COMPOSERS: Browne
LABELS: Gimell
ALBUM TITLE: Music from the Eton Choirbook
WORKS: Salve Regina I; Stabat iuxta; Stabat mater; O regina mundi clara; O Maria salvatoris
PERFORMER: Tallis Scholars, Peter Philips
CATALOGUE NO: CDGIM 036
John Browne seems to have worked
in the household chapel of John de
Vere, Earl of Oxford in the 1490s.
Most of his compositions appear
in the splendid Eton Choirbook – a
source recorded almost complete in
the 1990s by The Sixteen (reissued on
Coro in 2003). These performances
by the Tallis Scholars, though, are
generally better, with greater lucidity
of texture and more careful pacing.
Peter Phillips has set the
performance pitch for these pieces
somewhat higher than their notated
pitch. This allows the extraordinary
close harmonies of low men’s voices
on tracks 2-4 to remain transparent,
and it evokes a magical, bell-like
sound from the high trebles in Salve
regina I. The phrasing employed
is usually simple and untheatrical
– though I did wonder about the
self-effacing presentation of the
tenor part in Stabat iuxta that
happens to be taken from a song by
Turges (a fact perhaps unknown to
the performers). Browne’s greatest
work is the wonderful Stabat mater,
and for this one piece there is a
serious rival recording by Andrew
Parrott on Virgin Veritas. Parrott’s
rhythms are sharper, and he makes
more sense of the great dramatic
cries of ‘Crucify him!’ in the
penultimate section. Anthony Pryer