I, for one, absolutely adore Anonymous 4 in a lot fo their 13th/14th century repertoire. Fantastic stuff.

But NOBODY beats Perotin.

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OOOXXO
Doing it backwards since 2005.

Johannes Ciconia

Guillaume Dufay, check out the picture in the Wikipedia article, his associate in the painting, Binchois, has a certain...um..."attitude" which seem more RuPaul School than Burgundian School. There exists somewhere an interesting paper on the mathematical/proportional correspondences between the structure of his Nuper Rosarum Flores motet and that of Brunelleschi's dome.

Machaut

Sadly, many of the pieces from this era look better on paper than they sound in the all-too-often idiosyncratic or mannered performances & recordings. It's like they're using the original music for the "Blackadder" TV series as a model for performance style. Not unlike those who argue that Bach's keboard works should only be heard on harpsichord or clavichord.

I've had the pleasure of seeing both Anonymous 4 and Sequentia perform live. A4 was doing their love songs tour and performed That's Amore as their encore. I've never heard that song sound so good.

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Learning to Whistle
Téada photos

If I had a chance to see Anonymous 4 do their Christmas material, and on the same night in another venue the Beatles were performing with a resurrected Lennon and Harrison, it would be a tough call.

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OOOXXO
Doing it backwards since 2005.

Anonymous 4 really needs to be heard live to appreciate how talented they are. Not only does their show make you realize the limitations of CDs as a medium for recording audio, but they just never make mistakes. They'll sing for an hour in harmony and unison, full of style, and never be even slightly off-pitch. That they do most of the historical scholarship assembling their early music material is just icing on the cake.

Gush!

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Learning to Whistle
Téada photos

I have just three CDs of early music and I love 'em all to pieces. One is some Leonin and Perotin, performed by Tonus Peregrinus, one is music by Hildegard of Bingen performed by Sequentia, and the third is Cantigas de Amigo (Songs for a friend) - 13th century music from Spain and Portugal performed by the Ensemble Alcatraz with Kitka (women's vocal ensemble). The highlight for me on the last of these is the seven cantigas de amigo by Martin Codax. This CD could change your life!

Steve

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"Last night, among his fellow roughs,
He jested, quaff'd and swore."

They cut me down and I leapt up high
I am the life that'll never, never die.
I'll live in you if you'll live in me -
I am the lord of the dance, said he!

Other than ITM I listen to Early music more than anything else.
A great - nay, fantastic - disc is the Harp Consort's "Miracles of Notre Dame."

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OOOXXO
Doing it backwards since 2005.

Allegri's Misirere - just a gorgeous piece of music. Recordings by several different groups. Also, anything by Carlos Gesualdo - late 16th century madrigalist, died in 1613 and wrote some of his best works right before that. His music is extremely manic and just very interesting to listen to.

One of my favourite recordings for early vocal music. Andrew Parrott and the Tavener Consort's recording of Palestrina's Stabat Mater. The ornamentation they add is just amazing.

~Crysania

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<i>~`~"I have nothing to say and I'm saying it." <blockquote>-- John Cage~`~</blockquote></i>

I always wondered what the linkage is between Perotin and peritonitis. Like, being a monk gives you an infection that nobody can cure because its the 12th century or sumthin.

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How do you prepare for the end of the world?

I always wondered what the linkage was between Perry Como and music. Come to think of it, Perry Mason and the law.

Steve

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"Last night, among his fellow roughs,
He jested, quaff'd and swore."

They cut me down and I leapt up high
I am the life that'll never, never die.
I'll live in you if you'll live in me -
I am the lord of the dance, said he!

I have a session buddy named Perry. . . but I think the trend gets busted here. He's a pretty darned good flute player.

_________________
OOOXXO
Doing it backwards since 2005.

This started as a serious thread but now we're getting into peripheral issues.

Steve

_________________
"Last night, among his fellow roughs,
He jested, quaff'd and swore."

They cut me down and I leapt up high
I am the life that'll never, never die.
I'll live in you if you'll live in me -
I am the lord of the dance, said he!

I'm a fan of the Boston Camerata, which does primarily early music and has also delved into other areas (like 18/19th century American music). I'm going to see them perform a program of Medieval Christmas music next weekend. I'm looking forward to it--should be a good concert.

hmmmm....good taste, I must say,
yet...
surely we can t call Palestrina, Gesualdo, + Allegri early....

"A4" was truly inspired...but this most recent CD they have out makes me wonder if they havent run the course for the genre.

as for me,
Machaut, Dufay, Binchois, Dunstable...love em all~! & Schutz, Praetorius, Schein, Scheidt, Senfl, Jakob Handel too.

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*NEW* http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/zampognaridifiladelfia2

http://www.folkworld.eu/51/e/cds2.html#sylv
http://itunes.apple.com/album/sylvia-pl ... mpt=uo%3D1

My fave early music group is the UK's Dufay Collective.

Some classically-trained eary musicians skew towards a regretable stiffness, I've found, and that's not actually a part of the music. It's not until after the baroque era that an orchestra became the paramilitary-type of organization that it is today.

Real early music was closer to traditional music in training and attitude, IMO.

The DuFay Collective appear to share that attitude where similar groups I've listened to don't.

I note that several members of the Dufays cross over with the Carnival Band, which has recorded a number of CDs with English folk diva Maddy Prior, and that the Fiddler/Violin/Flemish Bagpipes/Rebec/Viol player for both bands has now been recruited as part of the Engfolk supergroup, Bellowhead.

The Dufays have worked with some excellent vocallists over the years, but their primary focus is instrumental rather than vocal, however.

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And now there was no doubt that the trees were really moving - moving in and out through one another as if in a complicated country dance. ('And I suppose,' thought Lucy, 'when trees dance, it must be a very, very country dance indeed.')

C.S. Lewis