Manchicourt: Missa & Motet

Paul van Nevel and his Huelgas Ensemble have made a practice of resuscitating the music of forgotten medieval and Renaissance composers (especially their Flemish compatriots). The subject of this disc is quite a find: Manchicourt was choirmaster to none other than Philip II. His music is unusual: He uses many false relations (dissonant cadences where the same note gets different accidentals in different voices) and he habitually leads up to cadences only to delay them. Still, it is eminently worth hearing, especially in these skilled hands. The Huelgas Ensemble has a dark Flemish tone color very different from the English choirs who dominate this repertory; while their performances sometimes seem flat and lacking in energy, their singing here is engrossing. --Matthew Westphal