BWW Reviews: FESTIVAL OF MEDIÆVAL LESSONS AND CAROLS Presented Carols from the 14th and 15th Centuries

Reviewed by Ewart Shaw, Sunday December 21 2014

St Cyprians Anglican Church is a small and elegantly proportioned outpost of the Anglican Church, located among the cafés and boutiques of Melbourne Street, and it housed the Lumina Vocal Ensemble, under the direction of Anna Pope. Their concert, Festival of Mediæval Lessons and Carols, took pace as its motto, and was about fifty five minutes long.

This concert included readings, delivered by Professor Thomas Burton, from the 1395 Wycliffe Bible translation into the English vernacular from the Latin vulgate. They were chosen with great care and spoken in an approximation of 14th century pronunciation by the one person in Adelaide whom I would trust to get it right.

The choice of the Wycliffe translation was inspired, as most of the music in the program dated from the early centuries of western music. Anna Pope has, for years, developed her Lumina Vocal Ensemble as a vehicle for her love and research into early music. Almost all of the music is anonymous and from the fifteenth century, delivered by her singers, who took solo and chorus parts as necessary with equal enthusiasm.

While the one anachronism was a piece by Benjamin Britten, the words to his Hymn To The Virgin are appropriately fifteenth century. The standout for me, amid all the polyphony, was a piece from the Middle European Codex Specialnik, Sophia Nasci Fertur Singular, in three parts. The tenor holds a slow statement while the other two voices, each with their own but related texts about the gifts of the Three Kings, and rhythmic patterns, sing above and round it. It's hypnotically beautifully and, if you don't believe me, Anna Pope posts their performances on Youtube. Just enter Sophia Nesci Fertur Singular. The performance was recorded by Rosemary Beal in the Reading Room of the Barr Smith Library at the University of Adelaide.

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