Despres: Miserere mei, Deus

Following the successful release of Josquin’s mass Ave maris stella on cpo, the WESER-RENAISSANCE Bremen under Manfred Cordes now turn to a selection of psalm settings by the same composer. This collection of psalms includes the fully dimensioned Miserere mei, Deo (on Psalm 50), one of his most famous motets – if not one of his most important works of all.

As in the case of their first Josquin CD, Manfred Cordes and his musicians give stylistic and sensitive interpretations.

This release presents music associated with the Renaissance master Josquin Des Prez, a composer who towers above all others in the first part of the sixteenth century. Numerous works were attributed to him that have now been proven to be by his contemporaries and successors, including the central work on this recording, Jean Richafort’s expansive and beautiful Requiem. It is performed with affecting clarity by the all-male vocal group Cinquecento, whose many previous discs of Renaissance repertoire for Hyperion have garnered the highest critical praise.

Booklet notes by Stephen Rice, an acknowledged authority on this repertoire, place the music in its historical context and unpick the mysteries of its composition.

For centuries the Carinthian Organ Tablature from around 1560 was a fragment in the archives and is heard here for the first time in recorded form. The manuscript includes works by Senfl, Desprez, de la Rue and Mouton and was discovered by Novak. During the sixteenth century, if a choir was not available, the organ assumed the repertoire of the singers, so the tablature includes many arrangements of mass selections, chansons and motets.

The internationally-acclaimed early music specialist and music director Joshua Rifkin leads the highly regarded choral group Cappella Pratensis, in a recording of music from the court of the Medici Pope Leo X. The disc is being made available as a Hybrid SACD.

Founded in 1987, the Dutch based vocal ensemble Cappella Pratensis champions the music of Josquin Desprez and the polyphonists of the 15th and 16th centuries. The group combines historically informed performance practice with inventive programmes and original interpretations based on scholarly research and artistic insight. As in Josquin’s time, the members of Cappella Pratensis perform from a central music stand, singing from the original mensural notation scored in a large choir book.

Joshua Rifkin’s work as conductor, pianist, and harpsichordist has spanned music from the fifteenth to the twentieth centuries. His recordings and concert performances with the Bach Ensemble, which he founded in 1978, set an internationally recognised mark for historically informed and musically vital interpretation of their namesake composer.

Music played a massive part during the time of the Medici pope Leo X, whose tenure covered the years between 1513 and 1521. Much of this has vanished, but a particularly vivid image of Leo’s musical world comes from the so-called Medici Codex, a collection of 53 motets possibly meant at first for Leo’s private use but ultimately presented to his nephew Lorenzo de’ Medici, Duke of Urbino.

Stradivarius presents a new edition of the first disc recorded by Ensemble De Labyrintho and Walter Testolin.The critically acclaimed ensemble here performs "A music that explores Man's most intimate feelings and which creates unequalled depths of emotion" (Walter Testolin).