Darkness into Light: Medieval & modern-a mystical journey

"John Tavener fans have a world-premiere to savor and followers of Anonymous 4 get to hear the acclaimed quartet do more of what it does best. What's not to like? On the surface, we're bathed in gorgeous sound--both in terms of the music itself and the clear, resonant, nicely balanced recording. The medieval plainchant and polyphony, selected from the Divine Office and mass, includes the beautiful hymns O lux beata trinitas, Christe qui lux es, and Medie noctis tempus est (sung in Anonymous 4's trademark perfect unison), as well as three "medieval lections" whose two-part scoring features lines that bounce freely among open fourths and fifths, unisons, and octaves. And if you know any of Anonymous 4's previous work, you're not surprised here at the singers' amazing technical precision, uniformity of phrasing, and absolute one-ness of sound in these very challenging pieces.

Most of the rest of the program consists of four works by John Tavener, three of which are scored for voices and strings, the other (The Lord's Prayer) for voices alone. The Bridegroom, written in 1999 for Anonymous 4 and the Chilingirian Quartet, receives its world-premiere recording here, and suffice to say, in all of its 17 and one half minutes we hear nothing we haven't heard before in numerous other Tavener works. In fact, the pieces on display here clearly reveal the rather formulaic nature of much of his writing: predominance of close-scored dissonances; slow-moving, mostly stepwise chordal structure that involves much forward/backward motion and repetition, almost invariably centered in a minor "key"; very short phrases marked by regular, distinct pauses; drones supporting bursts of high-lying melodies, often harmonized in thirds and sixths. There's little of what we normally think of as rhythm, and once Tavener latches onto a melodic or harmonic idea he likes, he never lets go of it. In fact, he makes entire pieces out of almost nothing, just by repeating the simplest fragment--ad nauseam. When he's through with an idea, he just dumps it and begins another; when he runs out of words--as in The Lord's Prayer--he just stops.

Granted, the music is almost invariably pretty, sometimes even truly if momentarily exciting. The earliest Tavener work here, As one who has slept, is very appealing in its simplicity--and along with the equally ingratiating The Lord's Prayer could serve as a summation of his recent style, whose scale of superficiality is surpassed only by the composer's astonishing pretentiousness (which we should be used to by now), exemplified here in his directions to performers: "The music must be sung with enormous intensity and sonority, casting all into the fire of God"; "The music [of The Bridegroom] should be almost unbearable in its ecstatic light . . . the female voices [represent] the people in the world, full of that longing which is a kind of Divine eros."

What exactly the performers are supposed to do with this information is anyone's guess, but at least the Chilingirians and Anonymous foursome make it all sound very sonorous and genuinely, sincerely felt (if not quite "unbearable" or fully "cast into the fire of God"). Considering the great temporal distance between the medieval works and those of Tavener, the program actually coheres and flows very well--but for me, the juxtaposition only reinforces my conviction that those anonymous church composers of long-past centuries are far more compelling in (and perhaps largely because of) their anonymity than a certain all-too-self-aware 21st-century composer whose presumptions of greatness never will garner him a place in their exalted company. (The rating, given the foregoing, reflects the overall high quality of the production and the exceptional performances.)"
(Classics Today 9/10 Artistic Quality / Sound Quality

The spiritual dichotomy of darkness and light, explored in music from the Middle Ages and of our time, including the world premiere recording of The Bridegroom, composed by John Tavener for Anonymous 4 and the Chilingirian String Quartet.

"Anonymous 4 present a disc that spans many centuries - from the medieval to our own time and the music of Sir John Tavener. Such a combination makes perfect sense for a composer whose own musical language draws its strength from the ancient traditions of the Russian Orthodox Church. In a world where fusion is all the rage, this is an intelligently conceived and rather special example."
- Editor's Choice - Gramophone Magazine (June 2003)

"Mesmerizing" - San Francisco Chronicle

Renowned for their unearthly vocal blend and virtuosic ensemble singing, the four women who comprise Anonymous 4 combine musical, literary, and historical scholarship with contemporary performance intuition as they create ingeniously designed programs, interweaving music with poetry and narrative.

Anonymous 4 performs in major cities throughout North America, including New York, Boston, Washington DC, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, Chicago, Seattle, and Toronto, among others. Celebrated regulars at major international festivals, Anonymous 4's appearances include Tanglewood (MA), Wolf Trap (VA), BBC Proms (UK), Lucerne International Festival (Switzerland), Flanders Festival (Belgium), International Oude Muziek Festival (Holland), Brisbane Biennial (Australia), and the Bergen Festival (Norway).

Highlights of Anonymous 4's 2002-2003 season include the release of their 12th album, la bele marie: Songs to the Virgin from 13th-century France (harmonia mundi usa), as well as the premiere of Wolcum Yule, a new program of Celtic and British Isles traditional and contemporary music for the Christmas season, with Celtic harp. Two new commissions for the program, by Peter Maxwell Davies and Jocelyn Pook, will be premiered during the 12-concert December tour.

In the realm of contemporary music, Anonymous 4 tours as the voice of Joan of Arc in "Voices of Light," an oratorio with silent film, composed by Richard Einhorn. Anonymous 4 has performed the work under Marin Alsop, with the Vienna Symphony, and at Lincoln Center with Concordia Orchestra, as well as with the Hong Kong Philharmonic under Lucinda Carver. In 2000-2001, Anonymous 4 and the Chilingirian String Quartet premiered John Tavener's newly-commissioned work, "The Bridegroom," and have recorded a program of Tavener's music, "Darkness into Light," for upcoming release. Other new works include Steve Reich's "Know What is Above You," and Richard Einhorn's "A Carnival of Miracles," both commissioned by WNYC Radio.

Anonymous 4 has appeared on a wide range of radio and television programs, including NPR's "All Things Considered," "Performance Today" and "Weekend Edition," MPR's "St. Paul Sunday," WETA's "Millennium of Music," Garrison Keillor's "A Prairie Home Companion,"ZDF's "Ersteklassich!" (Germany). The ensemble has been featured on A&E's "Breakfast With the Arts," as well as on Discovery Health Channel and Fox News Channel.

Anonymous 4's award-winning recordings for harmonia mundi usa (for whom they record exclusively) have sold over one million copies worldwide. Their debut recording, An English Ladymass, was named 1992 Classical Disc of the Year by CD Review. On Yoolis Night, received France's prestigious Diapason d'Or, and The Lily and the Lamb, was Classic CD's Disc of the Year for 1996. Legends of St. Nicholas was Classic FM's Early Music Recording of the Year for 1999, and 1000: A Mass for the End of Time, was a Gramophone Editor's Choice for 2000. The Second Circle, love songs of the 14th-century Italian composer, Francesco Landini, received Italy's Antonio Vivaldi Award for 2001. Their release, la bele marie, was given highest rating (10/10) by ClassicsToday.com.