Saturday’s EMS: Don Fernando de las Infantas

[doversoul1]

the music of the 16th Century Spanish composer Don Fernando de las Infantas, with performances by the BBC Singers.

Sounds interesting though I am not too sure about BBC Singers in this repertoire

[rauschwerk]

I'm familiar with just one piece by Infantas: Loquebantur variis linguis, for 8 voices. I picked up some copies out of curiosity, seeing that some parts have a 2 flat key signature, one 3 flats and some 4 flats. The two bass parts form a mirror canon. Trying it over with my group, I'm sorry to say that I was disappointed. Once all voices have entered (after about 10 bars in each of the two sections) all of them sing virtually all the time, creating considerable textural monotony. The bitonality of the piece amounts to some voices being in a major key, the rest in the tonic minor.

We decided not to add this piece to our repertoire. However, I'll be interested to see what Robert Hollingworth has uncovered from this guy's 4 books of motets, the fourth of which consists of 101 contrapuntal exercises on a single plainchant melody (!).

[doversoul1]

mmm … It was politely interesting. I wonder if there had been his contemporaries’ works, would it have made the music less, well…, wallpaper-like? Robert Hollingworth was enthusiastic but a lot of his comments were somewhat too technical for me.

Are there HIPs in vocal performances? BBC Singers sounded timeless, which could be a great thing in some cases.

[rauschwerk]

Nothing here to persuade me that Infantas's music is in the same class as his compatriots' - Francisco Guerrero, Tomas Luis de Victoria and Alonso Lobo. Not even the last piece played, which Mr Hollingworth and Dr Knighton seemed most enthusiastic about. Still, the BBC has given us a chance to hear some of it, for which we should surely be grateful!

[doversoul1]

I agree with you on both points. It is good that we have opportunities to hear these lesser know composers’ works but surely there is no need to present all their works as great and special?

[ardcarp]

Well I was a bit worried about the BBC Singers doing this stuff, but Hollingsworth had them as tamed as anyone. Good to hear Westminster Cathedral...whose men were not that far removed from the BBCS in their full-bodied sound. But that music calls out for such a treble line. I'd like to stand up for Infantas' polyphony, however. It was surely well wrought and I didn't find it inferior in any way to the generality of late 16th cent European church music. I thought too that RH presented the programme well and had an easy conversational style with Tess Knighton.