Dufay: Music for St James the Greater

This is a glorious disc: superb performances of truly wonderful music.

St James the Greater, Apostle of Christ, foster son of the Virgin Mary, brother of St John the Evangelist, and indelibly—if somewhat perplexingly—associated with Compostela, became the focus of many composers; after all, anyone who was anyone in the Middle Ages (including Chaucer's Wife of Bath) would make a pilgrimage to St James's shrine in Spain at some point in their life. The exact background to Dufay's Mass is as yet unknown but it is an enormous work (forty minutes plus) of great passion.

Also included on this disc are three motets composed around the same time as the Mass, and a Gloria/Credo pairing, remarkable for up-beat, if irreverent, interpolations of snippets from Italian and French popular songs during the 'Amens'.

CDH55272  66 minutes 27 seconds
GRAMOPHONE RECORDING OF THE MONTH
GRAMOPHONE CRITICS' CHOICE
GRAMOPHONE AWARDS WINNER
DIAPASON D'OR
‘This is Dufay as I have always wanted to hear him. [It] is as close to a perfect Dufay CD as I have ever heard … so utterly compelling is this recording that I can imagine it acquiring cult stat ...
‘Superb’ (BBC Music Magazine)
‘This recording … deserves a renewed life as the only currently available recording, not only for the significance of this Mass among the works of Dufay, but also for the sensitivity of Kirkman's ...