Tallis: The Complete Works, Vol. 4

This disc is the fourth in a series of nine covering the complete works of Thomas Tallis (c1505-1585). Not for nothing is Tallis known as the 'father of church music'—with his colleagues at the Chapel Royal he created most of the church music genres that we take for granted today. Volumes 4 and 5 both focus on music written for the office hours—the daily services found mainly in the monasteries that eventually suffered at the hands of Henry VIII’s dissolution. Here we have a selection of hymns and Responds from the Henrician and Marian periods, each matched with their accompanying plainchant taken from contemporary sources.

SIGCD010  66 minutes 34 seconds
'Alistair Dixon draws out lively and impassioned singing from his Chapelle du Roi … he shows a wholly admirable grasp of structure and balance. Andrew Benson-Wilson is equally skilled in coaxing ...