Monday, 29 April 2019

de la Rue - Masses - Beauty Farm


Rating: 5/5

Review:
An excellent recording

This is an excellent double-CD. Don’t be put off by the silly name of the ensemble or the abominably bad cover because the music is wonderful.

The set consists of four hitherto unrecorded mass settings by Pierre da la Rue: Missa Almana, Missa De Sancto Antonio, Missa Puer natus est nobis and Missa Tous les regretz. They are varied but all very fine settings as one would expect from de la Rue, who was an excellent composer. There is a spare beauty about them which I love and we owe Beauty Farm a debt of gratitude for making them available to us.

The performances are excellent. Beauty Farm sing one to a part here; they are technically impeccable, with a lovely fluency of line and genuine engagement with the text. At a lower Flemish pitch the lovely acoustic makes the overall sound extremely beautiful and this is a very rewarding recording all round which I can recommend very warmly.

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