It's not too early to start thinking of the Annual Canadian Renaissance Music Summer School

I have a confession to make.  I love choral music.  Just love it.  The sound of human voices soaring into the rafters is for me, the nearest thing to heaven on earth I think we mere mortals can achieve.

Unfortunately, my love of choral music does not extend to me actually singing with a choir.  Oh I have been approached to sing in choirs before, but that invitation usually is rescinded when they actually hear me sing.  Really.

It's not that I am all that bad.  I mean, I do have a voice since I spent 40 years in radio broadcasting.  However I never learned to read music, and besides, my timing is off.  My far better half has gone on record as stating I am always about half a beat behind everyone else whenever I sing with a group.  And that's on a good day.  I just like to be ready, that's all.

What's more, I tend to sing as flat as Saskatchewan.  Meaning, of course, my occasional basso-profundo is enough to annoy the cats we share the house with on a regular basis.

But that's not to say I don't enjoy hearing great choral music sung by those who can hold a note or two.  Or three.

Many of those aspiring young singers with an interest in Renaissance polyphony will be more than a little interested in the announcement this week the so-called "soft" deadline for applications to participate in the annual Canadian Renaissance Music Summer School at Huron University in May is set for February 1st.

Huron University is part of Western University in London, Ontario, and CRMSS is directed by world-renowned baritone and choral workshop leader Greg Skidmore.  The summer music school is now in its third year, running this year from May 9th to 17th and is the only Renaissance choral music workshop of its kind in Canada.

If you need a comparison of how important this summer music school is, it's basically on a par with those run by The Tallis Scholars in Seattle and the Early Music Academy in Boston, along with those held in England and throughout Europe.

In fact, the Canadian school's official patron is none other than the current director of The Tallis Scholars, Peter Phillips.  His recordings with the Scholars are luminous in sound and quite literally can take your breath away with their beauty.

Director Skidmore says this year they will be focusing on the works of the Franco-Flemish school, really the 'home' of Renaissance polyphonic music.  Helping out the home team in musical tutoring this year will be five master's level performance students from the University of York in the U.K., as well as guest artist Robert Hollingworth, director of the dynamic and inventive U.K.-based vocal consort I Fagiolini.

The Canadian Renaissance Music Summer Music School is aimed primarily, but not exclusively, at undergraduate students, graduates and young professional singers.  It will be a week-long deep dive into Renaissance polyphonic vocal music with an intensive period of rehearsal and performance, both liturgically and in concert, all with an emphasis on quality in performance.

In fact the week will culminate in a final live concert performance for the public at the end of the course in London, Ontario on Sunday, May 17th at 2:30 pm.

The theme of CRMSS 2020 is Beyond the Ordinary, with a focus on Franco-Flemish music.  Essentially this polyphonic style, meaning music with multiple, independent melody lines performed simultaneously was pioneered by the great master of the genre Josquin des Prez.

Renaissance music is both vocal and instrumental music written and performed in Europe essentially during the Renaissance era.  Most agree the period began about 1400 and ran for the better part of 200 years, closing around 1600 with the advent of the Baroque period.

The distribution of music and music theory texts to a wider audience was a laborious task at the start of the Renaissance period, as it all had to be hand-copied.  That time-consuming and expensive process was replaced by the first printing press that came out in 1439 and that made music more accessible to those who no longer had to pay a king's ransom to acquire scores with which they could rehearse.

So now here we are in 2020 and the music is not only readily available for study and performance, but there are schools such as CRMSS dedicated to making the music literally come alive for a whole new generation.

If you want more information on the course curriculum just go to http://www.crmss.org/course.html.

I might not be able to sing with the graduates but I think I can handle sitting in the audience and enjoying the final results.  Just so long as I keep my mouth shut...

Have a great weekend!

January 25th, 2020.