Vocal Chant

A chronological history of jazz vocal presented by André Francis and Jean Schwarz. 10 CDs with more than 12 hours of music.
The resulting 2 boxed sets of 10 CDs in each, unlike any other available today, groups together the main vocalists in the story of jazz from the first half of the 20th century. Each of these 20 CDs offers in more or less the same proportion, the purest of African-American song with gospel and blues singers, from truculent Ma Rainey to majestic Bessie Smith, sophisticated Sarah Vaughan to popular Louis Prima, the folk-related tones of Charlie Patton to the honeyed voice of Frank Sinatra.

Conductus, organum, and discantus may not be words in your everyday vocabulary, but these terms identify musical forms that defined everyday musical activity during one of music history's most fruitful periods. The 12th century in France, especially in Paris–the artistic, educational, and religious center of Western Europe–saw enormous progress in the arts, architecture, and education. Not surprisingly, technical and theoretical aspects of music advanced as well. On this disc, the six-voice men's ensemble Lionheart demonstrates in vivid, rich vocal tones the sometimes stark but always powerful sound of Medieval chant and its expanded two- and three-part forms. The liner notes give clear explanations of the compositions and provide the listener with meaningful historical context. But listening to these excellent voices is not just an educational experience. The music has an inherent purity, sensuality, and honesty that's refreshing and reassuring.

This re-issue of early Medieval vocal music from Finland includes a unique reconstruction of 14th and 15th century Gregorian music that was performed in Finland in the memory of St. Henry, Finland’s Patron Saint. Liturgical literature dealing with St. Henry is abundant and the music in this collection consists of extracts from masses and offices to St. Henry. Liturgical legend and oral tradition provide a colorful account of the English clergyman’s mission to Finland where he was killed on January 20th, 1156.

Since 1979 Dominique Vellard has been the inspirational driving force behind the Ensemble Gilles Binchois : more than 35 years of research and performance that have led to the creation of some of the essential recordings, especially of music from the medieval and Renaissance periods. An outstanding catalogue of recordings devoted to the music of Machaut, the Notre-Dame School, the Burgundian repertoire, early french polyphony or the spanish Renaissance, on labels such as Virgin Classics, Harmonic Records, Ambroisie, Deutsche Harmonia Mundi, Glossa y Aparté, have met public, critical and musicological acclaim. The Ensemble Gilles Binchois performs regularly mostrly across Europe, but also in Morocco, India, Malaysia USA and South America.

Country hit maker LeAnn Rimes is ready to present her acclaimed voice in a whole new way, announcing a new album of meditations titled CHANT: The Human & The Holy. Set for release on November 20 and featuring 12 soothing tracks, the project will be a bold (but relaxing) change of pace for the “Blue” star. It aims to showcase the power of her country vocal “in a completely new light, channeling wisdom into mantras and messages of hope and remembrance during a time of need.”

This disc demonstrates that Cecilia Bartoli is as much at home in the world of the salon recital as she is in the swoops and vocal acrobatics of the Rossini coloratura repertoire. Her voice is in fine form here- -rich, resonant and full of surprising colours–but her talent for characterisation is even finer. In Pauline Viardot's "Havanaise" for example, she perfectly captures the flirtatious, almost desperate pleadings of a Spanish sailor for a French girl to accompany him on his boat –and then switches easily to the more capricious and teasing reply of the girl in French. In a number by Ravel (sung in Yiddish and Hebrew) she brings a rather elliptical exchange between a father and his young son to life with exquisite tenderness, and finds yet another voice out of her repertoire to characterise the little boy.