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Last Saturday night, while streets were blocked to crowds watching the bonfires of WaterFire float down Brush Creek, an intimate crowd of ancient music lovers gathered at the Visitation Catholic Church for a journey within.  There the serenely scintillating voices of Anonymous 4 imparted the cloistered incantations of 13^th century royal Castilian nuns in a bonfire for the soul.

Since its inception 25 years ago, Anonymous 4 has topped the international medieval charts with 18 recordings.  The members of the vocal quartet, Ruth Cunningham, Marsha Genensky, Susan Hellauer and Jacqueline Horner-Kwiatek, have been touring the United States with the Secret Voices: The Sisters of Las Huelgas program the past two months to rave reviews, and will, I am happy to say, record the program for the Harmonia Mundi label in November.

A hallmark of The Friends of Chamber Music presentations is its consistent record of sponsoring artists of the highest standard of excellence who not only deeply satisfy the musical senses but also raise thought-provoking questions that expand beyond the concert experience.  This concert soared on both levels.

The music was culled from a 13^th century manuscript re-discovered at the convent of Las Huelgas in 1904 by two monks from the nearby Silos monastery, the same order of monks that gained renown in the last decade for their hit chant CDs.  Notated in 1325, the Codex Las Huelgas manuscript is an anthology of the most advanced chants and avant-garde polyphony composed from about 1200 to 1325 for women.  Its sacred Latin texts belie the international secular sources of much of the music, including solos, duets, trios and quartets set to popular music as diverse as French love songs and instrumental dance tunes, incorporating sound effects of the bagpipe drone and an occasional nasal twang reminiscent of the hurdy gurdy. 

Upon hearing flawlessly-crafted unison waves of neumatic chant rise and recede in perfect cadence from this consummate quartet, questions arose as surely as the tingling hairs on the back of my neck in response to the pure clarity of their voices.  How had these nuns of ancient Castile accomplished performing such virtuosic polyphonic music when women were permitted to sing only plainchant at that time in the church?  And how could one know that the music they were singing was really written for women, not for men, whose chants sound just the same to me?  Those initial musings were answered in the course of the evening, via a panel discussion held before the concert and a Q&A session with the members of Anonymous 4, hosted by The Friends President, Cynthia Siebert, afterwards. 

The Cistercian convent, Santa Maria Regalis de Las Huelgas, was founded in 1187 at the instigation of Queen Eleanor of England, who, with her husband, Alfonso VIII of Castile, built it with the idea to provide sanctuary for noble women who desired to pursue the spiritual path.  It boasted a choir of 100 women in the 13th century, and was run by abbesses who exercised uncommon privileges granted by kings and popes, including hearing confessions and saying mass.  It was in that extraordinary liberal convent environment that the head-strong aristocratic daughters of nobility were given refuge and allowed to hone their musical talents to such a sophisticated degree. 

Anonymous 4's Susan Hellauer answered the question about discerning whether the music was intended for women or men, since musical notation did not indicate exact pitch or voicing.  Women's chants reflected a woman's perspective with texts such as "We are the wise virgins."  With that background information in mind, I was able to lose myself in the extraordinarily complex melodies and rhythms heard, and to revel in the sheer artistry with which they performed.

The program was constructed around a fictional day in the musical life of the convent with music in honor of the Virgin Mary that could have been sung in the morning, at the daily Mass, and in the evening.  The opening Sequence chant for First Light, Virgines egregie drew the audience immediately in with its precisely shaped unison line that floated gracefully above the nave.  Ethereally tapered phrases seemed to evaporate into nothingness - an element of beauty often heard in the program.  

Several versions of Benedicamus domino ("Let us bless the Lord") were performed at the end of sections that afforded the artists rich material to demonstrate their impressive range of vocal styles and musical acumen.  In the Conductus: Ave maris stella, a fantastic galloping rhythm led straight into the Benedicamus domino: cum cantico sung in a pure timbre without vibrato in the same tonality that was sung in the Conductus, but now in an expansive tempo that opened into one of the many moments of transcendent expression. 

Hellauer shared the ensemble's approach to achieving their heavenly blend of voices in an interview before the concert: rather than try to mimic each other's voices to match timbres, each musician sings freely in her own distinct sound, but in exact synch of breath, dynamics and musicality as the others.  The result is that amazing blend one perceives in Anonymous 4 as the sound of a single voice magnified to sound as full and resonant as a choir.

About mid-way in the program one of the rarest of events occurred: an audience member in the front row fell ill.  The sensitivity of the musicians and the members of the audience was apparent during the brief interlude that the concert was halted.  It speaks well of the musicians that they were able to return and continue to make beautiful music.

And a good thing, too, because as the evening wore on, the music just got better and better.  The final Night songs were especially noteworthy, each one leading into the next without pause and ending on the serene unison of Omnium in te that brought the audience to its feet with appreciation.  The briefest of encores followed, a radiant ending that said it all: Ite missa est. Deo gracias. (Go, the mass is ended. Thanks be to God!)

REVIEW:
The Friends of Chamber Music
Anonymous 4
Secret Voices: The Sisters of Las Huelgas, Music of Thirteenth-Century Spain
October 24, 2009
Visitation Catholic Church
5141 Main Street, Kansas City, MO
For tickets call 816-561-9999 or online at www.chambermusic.org

Cover Photo by Christian Steiner

By Gayle G. Hathorne

Classical and Vocal Contributor (Past writer)