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Vox Luminis

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

Vox Luminis is a Belgian vocal ensemble for early music, led by Lionel Meunier. The ensemble was founded in 2004; its first performance was a concert at the IMEP music academy in Namur. In 2009 it settled in that city. The line-up varies: the core consists of eight to thirteen singers and two continuo players, and for certain projects instrumentalists are added. The ensemble sings mainly vocal music from Italy, England and Germany from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It strives for a coherent vocal colour, without hiding the personality of the individual singers.

Music and breakthrough

The international breakthrough came in 2012 with the recording of Heinrich Schütz's Musicalische Exequien for the label Ricercar. That record won, among other awards, a Gramophone Award and an International Classical Music Award. Other recordings include Samuel Scheidt's Sacræ Cantiones, English Royal Funeral Music from 2013, Brockes-Passion from 2014, Motets of the Bach family, Actus Tragicus with cantatas by Bach and Requiems by Fux and Kerll from 2016. In 2018 the record Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott won a BBC Music Magazine award, and in 2019 the ensemble again received a Gramophone Award, for Buxtehude: Abendmusiken.

Influence

Vox Luminis performs in major concert halls and festivals throughout Europe. The ensemble is among the most important players in the contemporary practice of early music and brings choral music from before the Classical period to a broad audience.

Listening

Listening tip. Listen to Schütz's Musicalische Exequien and notice how the voices merge into a single sound and then emerge again separately. Can you hear how few instruments are needed to make the funeral music weighty?

Discography

Studio albums

Categories: Artists