Recording
Title: Morales en Toledo - Polifonia inédita del Codice 25
Performer: Ensemble Plus Ultra
Director: Michael Noone
Year: 2004
Length: 1 hour 17 minutes
Review
Yet another polyphonic vocal recording, frankly I am becoming more of an expert on this than I ever had an interest in becoming. It has certainly been informative if sometimes somewhat dull due to a certain sameness of the recordings. Fortunately the next album is something different.
Okay now to the recording at hand, as we have come to expect the recording itself is flawless, and the music is quite lovely. Morales seems to have a more focused style of composing in the sense that the polyphony is not as dispersed as in some of the things we have been listening to. It has a more dramatic sense than most works of its kind in the way the voices come together to express certain important points of the text, most other Motet composers did the same but in Morales it is somehow more apparent. Another thing which this recording makes great use of is the plainchant embedded in the tracks themselves.
This said I could do with a break from Motets, motet-like masses or motet-like settings of texts. That is maybe why this album hasn't fascinated me that much. Good enough but not different enough to grab me.
Track Highlights
1. Asperges me
2. Eripe me
3. Ave Maris Stella
4. Et factum est postquam
Final Grade
8/10
Trivia
From Wikipedia:
Morales was the first Spanish composer of international renown. His works were widely distributed in Europe, and many copies made the journey to the New World. Many music writers and theorists in the hundred years after his death considered his music to be among the most perfect of the time.
Requiem Aeternam from Missa Pro Defunctis by Cristobal de Morales:
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