Die Singphoniker
51:51
Hänssler classic HC24007
This programme emphasises Lassus’s cosmopolitan status, working in Munich at the centre of Europe and composing secular songs in German, French and Italian – technically the title should read Orlandus Lassus, Rolande de Lassus, Orlando di Lasso! This remarkable chameleon composer manages to adapt completely to each of the musical worlds he enters. The German Lieder, many of them comic novelty songs, are wonderfully mischievous, an aspect fully exploited by the Singphoniker, a sort of German equivalent of our own King’s Singers. Like the latter, they produce a perfectly tuned, wonderfully unified and beautifully blended sound. The transition to the French repertoire is seamless, as is Lassus’ transformation into Rolande de Lassus, and they provide genuinely moving accounts of these delicious French lovesongs as well as trippingly lively performances of the comedy songs Quand mon mari, O vin en vigne, and Dessus le marché d’Arras. Perhaps of his three guises, di Lasso is least typically represented in the madrigals and villanelle, with the concluding extended Sestina setting Là ver l’aurora sounding much more French than Italian in style. Recorded back in 1992, this CD stands the test of time very well with thoroughly modern standards of recorded quality and performance.
D. James Ross