ClevelandClassical
020811MignardaRev
Review
Mignarda: "Harmonia Caelestis" at St. John's Cathedral (February 6)
by Nicholas Jones
The duo Mignarda, composed of Donna Stewart (soprano) and Ron Andrico (lute), brought their intimate music to the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist Sunday afternoon. On a day on which we are usually assaulted with the raucous and mercenary tones of the Super Bowl, this meditative and lovely concert of largely Spanish polyphonic music caressed the ear and soothed the soul.As the performers noted in their informal remarks, the motets included some well-known choral works, such as Palestrina’s Sicut cervus and Victoria’s O magnum mysterium. It was a pleasure also to hear a substantial selection from the lesser-known sixteenth-century composer Francisco Guerrero, whose music sounds particularly “Spanish” with its flexible rhythms and melodic plangency. The program was largely identical to the duo’s latest CD, reviewed at ClevelandClassical last October.
Readers unfamiliar with Mignarda will wonder how five-part polyphony can be performed by only two people. Stewart and Andrico have revived “intabulation,” a practice (little-known outside of lute circles) by which motets were adapted to be performed by a lute, which plays, remarkably, all the parts but one, reserved for a single vocalist.
Apparently widespread in the sixteenth century, this practice radically changes the effect of the music. By moving the vocal counterpoint to the lute, it makes the text (sung now by a single voice) much clearer, and brings out rhythms that are not usually apparent in the fully vocal versions. Because of the contrast between the soprano’s sustained notes and the lute’s articulated plucking, the pieces gain a certain quiet tension that is not present in choral versions.
The most immediate downside of this form of adaptation is the loss of almost all of the suspensions that make sixteenth-century motet writing so deeply expressive, due to the inability of the lute string to sustain a tone. Hearing these adaptations, as beautiful as they are, was a little like hearing Stevie Wonder playing his cover of the Beatles’ We can work it out: something gained, something lost.
Donna Stewart delivered the powerful Latin texts with gentle expressiveness and obvious faith in their meaning. Her admirable hold on the center of the pitch would be even more effective without a slight habit of scooping some notes, often apparently for emphasis. Ron Andrico brought high-quality lute playing to what must be fiercely difficult parts. His solo pieces, interspersed among the motets, were performed cleanly and with appropriate expressivity.
The duo, performing in a transept of the striking Gothic revival cathedral, made the intimacy of the music visually apparent, sitting close enough to each other to read from the same music. Behind them was a statue of the Virgin, appropriately for a concert largely featuring devotional music honoring Mary. While the cathedral setting was certainly evocative of the magnificent ecclesiastical spaces for which the motets were originally composed, the delicate notes of the lute would have been better heard in a smaller chamber.
In two numbers, Stewart and Andrico were joined by a performer on the Renaissance harp, whose name was not listed in the program. Stewart sang the last piece on the program, the well-known chant Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est, as a solo; it was a moving and lovely benediction for a meditative and prayerful afternoon.
Greeted warmly by the small audience, the duo performed Byrd’s famous Ave verum corpus as an encore.
ClevelandClassical
