The front cover of this Hyperion disc, Nicolas Gombert: Tribulatio et angustia featuring the Brabant Ensemble under Stephen Rice, is decorated with a very striking and violent image, that of a scroll-bearing demon standing amid hellfire with the souls of the damned in torment beneath as they are vomited up by some sort of fire-breathing dragon. The image comes from the painting The Triptych of Earthly Vanity and Divine Salvation by early Dutch master Hans Memling, and indeed, the mood of the souls and their suffering are ...
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The front cover of this Hyperion disc, Nicolas Gombert: Tribulatio et angustia featuring the Brabant Ensemble under Stephen Rice, is decorated with a very striking and violent image, that of a scroll-bearing demon standing amid hellfire with the souls of the damned in torment beneath as they are vomited up by some sort of fire-breathing dragon. The image comes from the painting The Triptych of Earthly Vanity and Divine Salvation by early Dutch master Hans Memling, and indeed, the mood of the souls and their suffering are well reflected in Gombert's depressive, deeply penitential music. This collection consists of 11 of Gombert's four- and five-voice motets, some of which appeared in his first two motet collections, printed in 1539 and appearing not long after his return from exile on the high seas. Gombert was sent on this arduous journey to do penance for an act of priestly pederasty for which he was ever repentant and by which his music is often judged -- and dismissed without the hearing --...
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