Hellas

L'arbre de mai (The Tree of May) is a terrifically presented album of early Renaissance music, one that tries to place the listener inside the musical culture of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries and does a highly imaginative – sometimes overactively imaginative – job of it. The album divides its 19 works into four thematic groups: Love and Youth, the Tree of May, War and the King, and the Evening of Life. Within each group, works by high-Netherlandish composers like Dufay and Compère are mixed with anonymous works of a more popular quality, and vocal works alternate with instrumental dances.