|
||||||||||||||||||||||
The Tallis Scholars’ Christmas Concert“Love is better than wine” - a programme celebrating ChristmasFramed by two brilliant double choir settings of the Magnificat — one Spanish, the other German — this programme features the unforgettable setting of Osculetur me by Lassus. Taken from the Song of Songs, this fragrant and at times erotic text inspired one of Lassus’s greatest motets, which in turn inspired the double choir mass of the same title. The Flemish master is at his most persuasive in this music, deploying the eight voices with consummate skill and variation. In the second half of the programme The Tallis Scholars continue their exploration of the contemporary composer Arvo Pärt with one of his finest motets, preceded by the sequence known as the Triodion. Pärt’s particular world of intense simplicity and calm is often said to resemble the mood of renaissance polyphony, and it is for this reason that the Tallis Scholars have begun to programme the two side by side. The evening ends with another extended sequence, this time of a strongly seasonal nature. Hieronymous Praetorius published his fifth tone Magnificat with two famous Christmas carols, In dulci jubilo and Joseph lieber, interleaved between its verses. These works will be performed as he intended, bringing the concert to an end in a blaze of proto-baroque glory.
PLEASE NOTE: Tickets for this performance, at $63, $48 and $32 (students & seniors $3 discount) including HST are only available at the Chan Centre Ticket Office, or through Ticketmaster: 1-855-985-ARTS (2787) or www.ticketmaster.ca. (Note: Surcharges apply to orders made through Ticketmaster). Rush Seats for Students with valid ID on sale for $10, at the door only, from 7:00 pm on the evening of the concert. This concert is included in our “Bring a Youth for Free” programme. |
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sebastián de Vivanco (1551-1622):
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
Programme notes will be posted here soon. |
||||||||||||||||||||||
The Tallis Scholars The Tallis Scholars were founded in 1973 by their director, Peter Phillips. Through their recordings and concert performances, they have established themselves as the leading exponents of Renaissance sacred music throughout the world. Peter Phillips has worked with the ensemble to create, through good tuning and blend, the purity and clarity of sound which he feels best serve the Renaissance repertoire, allowing every detail of the musical lines to be heard. It is the resulting beauty of sound for which The Tallis Scholars have become so widely renowned. The Tallis Scholars perform in both sacred and secular venues, giving around 70 concerts each year across the globe. In the past season the group visited the USA three times and appeared at festivals and venues across the UK and Europe including in their own Choral Series at Cadogan Hall. This year, The Tallis Scholars team up with the National Centre for Early Music and the BBC for the bi-annual nation-wide composition competition, designed to encourage young people to write for unaccompanied voices. The winning entries will be performed by The Tallis Scholars in a concert recorded and broadcast by BBC Radio 3. In 2013 the group celebrates their 40th anniversary with some exciting new projects, commissions from Gabriel Jackson and Eric Whitacre and extensive touring. The Tallis Scholars’ career highlights have included a tour of China in 1999, including two concerts in Beijing; and the privilege of performing in the Sistine Chapel in April 1994 to mark the final stage of the complete restoration of the Michelangelo frescoes, broadcast simultaneously on Italian and Japanese television. The ensemble have commissioned many contemporary composers during their history: in 1998 they celebrated their 25th Anniversary with a special concert in London’s National Gallery, premiering a Sir John Tavener work written for the group and narrated by Sting. A further performance was given with Sir Paul McCartney in New York in 2000. The Tallis Scholars are broadcast regularly on radio (including performances from the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall in 2007, 2008 and 2011) and have also been featured on the acclaimed ITV programme The Southbank Show. Much of The Tallis Scholars reputation for their pioneering work has come from their association with Gimell Records, set up by Peter Phillips and Steve Smith in 1980 solely to record the group. In February 1994 Peter Phillips and The Tallis Scholars performed on the 400th anniversary of the death of Palestrina in the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, Rome, where Palestrina had trained as a choirboy and later worked as Maestro di Cappella. The concerts were recorded by Gimell and are available on both CD and DVD. Recordings by The Tallis Scholars have attracted many awards throughout the world. In 1987 their recording of Josquin’s Missa La sol fa re mi and Missa Pange lingua received Gramophone magazine’s Record of the Year award, the first recording of early music ever to win this coveted award. In 1989 the French magazine Diapason gave two of its critical Diapason d’Or de l’Année awards for the recordings of a mass and motets by Lassus and for Josquin’s two masses based on the chanson L’Homme armé. Their recording of Palestrina’s Missa Assumpta est Maria and Missa Sicut lilium was awarded Gramophone’s Early Music Award in 1991; they received the 1994 Early Music Award for their recording of music by Cipriano de Rore; and the same distinction again in 2005 for their disc of music by John Browne. Released on the 30th anniversary of Gimell Records in March 2010, The Tallis Scholars’ recording of Victoria’s Lamentations of Jeremiah received critical acclaim, and to further celebrate the anniversary, the group released three 4 CD box sets of “The Best of The Tallis Scholars”, one for each decade. The ongoing project to record Josquin’s complete cycle of masses, when completed, will run to 9 discs. These accolades are continuing evidence of the exceptionally high standard maintained by The Tallis Scholars, and of their dedication to one of the great repertoires in Western classical music. For the latest opportunities to hear The Tallis Scholars in concert, or for more information on how to purchase CDs or DVDs of the group, please visit the Gimell Records website. Here you will also find details of how to register for free e-newsletters and purchase gift vouchers for items available on the web. Peter Phillips has made an impressive if unusual reputation for himself in dedicating his life’s work to the research and performance of Renaissance polyphony. Having won a scholarship to Oxford in 1972, Peter Phillips studied Renaissance music with David Wulstan and Denis Arnold, and gained experience in conducting small vocal ensembles, already experimenting with the rarer parts of the repertoire. He founded The Tallis Scholars in 1973, with whom he has now appeared in over 1750 concerts and made over 50 discs, encouraging interest in polyphony all over the world. As a result of his work, through concerts, recordings, magazine awards and publishing editions of the music and writing articles, Renaissance music has come to be accepted for the first time as part of the mainstream classical repertoire. Apart from The Tallis Scholars, Peter Phillips continues to work with other specialist ensembles. Amongst others he has appeared with the Collegium Vocale of Ghent, the Netherlands Chamber Choir, the Choeur de Chambre de Namur, the Finnish Radio Choir, Musix of Budapest, the Studio de Musique ancienne de Montreal and numerous others around the world. Peter also works extensively with the BBC Singers with whom he gave a Promenade concert, in collaboration with The Tallis Scholars, from the Royal Albert Hall in July 2007, which was broadcast live and attended by over five thousand people. He gives numerous master-classes and choral workshops every year around the world and is also Artistic Director of the Tallis Scholars Summer Schools - annual choral courses based in Oakham (UK), Seattle (USA) and Sydney (Australia) dedicated to exploring the heritage of renaissance choral music, and developing a performance style appropriate to it as pioneered by The Tallis Scholars. In addition to conducting, Peter Phillips is well-known as a writer. For many years he has contributed a regular music column (as well as one on cricket) to The Spectator. In 1995 he became the owner and Publisher of The Musical Times, the oldest continuously published music journal in the world. His first book, “English Sacred Music 1549-1649”, was published by Gimell in 1991, while his second, “What We Really Do”, an unblinking account of what touring is like, alongside insights about the make-up and performance of polyphony, was published in 2003. Peter Phillips has made numerous television and radio broadcasts. Besides those featuring The Tallis Scholars (which include live broadcasts from the 2001, 2003, 2007, 2008 and 2011 Proms, the 2007 Edinburgh Festival, the Aldeburgh Festival and the Bath Festival), he has appeared several times on the BBC’s Music Weekly and on the BBC World Service, on Kaleidoscope (BBC Radio 4), on Today (BBC Radio 4), National Public Radio in the US and on German, French and Canadian radio, where he has enjoyed deploying his love of languages. In 1990 ITV’s The South Bank Show featured Peter’s ‘personal odyssey’ with The Tallis Scholars; while in 2002 they made a special television documentary for the BBC about the life and times of William Byrd. Peter has recently been appointed Reed Rubin Director of Music at Merton College, Oxford, where the new choral foundation he helped to establish began singing services in October 2008. In 2005 Peter Phillips was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Minister of Culture, a decoration intended to honour individuals who have contributed to the understanding of French culture in the world. |
Peter Phillips