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Track(s) taken from CDA67675

Salve regina a 4

composer
4vv; Gradualia 1605 II:xii
author of text
Antiphon to the Virgin Mary from Trinity until Advent

The Cardinall's Musick, Andrew Carwood (conductor)
Studio Master FLAC & ALAC downloads available
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Recording details: April 2009
Fitzalan Chapel, Arundel Castle, United Kingdom
Produced by Jonathan Freeman-Attwood
Engineered by Martin Haskell & Iestyn Rees
Release date: September 2009
Total duration: 4 minutes 23 seconds

Cover artwork: The Death of the Virgin (Ms Fr 71 fol.11). Jean Fouquet (c1420-1480)
Musée Condé, Chantilly, France / Giraudon / Bridgeman Images
 

Reviews

‘Some of the three-part hymns are masterly in their technical assurance, setting the voices free to wander and with the lightness of touch recalling them to the fold for a cadence … exquisitely wrought … to the singers and their director is due an additional hymn of praise’ (Gramophone)

‘Some of Byrd's best writing, with complex imitation enlived by madrigal-style word settings. The Cardinall's Musick seize on the subtleties and expressiveness of these settings … the inventiveness and depth of this recording outweigh its rare longeurs’ (BBC Music Magazine)

‘Sublime music, then, an inspired and inspiring director and a series that Hyperion rescued from another label and has persevered with against all odds’ (International Record Review)

‘The Cardinall's Musick under Andrew Carwood show the deep feeling as well as the dignity of these illicit and originally secret settings’ (The Independent on Sunday)

‘The Cardinall's Musick continues its odyssey through Byrd's vocal output … the singing here is clean and balanced, with no attempt to make women's voices resemble those of boys’ (The Sunday Times)

‘Carwood has given us a series of Byrd recordings that will be a monument when he has finished, and this is a worthy part of the series… don’t wait to add this to our collection’ (Fanfare, USA)
The Salve regina is a setting of one of the most popular texts in honour of the Virgin. Byrd had already produced a more extended setting (published in 1591) but this later composition is more succinct and chamber-like. It contains some typical traits, like the downward semitones for ‘gementes et flentes’ (‘groaning and weeping’), but is on a much smaller canvas than the earlier version.

from notes by Andrew Carwood © 2009

Le Salve regina met en musique l’un des plus populaires textes en l’honneur de la Vierge. Byrd en avait déjà produit un plus vaste (publié en 1591); celui-ci est plus succinct, plus façon chambre, et présente un canevas bien plus modeste, même s’il renferme aussi certains traits typiques, comme les demi-tons descendants pour «gementes et flentes» («gémissant et pleurant»).

extrait des notes rédigées par Andrew Carwood © 2009
Français: Hypérion

Das Salve regina ist eine Vertonung eines der beliebtesten Texte zu Ehren der Heiligen Jungfrau. Byrd hatte bereits eine längere Vertonung komponiert (1591 herausgegeben), doch dieses spätere Werk ist präziser und kammermusikalisch angelegt. Es kommen darin einige typische Charakteristika vor, wie etwa abwärts gerichtete Halbtöne bei „gementes et flentes“ („trauernd und weinend“), doch ist dieses Werk deutlich kleiner gehalten als das vorangehende.

aus dem Begleittext von Andrew Carwood © 2009
Deutsch: Viola Scheffel

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