Guerrero – Missa Super flumina Babylonis

Following the revelatory release a couple of years ago of Morales en Toledo [Glossa GCD922001] it is a great pleasure to welcome back Michael Noone and Ensemble Plus Ultra to Glossa for a further demonstration of Noone’s remarkable knack of uniting unknown music from recognised masters in superb performances underpinned by exemplary scholarship.Through his ongoing research in the Cathedral Archives of Toledo, Noone has discovered a group of six hymns by Francisco Guerrero, written when he was apprenticed to Morales, recording these in the church of San Miguel in Cuenca along with the previously-unrecorded Missa Super flumina Babylonis.

For this new Guerrero recording Noone has added the superlative 8-voice antiphon Regina cæli and the motet Ave virgo sanctissima in performances which provide convincing proof of the highly sophisticated nature of polyphony from the Spanish Renaissance.The conductor, along with fellow researcher Graeme Skinner, contributes an essay on the works recorded here.