REQUIEM

The 500 years that separate Renaissance master Johannes Ockeghem and Danish composer Bent Sørensen seem to disappear in this extraordinary Requiem which is a totality integrated both dramatically and musically; a work that unites the stylistic contrasts in a mode of expression that seems at once timeless and entirely present.

The project has been initiated by conductor Paul Hillier and interpreted by his GRAMMY-winning ensemble Ars Nova Copenhagen.

Ockeghem:
 Missa Pro Defunctis

Sørensen, B:
 Fragments of Requiem

"Sorensen achieves a convincing transition between the two styles, using the plainchant as a kind of mediation...Sorensen specifies the positioning of the choir and individual voices: the outstanding performances and recording vividly bring out this spatial aspect of the music in both SACD and stereo"
BBC Music Magazine October 2012 *****

"Paul Hillier was the Hilliard's director when they recorded Ockeghem's Requiem and his view of the work has hardly changed, though the ensemble he now leads is very different. So, rather than reinvent the wheel, Hillier intersperses its movements...with pieces by the Danish composer Bent Sorensen...Those who know their polyphony, by the way, will enjoy Sorensen's splicing and looping together of Sanctus settings by Monteverdi and Ockeghem."
Gramophone Magazine July 2012