Winchester Concert 9th May 2015

Poster image: Nicolo Renieri, The Divine Inspiration of Music, Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Tickets available from

www.winchester-cathedral.org.uk

Carissimi’s Jephte is a jewel of early Baroque oratorio, narrating with drama and passion the Old Testament tragedy of Jephtha, who sacrifices his only daughter in return for the Israelites’ victory in battle.  The music culminates in one of the most beautiful laments of the Italian Baroque.  In this programme Carissimi’s masterpiece is set alongside music of sacrifice and lament by his contemporaries (including Lotti’s searing settings of the Crucifixus and extracts from Scarlatti’s spectacular 10-part Stabat Mater), together with highlights from Monteverdi’s magnificent Vespers of 1610.  Cambridge Renaissance Voices are joined in this concert by soprano Kate Semmens and period instruments, recreating the glorious sounds of 17^th-century Rome and Venice.

Long Melford concert 16 November 2014

Buy tickets here

Following last year’s concert celebrating musical splendour and devotion, Cambridge Renaissance Voices return to Long Melford to continue their exploration of the Tudor sacred choral repertoire, with a programme contrasting extremes of moods, of mourning and joy. 
As well as some of the most exuberant songs of praise in the repertoire, such as William Byrd's 'Sing Joyfully', and more contemplative motets for different seasons, the programme illustrates the intense beauty of music intended to inspire repentance or to serve as consolation.
The Lamentations of Jeremiah had a particular resonance for several Tudor composers, with the plight of Jerusalem offering a parallel with that of catholics in protestant England.  Robert White’s hauntingly beautiful setting will be juxtaposed in this programme with musical renditions of another great Biblical lamentation, that of David for his son Absolom, and some rarely performed funeral music by John Dowland, most famous among his contemporaries for spinning musical beauty out of grief.

Concert 17 May in Cambridge

Ascendens Christus
Victoria’s Mass for the Ascension
and motets for the Virgin

Corpus Christi Chapel, Cambridge
7.30 pm Saturday 17th May 2014

Tickets £16 (£13 concessions) from Cambridge Corn Exchange
01223 357852
www.cornex.co.uk

Long Melford concert photos

The choir is very grateful to its new friends at Long Melford who took such great care of us, and to a fabulous audience. Plans are being made for our 2014 season now!

Members of the choir stayed at Cavendish Hall for the weekend.

Concert 17 November 2013

The programme for the choir's inaugural concert centres on the beautiful mass in four parts by William Byrd, England’s finest Tudor composer, who wrote for both protestant and catholic faiths in the volatile religious transitions between the reigns of Mary I and Elizabeth I.

In addition, we will sing devotional motets by English composers including Byrd’s great predecessor Thomas Tallis, and their contemporaries John Sheppard, John Taverner, William Mundy and Robert Parsons.

Book your tickets here.

About Long Melford.

About the choir

Cambridge Renaissance Voices is formed by singers with deep experience of Renaissance polyphony, most of whom met as members of The Cambridge Taverner Choir, with whom they have made several CD recordings.
We aim to share our love for this repertoire of sacred music with new audiences and in places of historic interest.
Our inaugural concert takes place in Holy Trinity, Long Melford, one of the great Suffolk wool churches of the fifteenth century, containing some of the finest medieval glass in England. The church’s fine acoustic offers an ideal setting for a concert of music from Tudor England, combining the mystery of private devotion with some of the most glorious polyphony of the Renaissance.