On Friday evening Toronto’s Diapente Renaissance Quintet [1] combined with Montreal based medieval music ensemble Comtessa [2] to create an intriguing programme at St. Thomas’ Anglican.  The concert was titled Across the Channel : English and French Music of the Hundred Years War; which was more or less accurate!  The works; vocal and instrumental, actually spanned from the 13th century to the latter half of the 15th; so a rather longer span than the war, but the “English and French” bit was true enough.  Unlike the war, Scots and Gascons were notably absent!

It was an interesting journey through the stylistic shifts on either side of the channel as high medieval chant and trouvère song evolved through ever more complex polyphony to something close to what one would hear in the 16th century.  I also found the English texts interesting.  The earlier texts; especially “Ar ne kuthe ich sorghe non” have clearly dropped the grammatical complexity of Old English but the vocabulary is still archaic while by the time of the “Agincourt Carol” it poses few problems for anyone who can read Shakespeare.

But back to the music… There were eight musicians involved in all sorts of combinations. Some pieces were vocal only; for example the well known “Sumer is icumen in” was sung as a round with Len Torrie taking the lead while the “Agincourt Carol” got a rousing treatment from Messrs Capellazzo, Stuchberry and Gomes.  There was dance music using all the available instruments and a cheeky use of the St. Thomas organ by Ms. Gajraj for an “Estampie” from the Robertsbridge Codex.  In combination, it went from as simple as Peter Koniers accompanied by vielle and lute in the rather odd “Fumeus fume par fumée” to both sopranos, Koniers and Capellazzo accompanied by vielle and organelle in a rather lovely setting of “Salve regina misericordie”.

It was an extremely varied programme beautifully performed in the sympathetic church acoustic.  And nobody died of plague.

[1] Peter Koniers (countertenor), Jonathan Stuchberry (tenor and lute), Jane Fingler (soprano), Alexander Cappellazzo (tenor) and Martin Gomes (bass).

[2] Isabelle Douailly-Backman (vielle and rebec), Len Torrie (soprano and citole) and Maria Gajraj (organetto).

Photos not from Friday.