Robert Fayrfax (1464-1521)
Maria plena virtute
Ave Dei Patris
O Maria, Deo grata
Eterne laudis lilium
The Tallis Scholars / Peter Phillips
rec. The Chapel of Merton College, Oxford (dates not specified)
Latin texts, English, French & German translations included
Gimell CDGIM054 [60]
I may be wrong but I have a feeling this disc may be the first recording that The Tallis Scholars have made of music by Robert Fayrfax. I have a lot of their CDs in my collection and none of those include music by Fayrfax, nor could I spot any examples of his output on the Gimell website. Whether I’m right or not, this new album is very welcome; it is, I think, a year since the group released their last CD, devoted to music by John Sheppard (review).
Fayrfax was born in Lincolnshire in 1464 and died in St Albans in 1521; he was buried in St Albans Abbey. I read with interest in Peter Phillips’ booklet essay that one of the four pieces recorded here, O Maria, Deo grata was originally a setting of the antiphon ‘O Albane, Deo grata’ in honour of St Alban. Phillips observes that this “goes to support the idea that Fayrfax was associated with the town and abbey of St Albans for much of his life”. I believe that Fayrfax was a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal. It also appears that he enjoyed some court patronage, from Margaret Beaufort, the mother of King Henry VII and, as we shall see, from the king’s wife, Elizabeth of York.
It was salutary to remind myself that one of the earliest reviews I contributed to MusicWeb, back in 2001, was a set of recordings of masses by Robert Fayrfax (review). I greatly admired that music – and the performances – but not much music by Fayrfax has come my way since then. One exception was a big boxed set of English polyphonic music as recorded by The Sixteen, which I bought after reading the review by my late colleague, Brian Wilson. That set included the Missa Albanus – another link with St Alban and, possibly, the abbey church named in his honour – and also one of the works on this Tallis Scholars CD, namely Eterne laudis lilium. The other three pieces selected by Peter Phillips are, I’m sure, new to me.
The four pieces which The Talis Scholars have recorded are all Marian antiphons, each one of which is on a substantial scale – Eterne laudis lilium is the shortest of them, here taking a fraction under thirteen minutes to unfold. All four pieces are set for five voices – Treble, Mean, Counter-Tenor, Tenor and Bass. However, in each composition, Fayrfax varies the number of voices from section to section, reserving the full ensemble for crucial passages. Nor is this just a matter of texture; it seems to me that Fayrfax judges very well how many voices and, more importantly, which sorts of voices to deploy in order to illustrate the text at any one point. Gimell’s presentation is extremely helpful in that they divide each Antiphon into several tracks, often corresponding to a change in the vocal textures; this makes it really easy for the listener to follow what Fayrfax is doing and appreciate the subtleties of his writing.
As with the majority of pieces of Tudor polyphony, it’s not easy to date compositions with complete accuracy. However, Peter Phillips suggests that Eterne laudis lilium may be the earliest and that it may date from 1502. That’s the year in which Elizabeth of York paid Fayrfax twenty shillings for an ‘Anthem of oure lady and Saint Elisabeth’. Phillips cites as further evidence of the Antiphon’s origin the fact that the text is an acrostic which spells out ‘Elisabeth Regina Anglie’ (that’s made clear in the way Gimell lay out the text in the booklet). The text outlines the genealogy of Christ, laying emphasis on the female line; perhaps that’s why upper voices often seem to be quite prominent in the textures – rather more so than is the case in Maria plena virtute, as we shall see. I have the impression that the vocal lines are somewhat more decorated than in the other three pieces. The sections where Fayrfax slims down his textures to three, or in one case two, parts afford a really effective contrast with the full ensemble episodes. In the concluding minutes Fayrfax deploys all five voices. As befits the words set in this part of the piece, Fayrfax’s music – and the Tallis Scholars’ delivery of it – grows in strength and power until the Antiphon ends with a full-throated ‘Amen’. It doesn’t seem too fanciful to think that Fayrfax was moved to end his piece in this fashion in order to impress his royal patron.
Ave Dei Patris is a text which a number of Tudor composers set and I was intrigued to read Peter Phillips’ comment that “the rather sudden vogue for these settings has aspects of being a competition which Fayrfax might have started”. Phillips further notes that Fayrfax’s way with the words results in “lines that are notably dignified and melodic, grateful to sing”. In this piece I have the impression that Fayrfax made the higher voices stand out quite a lot; for example, in the first set of sections scored for five voices (tracks 14 & 15). The closing sections (beginning at ‘Ave virgo feta’, tr 18) also deploy the full ensemble and here both the music and the way it is sung are increasingly fervent.
We are lucky to be able to hear O Maria, Deo grata because only three of its five voice parts have survived; the treble and tenor parts are missing. However, the musicologist Nick Sandon has come to the rescue. Peter Phillips explains that the music is based on the same cantus firmus as Fayrfax’s Missa Albanus and the two works have other links, too. So, Sandon was able to copy across “quite substantial sections” of the missing material from the Mass to the Antiphon. That seems a notable piece of musical detective work and scholarship and the present performance demonstrates how worthwhile Sandon’s work was. Yet again, Fayrfax varies his textures and it seems to me that the portions of the setting which involve all five parts contain music that, as interpreted here, is very solemn and expansive. This solemnity means that the four sections which are set for just three voices – in different combinations each time – offer a particularly effective contrast.
I’ve left to last what seems to me to be the finest and most imposing of the four Antiphons; it’s also the longest. Maria plena virtute may be the latest of the four pieces; Peter Phillips suggests in his essay that Eterne laudis lilium may have been the start of a process whereby Fayrfax developed a new way of setting texts and that Maria plena virtute “might be said to show where this process finally ended”. This Antiphon is a setting of an anonymous poem which speaks of Christ’s suffering on the cross, as witnessed by his mother. The piece divides into eleven sections, including the Amen, and in only four of these is the full ensemble involved. I mentioned earlier that in Ave Dei Patris a degree of prominence was give to the upper voices; by contrast, in Maria plena virtute the lower voices, with the darker sounds they bring, are more to the fore. That’s appropriate given the subject matter. The nature of the music seems starker than in the other Antiphons; that’s largely a question of textures, I’m sure. Peter Phillips rightly references Fayrfax’s “uncompromising directness of expression” in this piece. It’s a magnificent composition and the performance by Phillips and The Tallis Scholars demonstrates its stature.
This is a most distinguished disc. The singing is immaculate and highly disciplined; one would expect no less from this ensemble. Under Peter Phillips’ astute direction, the singers show great understanding of how the words and music dovetail; they communicate these Antiphons marvellously.
Philip Hobbs is Gimell’s recording engineer of choice and once again he has produced a fine recording. All the vocal lines are clearly heard and the lovely acoustic of Merton College Chapel is used to excellent effect to impart a glow to the sound. The documentation is in keeping with this label’s consistently high standard.
Peter Phillips and The Tallis Scholars have done Robert Fayrfax proud with this fine CD. I wonder if they might be tempted to explore more of his music on disc; that would be extremely welcome.
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