Supersize Polyphony Armonico Consort & Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge

• Alessandro Striggio (1540 - 1592):
• 1 Ecce Beatam Lucem à 40 06:53
• 2 Missa sopra Ecco Sì Beato Giorno: Kyrie 03:35
• Hildegard von Bingen (1098 - 1179):
• 3 Ave Generosa 05:33
• Alessandro Striggio:
• 4 Missa sopra Ecco Sì Beato Giorno: Gloria 04:09
• Hildegard von Bingen:
• 5 O Virtus Sapientiae 01:42
• Alessandro Striggio:
• 6 Missa sopra Ecco Sì Beato Giorno: Credo 06:46
• Hildegard von Bingen:
• 7 O vos felices radices 04:49
• Alessandro Striggio:
• 8 Missa sopra Ecco Sì Beato Giorno: Sanctus 03:49
• 9 Missa sopra Ecco Sì Beato Giorno: Benedictus 03:08
• Hildegard von Bingen:
• 10 Spiritus Sanctus Vivicans 02:25
• Alessandro Striggio:
• 11 Missa sopra Ecco Sì Beato Giorno: Agnus Dei 05:48
• Thomas Tallis (1505 - 1585):
• 12 O Nata Lux 01:50
• 13 Spem in Alium Plainchant 02:24
• 14 Spem in Alium 08:37
• Total Runtime 01:01:28

Info for Supersize Polyphony

Supersize Polyphony is a celebration of large-scale choral works from the 16th century, performed here by the Armonico Consort and the Choir of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, under their musical directors Christopher Monks and Geoffrey Webber.

The unique programme features epic motets, such as Thomas Tallis’ Spemin Alium and Alessandro Striggio’s Ecce Beatam Lucem, alongside his rarely performed 60 part Missa sopra Ecco Si Beato Giorno. Interspersed with the serene beauty of ethereal chants by Hildegard of Bingen, this new recording presents works of magnitude and polyphonic drama in stellar performances by two of the UK’s leading choral ensembles.

"In glorious sound, the Armonico Consort presents a selection of large choral works, with a handful of pieces by Bingen, delivered with delicacy. A total delight." (BBC Music)

"The two assembled choirs turn in one of the fastest Spems I can recall, and none the worse for it, though the contrapuntal detail as the choirs come to a standstill on the final chord gets lost in the wall of sound. That aside, these are workmanlike performances." (Gramophone Magazine)

"The Armonico and Caius choirs give imposing performances of Striggio’s extraordinary Missa sopra Ecco si beato giorno, for 40 and 60 voices, rediscovered in 2005. Four pieces by Hildegard of Bingen, each sung with poise by a soloist, offer contrasting intimacy." (Sunday Times)

Adrian France, bass sackbut
The Choir of Gonville & Caius College Cambridge
Geoffrey Webber, musical director
Armonico Consort
Christopher Monks, musical director

Armonico Consort
began life in 2001, set up by Christopher Monks and a group of university colleagues with a shared passion for music from the Renaissance to Baroque, coupled with the imagination to find new and unusual ways to present concerts.

Audiences seemed to love their engaging and imaginative approach, and most concerts in the first years sold out. “That gave us confidence, energy and self-belief to carry on and do more, also to take more risks with our programming, and keep on experimenting,” says Christopher.

The ideas kept flowing, as did the titles (“many of them were created down the pub”) including the concert programmes Naked Byrd and Supersize Polyphony, and newly-created operas Monteverdi’s Flying Circus, Too Hot to Handel and Baroque Around the Block. Their horizons broadened to include later repertoire but at the heart remained music of the Baroque and Renaissance, including some rarely-heard gems, performed by the finest singers and players using period instruments. “We take great care to craft programmes which bring as much little-known music to life as possible, and find new and imaginative ways to bring this music to audiences. I’m particularly proud of Supersize Polyphony where we perform forty and sixty-part works by Tallis and Striggio completely in the round, interspersed with Hildegard of Bingen”. It earned the group their first five-star review, from The Times, and there were plenty more to follow.

Among many notable events were their Wigmore Hall debut in 2003, performing at the Hampton Court Palace Festival with violinist Nicola Benedetti (beginning a continuing musical friendship), Mozart’s The Magic Flute at the Barbican and giving the first performances of Francesco Scarlatti’s music in Italy (Naples) and Tel Aviv.

An education programme was fundamental to Armonico Consort from the outset and now encompasses six AC Academy after-school choirs and an in-school Choir Creation programme which trains teachers as choir leaders, leaving a strong legacy in each school. This Choir Creation scheme became the backbone of AC Academy reaching 15,000 children a year. By 2020, Armonico Consort aims to create 300 children’s choirs and 300 new choir leaders.

Armonico Consort counts Dame Judi Dench, Jeremy Irons, Nicola Benedetti, Sir Willard White, Ian Bostridge and Catrin Finch among their many guest artists. They have developed relationships with major concert halls across the UK and their recordings are regularly featured on BBC Radio 3, Classic FM and radio stations across the world. They continue to produce innovative new projects including Oz & Armonico Drink to Music with wine writer and broadcaster Oz Clarke, as well as touring their flagship programmes and seeking out new relationships.

Christopher Monks
The founder and Artistic Director of Armonico Consort and its ground-breaking education programme AC Academy, Christopher Monks has established himself as a versatile and prolific conductor and keyboard player.

Specialising in the performance of music from the Baroque and late Renaissance, Christopher is equally at home with major and modern choral repertoire, and during his career he has conducted at many of the greatest concert halls in the UK, including the Royal Albert Hall, Barbican, Wigmore Hall and Cadogan Hall in London, Bridgewater Hall Manchester, Symphony Hall Birmingham, St David’s Hall Cardiff and the RSC in Stratford-upon-Avon.

Christopher performs regularly at major national festivals and has worked extensively abroad, including in Israel, Italy, Ireland and France. Alongside his work with Armonico Consort, he has conducted internationally renowned orchestras and ensembles such as the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the Philharmonia and European Union Chamber Orchestra. Christopher also coaches and lectures on the MMus choral conducting course at Cambridge University and is a guest speaker on the Harvard Global Leadership Programme. Christopher is also part of a programme to role out the choir creation project and leadership programme with institutions aiming to restore street children back into main stream education in Kenya.

It was as a chorister from the age of eight that Christopher was introduced to the music of Byrd, Tallis, Bach, Monteverdi and Handel, of which today he is a highly acclaimed champion. After taking on piano at about the same age, he took his grade 5 in just 18 months as he wouldn’t otherwise have been allowed to start organ lessons, although by his own admission:

“I ignored this, and spent my spare time doing stealth practice in cold churches.” After graduating from Cambridge University, where he was organ scholar at Gonville and Caius College, Christopher went on as an organist under David Hill at Winchester Cathedral. Through David’s inspiration, he developed a passion and a talent for choral conducting.

“David Hill taught me the importance of performances being live and crafted ‘in’ the performance rather than a sanitised replication of hours of careful preparation. At school, I used to gather together musicians and singers, and perform pieces like Monteverdi’s Beatus Vir, and that sort of passion never stopped. But it was David Hill, the single biggest influence of those early years, who made me want to be a professional conductor”.

Although he admits to being cautious of much contemporary music, Christopher has commissioned many new works, including the ambitious Prodigal Son by Girling, premiered with Dame Evelyn Glennie, and Beowulf, an epic drama by Toby Young, premiered during Armonico Consort’s 2017 season.

Christopher records regularly under the Signum Classics label and his recordings, including Purcell’s Dido & Aeneas, have earned him several five star reviews in The Times, The Independent and The Guardian. Amongst recent projects are the first of a unique 3-disc set of complete recordings of Bach’s Cantatas for solo soprano with Gillian Keith (2017) and Supersize Polyphony, a recording of 40- and 60-part masses by Tallis and Striggio (2019) on Signum Classics.

A passionate advocate of reaching out to children of all backgrounds through the creation of youth choirs, Christopher founded and developed AC Academy, a music education programme

“which is unique in the UK, highly effective in its legacy and absolutely brilliant in quality. I never cease to feel proud of it.” A founding principle of the Academy is that the children learn all genres of music and perform regularly alongside professional orchestras and bands. They do everything from Bach to Jazz, folk to pop, ethnic music to musicals.

“I think it is vital that young people have the opportunity to perform all genres of music. As a chorister in a church, I only knew that repertoire, and I think this held me back as a musician in so many ways.” When not conducting, Christopher loves fine cooking. After a long day of music preparation, he often enjoys going for a cycle to process everything he has worked on, and on many occasions, this is where he feels that the real music learning takes place.

To anybody who asked him whether he has ever thought to give up his musical career, Christopher would bluntly reply:

“No, it feels bizarre when I talk to other people about their jobs for which they struggle to get out of bed, and I have never felt like a have a job. I just wake up and do a hobby.”

This album contains no booklet.