Hyperion Records

A Capella Portuguesa specializes in the performance of music from Portugal and Spain. Founded in 1989, the choir presents a regular series of concerts in Oxford and, between 1994 and 1996, has contributed to international festivals in Lisbon, Avila (Spain), London and Regensburg (Germany). Through the integration of polyphony and chant, A Capella Portuguesa attempts to provide a sense of the liturgical context for which sacred music was composed. Bernadette Nelson, a freelance musicologist based in Oxford, was a founder member of A Capella Portuguesa. She studied music at Somerville College, Oxford, and was awarded a Senior Research Fellowship from the Vincente Cañada Blanch Foundation and a grant from the Wingate Foundation for post-doctoral research in Iberian music. Research into the musical archives at Vila Viçosa was made possible through a grant awarded by Portugal 600, London, and by kind permission of the Casa de Bragança, Lisbon. Owen Rees studied music at Cambridge and taught at Oxford before moving to the University of Surrey where he is a Reader in the Department of Music. As a musicologist and choral director he specializes in the music of the High Renaissance, and particularly the English, Spanish and Portuguese sacred repertories: his study of the manuscripts of sacred music from Santa Cruz in Coimbra was published in 1995. In addition to A Capella Portuguesa he directs the Cambridge Taverner Choir.