Vox Animae is an early music ensemble, founded in 1994 by director and instrumentalist Michael Fields. The group specialises in Medieval music, particularly vocal music, such as sequences, chants and other music with a strong story-line, such as Visitatio sepulchri. They are particularly keen on using drama to enhance the audience experience of the music, and feature staged performances individually crafted to suit each venue. (Also, education-outreach projects, talks and vocal workshops etc. according to each project). They are renowned for their presentation of Hildegard of Bingen's Ordo Virtutum.
Based in South-East England, the group has performed across the UK and Europe, also broadcast live on Danish Radio and BBC Radio 3.
Founder members of Vox Animae include sopranos Evelyn Tubb, Ansy Boothroyd and baritone John Hancorn; Lindsay Richardson, Ruth Gomme, Clare Norburn and the rest of the established team of vocal soloists also have extensive experience of this music. Choruses are sung by people recruited and coached locally for each performance.
Reviews of the live performance and the DVD Recording
‘Stunning simplicity and pure serenity reach out to touch the heart of the listener...a cappella singing of excellent clarity and ensemble, the leading roles illuminating the parts with soaring virtuosity.’ Bournemouth Evening Echo
‘...the disciplined drama of Vox Animae's production extracted startling variety from the score - one was left marveling at Hildegard's daring.’ Opera Magazine
“This is a wonderful performance...the vocal artistry is at a very high level throughout. If I were forced to limit my library to only one recording of music by Hildegard von Bingen, this would be it. Continuo Magazine, USA
‘Opus Arte’s two DVD set explores Hildegard’s many facets and talents with a 70 minute performance of her musical morality play on the journey of the Soul, Ordo Virtutum. Followed by a fully dramatised BBC biographical documentary, Omnibus; a 40 minute documentary from The National Cathedral Washington; a 45 minute interview with two experts on Hildegard’s significance for us today, and a full gallery of Hildegard’s beautiful mystic Mandala-like paintings. A truly insightful performance and will be of interest to many who have a curiosity about human development. Excellent!’ In Balance Magazine
‘I can think of no better introduction to this earliest of music dramas than the performance filmed here... one is left overawed by the experience. But this is not just a performance of the Ordo Virtutum. Together, the two DVDs contain over four hours of material designed to create a well-rounded portrait of Hildegard. ... Certainly worth buying...’ International Record Review
This stylized performance, sung to music that blends the meditative qualities of Gregorian chant with lyrical emotional expression, presents Hildegard von Bingen's powerful vision of life's difficult journey. The stellar medieval music ensemble Vox Animae treats this morality play as part of a living dramatic tradition, while also stressing the story's contemporary relevance. Queen's University at Kingston [syllabus for study unit ‘Women, Gender and Music’]
‘I don't know whether it's the piece itself, or this highly stylized and impeccably conceived performance that converted me from a sceptic to a true believer. The end result is one of the most potent and electrifying - and profoundly moving - films I've seen in a long time.’ Kathy Dobkin, WNET, New York
Discography
Ordo Virtutum (Etcetera Record Company BV CD 1995 KTC 1203; also VHS 1997)
Hildegard von Bingen In Portrait (double DVD OA 0874 D, published by BBC Opus Arte 2003)
Hildegard of Bingen, also known as Saint Hildegard and the Sibyl of the Rhine, was a German Benedictine abbess, writer, composer, philosopher, Christian mystic, visionary, and polymath. She is one of the best-known composers of sacred monophony, as well as the most-recorded in modern history. She has been considered by many in Europe to be the founder of scientific natural history in Germany.
Benjamin Bagby is an American singer, composer, harpist, and performer of medieval music.
Evelyn Tubb is a soprano, and long-time member of The Consort of Musicke and one of the world's greatest early music specialists, known for her innovative and original performances.
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Sequentia is an early music ensemble, founded in 1977 by Benjamin Bagby and Barbara Thornton. The group specializes mainly in Medieval music. Sequentia focuses particularly on music with texts, specifically chants and other stories with music, such as the Icelandic Edda. They are interested in the interplay between drama and music, and sometimes do partially staged performances, such as that of Hildegard of Bingen's Ordo Virtutum. Bagby and Thornton have both been active in original research on the projects they perform.
Eibingen Abbey is a community of Benedictine nuns in Eibingen near Rüdesheim in Hesse, Germany. Founded by Hildegard of Bingen in 1165, it was dissolved in 1804, but restored, with new buildings, in 1904. The nuns produce wine and crafts. They can be heard singing their regular services, which have been at times recorded. The church is also used as a concert venue. The abbey is a Rhine Gorge World Heritage Site.
Ordo Virtutum is an allegorical morality play, or sacred music drama, by St. Hildegard, composed c. 1151, during the construction and relocation of her Abbey at Rupertsberg. It is the earliest morality play by more than a century, and the only Medieval musical drama to survive with an attribution for both the text and the music.
Nóirín Ní Riain is an Irish singer, writer, teacher, theologian, and authority on Gregorian Chant. She is primarily known for spiritual songs, but also sings Celtic music, Sean-nós and Indian songs. Nóirín plays an Indian harmonium (surpeti), shruti box and feadóg (whistle). She was Artist-in-Residence for Wexford and Laois. She performs with her sons Eoin and Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin under the name A.M.E.N. and gives workshops about Sound as a Spiritual Experience.
A death growl is a vocal style usually employed by death metal singers but also used in other heavy metal styles, such as metalcore. Death growls are sometimes criticized for their "ugliness". However, the harshness of death growls is in keeping with death metal's abrasive music style and often dark and obscene subject matter. The progressively more forceful enunciation of metal vocals has been noted from heavy metal to thrash metal to death metal.
The Canberra Academy of Music and Related Arts was a community organization dedicated to performance and training in music and theatre for the community of Canberra, Australia.
Scivias is an illustrated work by Hildegard von Bingen, completed in 1151 or 1152, describing 26 religious visions she experienced. It is the first of three works that she wrote describing her visions, the others being Liber vitae meritorum and De operatione Dei. The title comes from the Latin phrase "Sci vias Domini". The book is illustrated by 35 miniature illustrations, more than that are included in her two later books of visions.
Barbara Thornton was an American singer, musicologist, and groundbreaking performer of medieval music.
This is a discography of Hildegard of Bingen's musical works.
La Reverdie, stylized as "LaReverdie", is an Italian group performing polyphonic medieval and Renaissance music.
Stevie Wishart is an English composer, improviser, and performer on the hurdy-gurdy and medieval violin. Mainly involved in contemporary music, she has also had a career in early music and has edited and recorded the complete works of Saint Hildegard of Bingen, as well as performing music from the repertoire of the medieval troubadours, trouvères and the Cantigas de Santa Maria, with the medieval group Sinfonye, which she led.
The Texas Early Music Project is a performing arts ensemble based in Austin, Texas, that focuses on bringing audiences a closer knowledge and appreciation of Baroque music, Medieval music, Renaissance music, and early Classical-period music. The group uses historical instruments in keeping with historically informed performance practice. The ensemble was founded in 1987 by Daniel Johnson, who remains the group's artistic director. The group is classified as a non-profit organization and operates primarily on grant money and donations for individual and corporate supporters. Income is supplemented by ticket sales and merchandise sales. Texas Early Music Project is a member of Early Music America. Performers are primarily professional musicians from the Austin area, although performers visit from Texas at large, from all over the United States, and occasionally internationally.
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Barbara Stühlmeyer OblOSB is a German theologian, musicologist, writer and contributing editor, especially a Hildegard scholar.
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