Cardoso, M: Non mortui

Soli Deo Gloria is proud to release a sequel to its best selling album to date, Pilgrimage to Santiago (SDG701).

This CD is a journey through medieval and renaissance Spain. It takes listeners from the 14th century polyphonies of the Llibre Vermell (Red Book) of Montserrat – one of the only surviving manuscripts, from a time when music was transmitted orally – to elaborate 16th and 17th century choral music which travelled internationally thanks to the recent invention of print.

During the Middle Ages and Early Modern periods, pilgrimage routes formed part of a broader network of cultural and commercial connections between ecclesiastical institutions in Spain, Portugal and the rest of Europe.

This is an anthology of Golden Age “classics” which would have been performed throughout Europe for centuries. In turn moving, intimate, spectacular and awe inspiring, this sacred music is always uplifting and deeply spiritual.

This is the oldest of two recordings made around the 2004 Pilgrimage to Santiago – a project undertook by the Monteverdi Choir and Sir John Eliot Gardiner for their 40th anniversary. The musicians travelled through France and Spain to perform sacred polyphonies of the Iberian peninsula along the route to the shrine of Santiago de Compostela.

The CD features the same luxurious packaging as Pilgrimage to Santiago. It includes detailed notes by musicologist Tess Knighton.

This album was previously released internationally by Universal Spain under the title Santiago A Capella.

"Settings of the Requiem Mass are among the most frequent requests for concert music. This may seem unlikely, given the subject matter, but in fact it is just that subject matter which makes them so compelling. There is a drama inherent in the text which never fails to move audiences, having, in the first place, brought out the best in the composer. It is not a modern kind of drama such as we are used to seeing in the cinema or on television, but rather of the opposite: of the light which is shining on the deceased (whose body would have been present in the original performances), of the immediacy of heaven, of the peace which death will bring. Put in words this may sound a bit far-fetched, but from the split second that the opening ‘Requiem aeternam' chant is heard, every listener is inevitably transported. It is a classic instance of the power of music over every other art-form to communicate without reserve." Peter Phillips