• Music

    The York Waits & Deborah Catterall – Christmas Musicke

    The York Waits are a group out of York, England (no surprise there, right?), who specialize in Renaissance music from the 14th Century.  This album is a reissue of a 1996 album where they paired with vocalist Deborah Catterall, who, 25 years after the release of this disc, served as Choral Director at Higham Hall, Cumbria and Voice Teacher at the Royal Northern College of Music before embarking on a private career.  The music is not badly recorded – perhaps a bit compressed for choral music, and not as bright as it could be, but otherwise, the tunes are well-played…

  • Music

    The Striking Chamber – Tomás Luis de Victoria: Collected Works

    Although there are some phenomenal classical musicians represented on Bandcamp, I didn’t expect to hear any work by the Counter-Reformation-era priest and composer Tomás Luis de Victoria.  This cassette tape, released by The Striking Chamber, came as a pleasant surprise.  It’s only 13 minutes long, and it’s released here as one solitary, slightly over-compressed track, but the organ sounds clear, and I want to encourage more performers of Renaissance music to come out and share their wares.