COMPOSERS: Tye/Mundy
LABELS: Naxos
WORKS: Missa Euge bone; Peccavimus; Magnificat; Kyrie
PERFORMER: Oxford Camerata/Jeremy Summerly
CATALOGUE NO: 8.550937 DDD
A Mass, a Kyrie, a Magnificat and a pair of motets make up this suavely reverberant disc of two 16th-century Chapel Royal composers, Tye of one generation and Mundy of the next. Tudor polyphony falls gratefully upon the ear in billowing patterns of exquisite subtlety. A dozen assorted Oxford lads and lasses shine like so many Zuleika Dobsons and Dukes of Dorset, under their skilled but negligent director Jeremy Summerly.
He credits every one of the singers and the booklet-note writer, Edward Wickham. But Tye was not a ‘humorous man’, Mr Wickham. The Bodleian manuscript notes of Anthony à Wood specifically refer to him as ‘a peevish and humoursome man’, which is something quite different. Since he once told the Queen that her ears were out of tune, he would tell Mr Wickham to check his references, as well as reminding Mr Summerly to give proper credit to the musical editors Frank Harrison, Nigel Davidson and Paul Doe. Without their painstakingly accurate work, it would not have been possible even to begin recording a CD such as this. The musicologist is also worthy of his hire. Denis Stevens