Stuck in traffic on the way home from Venice, NPR nattering on, as always, I heard wonderful music from this great British chorale group, Stile Antico (which means 'ancient style').It was from their latest album, Song of Songs.
In general I love Renaissance and Medieval chants, but what makes this album extra wonderful/delicious/rapturous is that all of songs are renditions of the Biblical book, Songs of Solomon. For those of you who don't know, this "controversial" book is a collection of love poems from King Solomon to . . . a woman. Scholar and scriptorians love to intellectualize this book, justifying it with allegory and sexual politics, but really, it is the pretty explicit, wanton poetry of a hot-blooded man. Isn't it great?!!
So Jews and Christians read it in church and synagogue, sing songs about it, etc.
The songs Stile Antico has chosen are particularly wanton and beautiful, engaging in wonderful "conversation" through song.
What is special about Stile Antico is they don't use a conductor! They stand in a semi circle and look to each other and listen to each other for cues! What a wonderful parallelism to the subject matter they are singing about . . . .
I just love this music! It is this wonderful marriage of the ether of spirituality with the earthiness of carnal/aural pleasure (aural being auditory). I can think of few things more sublime than to perhaps make love to this beautiful music (overshare?). Sigh I will have to settle for some dark chocolate and wine for now, but I am definitely going to get this album!!
Check it here, yo.
7 comments:
Wow ... that's beautiful. Thank you. Some nice sounds to start off a Monday. See you soon.
they do have a nice sound... but I'm not sure it's quite as sexual as you would like it to be... :)
Could have sworn I commented on this. Did I? Did you delete it? Did I say something inappropriate? WHAT HAPPENED?
Nothing's hotter than a bunch of musically inclined monks. It's so much more original than the scruffy rocker look.
Spam--don't crush my dreams.
Tai--I am afraid to say you did not comment on this post previously. I would never delete your comments.
As for your observation on monks . . . I am agree: faux hawks are so two years ago. It's time to ressurect the friar bowl!
Ha ha, were we stuck in the same traffic? I got this and another of their albums after listening in the car to the NPR story.
Aww! Emmers we're like connected!
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