Music That Shouldn’t Exist

Quire Cleveland’s new CD, Madrigalian Motets from Jacobean England, includes music by the great composers of the day — William Byrd, Thomas Weelkes, Alfonso Ferrabosco, Jr., et al. These are exquisite Latin motets, written at a time when it was dangerous — sometimes fatal — to be a practicing Catholic. So this is music that shouldn’t really exist, yet the works are exquisite and worth hearing!

 

Some of the pieces survive in only a single manuscript, which is missing crucial portions. The award-winning scholar Ross W. Duffin gathered these together, reconstructing the missing parts, and A-R Editions published them in 2006 (RRMR R142). Now, the whole collection is available in a new recording by Quire Cleveland, conducted by Duffin.

 

Hear a sample and learn more at Quire’s YouTube channel and CD Baby. You can order the CD from Quire Cleveland’s website.