Contrapunctus
Coupling powerful interpretations with path-breaking scholarship, Contrapunctus presents music by the best known composers as well as unfamiliar masterpieces. The group’s repertoire is drawn from England, the Low Countries, Spain, Portugal and Germany, particularly in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The scholarly facet of the group’s work – including the discovery of long-lost music and reconstructions of original performing contexts – allows audiences to experience the first performances of many works in modern times. Since its foundation in 2010, the group has appeared in many of the world's most prominent music festivals – the Utrecht Early Music Festival, the AMUZ Festival in Antwerp, the Festival van Vlaanderen in Mechelen, the Eboræ Musica Festival and Setúbal Festival in Portugal, the concert series at De Bijloke in Ghent, and in the Martin Randall Festival of Spanish Music (Seville Cathedral), and alongside the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. Contrapunctus is Vocal Consort in Residence at the University of Oxford. The group's debut disc 'Libera nos: The Cry of the Oppressed' was released on the Signum Label in 2013 and was shortlisted for the Gramophone Early Music Award 2014. Contrapunctus' next recording project centres on the Baldwin Tudor Partbooks. A series of discs on the Signum label will present music from these partbooks. The first album 'In the Midst of Life' featuring motets on the theme of mortality, was released in February 2015 to great critical acclaim. It was shortlisted for the Gramophone Early Music Award 2015, named Album of the Week in The Sunday Times, The Week, and on BBC Radio 3 CD Review. It was Editor's Choice in Gramophone and Choral and Song Choice in BBC Music Magazine.