O gemma, lux New
Dufay The Complete Isorhythmic Motets (transc. van Nevel).
Vasilissa ergo gaude. O sancte Sebastiane. O gemma lux. Apostolo glorioso, da Dio electo. Rite majorem Jacobum canamus. Ecclesie militantis. Balsamus et munda cera. Supremum est mortalibus bonum. Nuper rosarum flores. Salve flos Tusce gentis. Magnanime gentis laudes. Fulgens iubar ecclesie Dei. Moribus et genere.
Huelgas Ensemble/Paul van Nevel.
Harmonia Mundi HMC901700 (full price, 1 hour 9 minutes). Texts and translations
included. Producer/
Engineer Markus Heiland. Date July 1999.
Comparisons:
Binchois Consort/Kirkman (Hyperion) CDA66997
Orlando Consort (Metronome) METCD1008
Whatever individual nits I, and other more expert than I, may find to pick at in this record, one fact needs to be proclaimed unambiguously: it represents an immensely important and ambitious project, carried through with expertise and commitment. Its importance first. The isorhythmic motet, overlaying the strictest and most symbol-laden constructive plans with the most intricately inventive melodic fantasy, is the finest flower of medieval church polyphony. By the beginning of the fifteenth century it had become a sine qua non for the celebration of great occasions - coronations, the consecration of churches, state weddings, peace treaties. But its very sophistication carried within it the seeds of its own fall from favour. These pieces demanded from their composers and performers, and presumably from their listeners, a type and degree of attention that came to seem formal and inaccessible; today they would certainly be dismissed as élitist. Because their texts often refer to the specific occasions for which they were written, they can be dated relatively securely. Dufay's 13 surviving works in this form all come from the first half of his long career, and not a single one from the last 30 years of his life. But before he abandoned the genre he had shown his complete mastery of it. A chronological survey such as this record presents shows him transforming it in a host of subtle ways to the tastes of a new humanistic culture. Paul van Nevel's booklet notes are useful, but the chapter David Fallows devotes to these motets in his book on the composer is no less enthusiastic and gives an insightful account of their differences and their development.
Their very special character may be one of the reasons why this is the first time that any performing group has attempted to present all 13 motets on a single disc. Another is the problems their performance presents. Almost every parameter gives rise to problems, often of the most basic kind. Are the vocal lines conceived for soloists or choruses, singing in vast churches or smaller chapels and chambers? Are the accompanying tenors and contra-tenors vocal or instrumental? And what implications does this have for pitch? How fast or slow should the music go, given that it seems to combine two distinct layers of musical energy? How should the notes themselves be inflected by added sharps and flats, when the notation is ambiguous, and vertical and horizontal aspects conflict? Van Nevel and his Huelgas Ensemble can't be accused of ignoring these problems, even if one can't always agree with their solutions.
They opt in general for a choral, large-building acoustic rather than a solo, chamber-musical one, and for sopranos rather than countertenors or falsettists on the upper lines. Sometimes, particularly in the earlier pieces, this involves some fairly radical transpositions (if the word can be used when we have only a rough idea of what pitch Dufay expected). Vasilissa, O sancte Sebastiane and a couple of others go up a fourth; O gemma lux, on the other hand, is taken down a fifth, presumably so that solo tenors can provide some variety of timbre. Soloists are also used in Magnanime gentis and, partly, in Balsamus et munda cera, but I have the impression that these are not voices of the virtuoso calibre the music calls for; Dufay surely had in mind (and could call on) the finest singers of his day, and the music itself suggests that their technique may have had something in common with those of Indian classical music. The Huelgas singers are just a little soft-grained for my taste, and doubling inevitably smudges some of the virtuoso passagework with which Dufay tends to highlight the end of an isorhythmic period.
Oh dear! This review seems to be turning into a catalogue of niggles, when it should be celebrating an extraordinary achievement. Let me finish, then, by admitting that there are groups whose recorded performances of some individual motets I prefer to these on purely musical grounds: the Binchois Consort (Rite majorem, Balsamus and Apostolo glorioso) and the Orlando Consort (Balsamus again, Supremum est mortalibus and Ecclesie militantis). But there can be no doubt, particularly in these last two pieces, that Van Nevel and his Huelgas Ensemble, recorded (with trombones, etc.) in the romanesque Abbaye aux Dames at Saintes, South West France, convey a much more vivid impression of the great state occasions for which these magnificently challenging pieces were composed. No modern performance could claim to be definitive, but this one is not likely to be surpassed soon.
Jeremy Noble
© International Record Review 2001used by permission
