Three Cities – Munich, Vienna, Prague
Motets in 4-8 voices Munich, Vienna, and Prague are three cities that have long inspired the ideals of the Late Renaissance and endure to this day as monuments to these philosophies. These three cities and [...]
And Just Who Was Christopher Tye?
Christopher Tye was probably born in Cambridgeshire, where the family name was common, around 1505, making him about the same age as is more famous contemporary, Thomas Tallis (c. 1505-1585). He is often mentioned as [...]
Chianti and Rioja: and my Choir Curse
Polyhymnia’s choice for Lent and Holy Week for our Music in Isolation series, recently posted, is Inter vestibulum et altare by Christóbal de Morales (c. 1500-1553). When I discovered this, my thoughts wandered to my [...]
Full of Grace – Robert Parsons’ Ave Maria
Qui tantus primo Parsone in flore fuisti, Quantus in autumno in morere fores. Parsons, you who were so great in the springtime of life, How great you would have been in the autumn, had not [...]
The Chapel Royal in the Early 1600’s
For the 25 years that Polyhymnia has been performing, we have primarily centered our attention around music composed between 1450-1650. No matter how you may try to fit music into convenient little historical file cabinets, [...]
A Canadian Jew in Queen Elizabeth’s Court: A Jewish perspective on Byrd’s Ne irascaris
When I tell non-musicians that I sing in a choir that specializes in Renaissance sacred music - by which I really mean, sacred music of the Christian tradition - I am sometimes met with puzzled [...]
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love my Early Music Sound
I never got to meet my maternal great grandmother “Ma-Ma-Ma” (Rahela Jelinek, née Poljokan) but she lives on as a fascinating and colorful figure in my imagination. A Sephardic Jew from former Yugoslavia, she studied [...]
Gombert’s In Illo Tempore from an Alto’s Perspective
When we were asked to pick a motet we loved to write about, I was stumped. To be honest, almost everything we sing in choir becomes something of a favorite. It usually doesn’t start that [...]
Empty Highways with Vivanco
When John Bradley asked us to write blog posts about our favorite motets, I was sure I would choose one from the Spanish renaissance. In November 2015, my first Polyhymnia concert was a Morales program, [...]
Charting a Course Through 16th Century Europe
How the discovery of one composer and half of a motet led to 25 years of concert material I am guessing that anyone who has ever sung in a church choir has run into the [...]
