School of Rock
Random article All articles A–Z
2 languages

Huelgas Ensemble

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

The Huelgas Ensemble is a Belgian early-music group, founded in 1971 by the Flemish conductor Paul Van Nevel, who still leads the group. The ensemble consists of singers and instrumentalists and focuses on medieval music from the thirteenth century, Renaissance polyphony and early Baroque, especially of the Franco-Flemish school. The name refers to the Codex Las Huelgas, a manuscript of polyphonic music and one of the most important sources for the thirteenth century.

Music and breakthrough

The discography is large. Early recordings are Las Ensaladas from 1975, Motets Wallons from 1978 and Ars moriendi from 1979. Later came La Favola di Orfeo from 1982, Cypriot Advent Antiphons from 1990 and La Dissection d'un Homme armé, six masses on a Burgundian song, from 1990, among others. In 2009, after eight years with Bernard Coutaz's Harmonia Mundi, the group returned to Sony Classical, which reissued a box of fifteen CDs.

Influence

Van Nevel is known for a working method of his own: he often has the singers and himself stand in a large circle and slowly rotate, during concerts and around the microphone in recordings. For a concert in 2005 at the Rheingau Musik Festival, the pews had to be unbolted from the floor of the basilica for this. The ensemble is one of the groups that made the polyphony of before Bach audible again.

Listening

Listening tip. Listen to La Dissection d'un Homme armé. Notice how the same familiar melody emerges again and again in different masses, surrounded by other voices.

Discography

Studio albums

Categories: Artists