You may be puzzled to see 20th century dates on an album by the Gabrieli Consort, and its director Paul McCreesh, but two factors make it appropriate. The first is that McCreesh has recorded several other albums that reconstruct the music for a single event. More important, and this points to the strength of this release, the coronation program performed here does include Renaissance music. This is a strength of the British tradition: it descends from Renaissance music in a way that music of no other country does. McCreesh ...
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You may be puzzled to see 20th century dates on an album by the Gabrieli Consort, and its director Paul McCreesh, but two factors make it appropriate. The first is that McCreesh has recorded several other albums that reconstruct the music for a single event. More important, and this points to the strength of this release, the coronation program performed here does include Renaissance music. This is a strength of the British tradition: it descends from Renaissance music in a way that music of no other country does. McCreesh assembles actual music from the last four coronations of an English monarch: Edward VII in 1902, George V in 1911, George VI in 1937, and Elizabeth II in 1953. One imagines that whoever is tasked with planning the coronation of Charles (or whoever may be next in-line) will want to have this album on hand, for it gives a good idea of what the ceremony is about. The program mixes Renaissance, Baroque, Romantic, and contemporary anthems, with just one non-British piece (a Luther...
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