by Kevin McLaughlin
Before the Cleveland Chamber Choir sang a note on Saturday evening in First Lutheran Church in Lorain, the audience had choir practice.
With gentle guidance and help from the chorus, Gregory Ristow got them singing the anonymous L’homme armé melody, antique French pronunciation and all. The tune, now internalized, became a recognizable thread connecting two centuries of Renaissance music.
Under Ristow’s direction, “La fleur de la Renaissance” moved through Mass movements, laments, psalms, battle pieces, and spring chansons, using the L’homme armé melody as both connective thread and point of departure. The evening spanned nearly 200 years, but never felt like a history lesson. Ristow organized the concert as a sequence of changing scenes, moods, and colors, each piece leading naturally into the next.