2022 Concerts

Melbourne Recital Centre: Classical Music Series

Lassus & Palestrina

 

Monday 4th April 2022

7.30pm Elizabeth Murdoch Hall

Two of the greatest composers of the Late Renaissance.

 

Orlando de Lassus          Omnes de Saba, LV 973

                                          Magnificat secundi toni, LV 1070
                                          Magnificat super carmen praeter rerum seriem, LV 1070
                                          Tristis est anima mea, LV 238
                                          Il magnanimo Pietro
                                          Nunc dimittis primi toni, LV Anh.111

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Palestrina                          Missa ‘Assumpta est Maria’

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Lassus and Palestrina are regarded as two of the greatest composers of the Late Renaissance. In his day, Lassus’s works were widely disseminated across Europe and he was known as the finest living composer. Palestrina and his musical language became the hallmark of the era in succeeding centuries.

Today the two composers are of equal stature, Lassus better known for the number and enormous variety of his motets and Magnificats (101 of the latter), Palestrina for his 105 Masses.

Ensemble Gombert’s performance in Elisabeth Murdoch Hall opens with Lassus’s brilliant double-choir setting of Omnes de Saba venient, followed by his Magnificat Praeter rerum seriem, the highly expressive Tristis est anima mea, and his final work, a Nunc dimittis composed days before his death. Ending with Palestrina’s great 6-part Mass for the Assumption in a program of pure mastery.

The Art of a cappella

 

3.00pm Sunday 12th June 2022

St Ambrose Church, Woodend

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Johann Sebastian Bach        Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf (BWV 226)

Benjamin Britten.                  Hymn to St Cecilia

Arvo Pärt                                7 Magnificat-Antiphonen

William Henry Harris.            Faire is the heaven
 

Johannes Brahms                 Fest- und Gedenksprüche, Opus 109

Tallis & Byrd

 

Monday 7th November 2022

7.30pm Elizabeth Murdoch Hall

Works from undisputed masters of Late Renaissance music in England.

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Thomas Tallis and his pupil William Byrd are the undisputed masters of Late Renaissance music in England. Though Masters of the Chapel Royal, both remained devout Roman Catholics throughout their lives.

This program culminates in the most famous English choral work of the sixteenth century, Tallis’s forty-voice setting of Spem in alium nunquam habui. While the date and occasion of the motet’s composition remain a mystery, dates from 1556 to 1573 have been conjectured, along with possible connections with the Duke of Norfolk or the Earl of Arundel.

The technical mastery and architectural brilliance it exhibits have never been in doubt. This is one of music’s most dazzling masterpieces.
Ensemble Gombert is joined by friends and former members to present this work as it was originally intended.

All Saints

 

3.00pm Sunday 22nd May 2022

All Saints St Kilda

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Orlando de Lassus               Christus resurgens

                                               Huc me sydereo descendere jussit Olympo

                                               Surrexit pastor bonus

                                               Magnificat super “Praeter rerum seriem”

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Johann Sebastian Bach        Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf (BWV 226)

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William Henry Harris.            Faire is the heaven

Arvo Pärt                                7 Magnificat-Antiphonen