic cathedral. If it
is less ‘exciting’, less soaring than
much late-medieval and Renaissance polyphony,
that is appropriate to the mood of the
end of Compline, where it would follow
the Versicle and Response “We will lay
us down in peace and take our rest.
For it is thou, Lord, only that makest
us dwell in safety.”
The Te Deum is also a fine piece,
with alternate verses chanted and sung
in polyphony. The only surviving copy
of this music dates from 1581, shorn
of its tenor part, which has been restored
for this recording. The notes suggest
that it may date from after Taverner’s
time at Oxford, though it cannot be
much later if the story that Taverner
abandoned “Popish ditties” is true.
On the other hand, the Te Deum
as a hymn of praise to Christ, without
any Marian devotion, may have been particularly
palatable to the reformed Taverner.
Alleluia, Veni electa mea is
a Marian antiphon, an extension of the
Alleluia in Masses of the Virgin
Mary, or Lady Masses, as they were known,
celebrated daily at Cardinal College.
Its brevity does not preclude excellent
singing from The Sixteen.
The Western Wynde Mass is placed
last on the CD, which is appropriate.
Though noticeably faster than the St
John’s recording, The Sixteen never
hurry the music: if anything, the impression
is that they allow it more time to breathe
whilst keeping up a sense of forward
momentum. Each section is presented
as if it were the unwinding of some
great clockwork mechanism. I can easily
live with the St John’s version when
I take it out for the sake of the Tallis
coupling, but The Sixteen give the music
just that little extra that fully justifies
GF’s original five-star rating. Even
if you already have another version,
you need this too.
Don’t forget the other excellent Taverner
Mass recordings in this series:
Corona Spinea (CDH55051) Gloria Tibi Trinitas (CDH55052) Mater Christi sanctissima (CDH55053) O Michael (CDH55054) Sancti Wilhelmi (CDH55055).
Brian Wilson
see also review (of original
release) by Gerald
Fenech
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