Hesperion

Jenkins was relatively unknown, having spent most of his life quietly in the employ of wealthy landowners in Cambridgeshire and Norfolk up to the Restoration, when he took up a court appointment as a lutenist. His pupil-patrons Sir Nicholas and Roger L'Estrange and Roger North were, however, much quoted figures of the period.

Discover the music of Heinrich Isaac with these authentic performances from La Capella Reial de Catalunya and Hespèrion XXI under the inspired direction of early music specialist Jordi Savall. This program paints a portrait of an era during which the Hundred Year's War ended, the Medici family reached its peak, the idea of the Reformation surged and Charles V was crowned at the head of an Empire that redefined the idea of Europe.

Jordi Savall, La Capella Reial, Hesperion XX - Francisco Guerrero - Sacrae Cantiones (1992) {Naïve Astrée ES 9953 rel 2000}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 308 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 161 Mb
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© 1992, 2000 Auvidis / Naïve / Astrée | ES 9953
Classical / Renaissance / Choral

Sixteenth-century Spanish composer Francisco Guerrero is featured in a reissued disc of motets for four, five, six, eight and 12 voices, with and without instruments. They come from a handful of collections published between 1555 and 1597 and show Guerrero’s skill in evoking a wide range of moods, joyful, sombre and contemplative in turn. Jordi Savall’s ensemble is well-equipped to project the skilfully wrought structures and expressive allure of the music. Some of the pieces fare better than others in respect of vocal texture and ensemble. Tenors and basses occasionally lack tonal refinement but, at their strongest the performances provide a radiant conspectus of Guerrero’s masterly motets.

Hespèrion XXI & Jordi Savall - Ostinato (2002) {Alia Vox AV 9820}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 387 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 175 Mb
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© 2002 Alia Vox | AV 9820
Classical / Early Music / Baroque / Renaissance

Ostinato is an anthology which brings together the most representative works of the art of improvisation and of a musical form based on a unique concept of the basso, which is repeated sequentially throughout the compositions.

Jordi Savall & Hesperion XX - Elizabethan Consort Music, 1558 - 1603 (1998) {Alia Vox AV 9804}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 343 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 153 Mb
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© 1998 Alia Vox | AV 9804
Classical / Renaissance / Baroque / Chamber Music

Although the first full consort of viols did not arrive in England until 1540, there were actually several intriguing examples of what are now called "consort" music from before that time. Of course, the homogenous viol consort became supreme, and the present program (also featuring some 2-lute arrangements) focuses on the first part of that repertory. This developed at Elizabeth's court in the 1570s & 1580s, among professional musicians, but based on relatively restrictive models. Some pieces in the present program are composed freely, heralding the next step in consort development which, along with the small output of Byrd, allowed the English consort idiom to fully flower. Of course that was followed closely by the even larger and more famous repertory of consort music by composers such as Gibbons which was eventually geared more toward amateur players.

Jordi Savall & Hesperion XXI - Dinastia Borgia - Chiesa e potere nel Rinascimento (2010) [3CD+DVD] {Alia Vox}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 1.11 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 534 Mb
DVD5 -> 3.73 Gb | All Regions | PAL 4:3 | Dolby AC3, 2 ch | ~ 81m | ISO Image | Subs: Catala, French, English
Full Artwork @ 600 dpi (jpg) -> 927 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2010 Alia Vox | AVSA 9875
Classical / Renaissance

Coinciding with the 500th anniversary of the birth of Saint Francis Borgia, Fourth Duke of Gandia, Jordi Savall and Alia Vox offer a visually lavish and artistically comprehensive new release entitled Dinastia Borgia. Savall’s latest musicological/historical quest focuses on music from the time of the Borgia dynasty, including works by composers such as Isaac, Dufay and Morales, from Pope Alexander VI/6 and two of his children, Cesare and Lucrezia, through to Francis Borgia, Jesuit priest and, perhaps, composer. For five centuries, scholars have studied and debated the role of the Borgias in Renaissance history. Although their name is synonymous with Papal corruption and they were undoubtedly malevolent and immoral, as patrons of the arts, the Borgias were also instrumental in the period’s explosive growth of culture.

Ibn Battuta, dubbed the traveler of Islam, was a Moroccan scholar who at the age of 21 began a series of travels that eventually covered all of the Muslim world and several lands beyond. He traversed the Middle East, making the pilgrimage to Mecca and seeing the other great capitals of the region; traveled to what was then El Andalus in Spain and along the Mediterranean coast; recorded the glories of the Byzantine empire in its later stages; traveled to India, where he was appointed the Sultan's ambassador to China and described that culture as well…

Jordi Savall & Hesperion XXI - Alfonso Ferrabosco - Consort Music To The Viols In 4, 5 & 6 Parts (2003) {Alia Vox AV9832}
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© 2003 Alia Vox | AV9832
Classical / Renaissance / Baroque / Chamber Music

Alfonso Ferrabosco the younger (b. Greenwich, c. 1575; bur. Greenwich, March 11, 1628) was an English composer and viol player of Italian descent. Although he gained access to the royal court as early as 1592, it took him almost 10 years to come to the attention of the queen, but in 1601 he became a member of the royal consort of viols. Ferrabosco marks the true beginning of the English Baroque. When Elizabeth I died in 1603, her successor James IV appointed Ferrabosco as music teacher to Henry, Prince of Wales and Ferrabosco continued to work in the king's service, becoming Composer of the King's Music in 1625, in 1626 succeeding John Coprario in the post of official court musician. The respect shown for him by his contemporaries proves that Ferrabosco was the court musician of his day, borne out by the fact that he was also the most copied.

This disc of Iberian and Latin American Renaissance music is a reissue cleverly disguised as a new release. It compiles music from several recordings by Catalonian visionary Jordi Savall, his luminous-voiced collaborator Montserrat Figueras, and his Hesperion XXI and Capella Reial de Catalunya ensembles, dressing them up with a new set of rather philosophical booklet notes on themes of change, of intercultural tolerance, and of the evolving nature of Christianity in the Iberian realm and in New Spain. Some might call this a cynical ploy, but actually Savall has always been moving in a circle, so to speak, spiraling inward toward a deeper musical understanding of the historical themes touched on here: the lingering effects of the legacy of medieval Iberia and its "mestissage" or mixture of cultures, the reign of Holy Roman Emperor Charles (Carlos) V (did you know that he was both the first monarch to be called "His Majesty" and the first to be honored with the claim that the "sun never set" on his empire?), and the relationships between cultivated and popular styles, both in Iberia and the New World.

This new recording by Jordi Savall and his ensemble Hespèrion XXI enables us to discover the best pieces for consort of viols composed between 1500 and 1700. London, Venice, Rome, Versailles, Madrid : all the great European courts have been illuminated by this musica nova, this new style, dreaming of an harmony beyond time and frontiers. With this album, Jordi Savall sets a new standard by delivering the comprehensive vision of a repertoire he is already famous for.