For those unaware, Passing Fancy: Beauty in a Moment of Chaos, the AVIE debut by leading New York City early music ensemble Sonnambula, traverses’ music by several Renaissance composers who were forced to conceal their identities for social, religious or ethnic reasons.

Yet their music transcended the disorder surrounding them, flourishing in the intersection of beliefs and styles. Disruption and displacement wasn’t uncommon in 16th-and 17th-centuries Europe. During the Reformation, creative individuals, including composers, were often forced to conceal their identities - for reasons social, religious, ethnic, racial or otherwise. Yet despite - or perhaps due to - the disorder, musical styles and forms flourished, earning the era it’s Renaissance designation and thus creating Beauty in a Moment of Chaos.

Sonnambula, an ensemble of New York City-based early music luminaries, bestow beauty on their AVIE debut, traversing an aural intersection of beliefs with northern and southern European styles.

Here is the beauty of William Byrd and Richard Dering, two Catholics composing in Protestant England; of Leonora Duarte, a Portuguese-Jewish woman forced to live as a converso (New Christian), in Antwerp, and Parisian Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre, whose lost works have re-emerged with a vengeance in our own time; of the Bolognese Alfonso Ferrabosco the elder who emigrated to England, and Salomone Rossi who unusually set Hebrew texts to Western-style polyphony from his relatively tolerant position in the court of Mantua.

The release of Passing Fancy: Beauty in a Moment of Chaos coincides with Sonnambula’s taking up residency at New York City’s newly-renovated premiere museum, The Frick Collection.

ÉLISABETH JACQUET DE LA GUERRE (1665–1729)
1. Overture to Céphale et Procris (1694) [4.07]

RICHARD DERING (c.1580–1630)
2. Fantasia No.6 (a 5) VdGS No.2 [5.08]

SALOMONE ROSSI (c.1570–1630)
3. Gagliarda detta La Norsina from Il primo libro delle sinfonie et gagliarde (1607) [1.19]

LEONORA DUARTE (1610–1678)
4. Sinfonia No.5 [2.29]

ALFONSO FERRABOSCO I (1543–1588)
5. In Nomine a 5 VdGS No.1 [3.42]

SALOMONE ROSSI 6. Sinfonia a 5 from Il primo libro delle sinfonie et gagliarde [2.23]

WILLIAM BYRD (c.1540–1623)
7. The Bells BK 38 [6.19]

SALOMONE ROSSI 8. Elohim Hashivenu (Psalm 80) [3.02]
James Kennerley, tenor

LEONORA DUARTE 9. Sinfonia No.4 [2.31]

WILLIAM BYRD 10. My Lady Nevell’s Ground BK 57 from My Lady Nevell’s Book of Virginal Music (c.1591) [5.48]

RICHARD DERING 11. Fantasia No.4 (a 5) VdGS No.1 [5.12]

LEONORA DUARTE transcr. keyboard James Kennerley b.1984
12. Sinfonia No.7 [4.16]

SALOMONE ROSSI
13. Sonata undecima detta La Scatola from Il quarto libro de varie sonate, sinfonie, gagliarde, brandi, e correnteper sonar due violini et un chitarrone o altro stromento (1622) [3.39]

ENRIC DE PARIS (‘ENRRIQUE’) (fl. 1460s)
14. Mi querer tanto vos quiere [3.09]
James Kennerley, tenor

Recorded 17th & 18th November 2023, at the Concert Hall at Drew University, Madison, New Jersey, Sonnambula’s sophomore recording opens on DE LA GUERRE’s strident fare that drives Overture to Céphale et Procris, DERING’s aching elegance of Fantasia No.6 (a 5) VdGS No.2 and ROSSI’s flourishing Gagliarda detta La Norsina from Il primo libro delle sinfonie et gagliarde, and then we get brought forth DUARTE’s sophisticated Sinfonia No.5, FERRABOSCO I’s demure In Nomine a 5 VdGS No.1, and both ROSSI’s crystalline Sinfonia a 5 from Il primo libro delle sinfonie et gagliarde and BYRD’s rhythmically staggered The Bells BK 38.

Up next is ROSSI’s cultured Elohim Hashivenu (Psalm 80) - featuring James Kennerley, tenor - and DUARTE’s heartfelt Sinfonia No.4 and they are in turn backed seamlessly by BYRD’s forthright, yet embracing My Lady Nevell’s Ground BK 57 from My Lady Nevell’s Book of Virginal Music, DERING’s buoyant Fantasia No.4 (a 5) VdGS No.1, the set rounding out on DUARTE’s preciseness of notes within Sinfonia No.7, ROSSI’s enraptured Sonata undecima detta La Scatola from Il quarto libro de varie sonate, sinfonie, gagliarde, brandi, e correnteper sonar due violini et un chitarrone o altro stromento, closing on DE PARIS’s yearning earnestness within Mi querer tanto vos quiere - James Kennerley, tenor.

Official Purchase Link

www.sonnambula.org