Press Release: The Tallis Scholars celebrates its 50th anniversary singing masterpieces from England and Europe in Santa Fe’s Cathedral Basilica

Acclaimed British vocal ensemble known for performances of Renaissance sacred music performs in Santa Fe

Santa Fe, NM, March 23, 2023 – The Tallis Scholars, one of the world’s premier vocal ensembles, performs next month in Santa Fe as a part of its 50^th anniversary celebration. Under the leadership of founding director Peter Phillips, who formed the group from members of the Oxford and Cambridge chapel choirs, The Tallis Scholars come to Santa Fe with a program of Renaissance masterpieces. Resonating in the glory of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, their program features sacred music from England and Europe, including works by Tallis, Palestrina, Lassus, and Josquin des Prez, among others.

Program

Masterpieces from England

Orlando Gibbons
O clap your hands

Thomas Tallis
Suscipe quaeso

Robert White
Exaudiat te

Robert Fayrfax
Eterne laudis lilium

Masterpieces from Europe

Giovanni Pieluigi da Palestrina
Tu es Petrus

Orlande de Lassus

Timor et tremor

Nicolas Gombert
Lugebat David

Josquin des Prez
Absalon fili mi

Tomás Luis de Victoria
Magnificat Primi Toni

Presented through the generosity of LewAllen Galleries, Yoko and Thomas Arthur, and Heritage Hotels and Resorts
22–23 Season Sponsors: Ann Murphy Daily and William W. Daily; Leah Gordon

Details

The Tallis Scholars. Masterpieces of Renaissance vocal polyphony from England and Europe. Presented by Performance Santa Fe at the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, 131 Cathedral Pl, Santa Fe, NM 87501. Monday, April 24, 7:30 pm. Tickets: $25–$95. PerformanceSantaFe.org, 505 984 8759.

About The Tallis Scholars

Peter Phillips, director

The Tallis Scholars were founded in 1973 by director Peter Phillips. Through their recordings and concert performances, they have established themselves as the leading exponents of Renaissance sacred music throughout the world. Peter Phillips has worked with the ensemble to create the purity and clarity which he feels best serves the Renaissance repertoire. It is the resulting beauty of sound for which The Tallis Scholars have become so widely renowned.

The Tallis Scholars perform in both sacred and secular venues, giving around 80 concerts each year. In 2013 the group celebrated their 40^th anniversary with a World Tour and are now celebrating their 50^th anniversary in 2023. As of the beginning of the cancellations caused by the COVID-19 crisis, the Tallis Scholars had made 2,327 appearances, worldwide.

2021/22 season highlights included performances in Amsterdam, Vienna, Paris, the RheinVokal and Regensburg Festivals, Klangvokal Musikfestival Dortmund, Bremen Musikfest, and tours of Italy, in addition to their usual touring schedule around the USA, Europe, and the UK. As part of the postponed Josquin des Prez’ 500^th anniversary celebrations, The Tallis Scholars sang all eighteen of the composer’s masses over the course of 4 days at the Boulez Saal in Berlin in July 2022.

Recordings by The Tallis Scholars have attracted numerous awards. Their recording of Josquin masses, including Missa Hercules Dux Ferrarie, was released in November 2020 and was winner of the BBC Music Magazine’s much coveted Recording of the Year Award in 2021. This disc was the last of nine albums in The Tallis Scholars’ project to record and release all Josquin’s masses before the 500^th anniversary of the composer’s death in 2021.

About Peter Phillips

Peter Phillips has dedicated his career to the research and performance of Renaissance polyphony and to the perfecting of choral sound. He founded The Tallis Scholars in 1973, with whom he has now appeared in over 2,300 concerts and made over 60 discs. As a result of this commitment Peter Phillips and The Tallis Scholars have done more than any other group to establish the sacred vocal music of the Renaissance as one of the great repertoires of Western classical music.

Peter Phillips also conducts other specialist ensembles. He is currently working with the BBC Singers, the Netherlands Chamber Choir, the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, Intrada (Moscow) and El Leon de Oro (Spain). He is Patron of the Chapel Choir of Merton College Oxford.

In addition to conducting, Peter Phillips is well-known as a writer. For 33 years he contributed a regular music column to The Spectator. In 1995 he became the publisher of The Musical Times, the oldest continuously published music journal in the world. His first book, English Sacred Music 1549-1649, was published by Gimell in 1991, while his second, What We Really Do, appeared in 2013. During 2018, BBC Radio 3 broadcast his view of Renaissance polyphony, in a series of six hour-long programmes, entitled The Glory of Polyphony.

In 2005 Peter Phillips was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Minister of Culture. In 2008 Peter helped to found the chapel choir of Merton College Oxford, where he is a Bodley Fellow; and in 2021 he was elected an Honorary Fellow of St John’s College, Oxford

About Performance Santa Fe

Performance Santa Fe has been bringing the very best of music, dance, and theater to iconic Santa Fe locations since 1937. Now in its 86th season, the organization upholds excellence in the performing arts and brings joy and enrichment to the community. Alongside its extensive performance season, the organization runs three dynamic, exciting, and inclusive educational programs for students in the community— Arts for Life, the Masterclass Series, and the Field Trip Series. PSF’s 2022-2023 season brings 27 performances to Santa Fe and celebrates the diverse possibilities of artistic expression. Learn more at PerformanceSantaFe.org. Performance Santa Fe is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization.

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