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ARS NOVA COPENHAGEN, PAUL HILLIER

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ARS NOVA COPENHAGEN
Conducted by PAUL HILLIER

The music on this recording reflects several years of my association with Ars Nova
Copenhagen. Contrary to our usual way of working, however, the recordings have
been made at different times, in more than one place, and with slightly different
configurations of singers. The composers are from numerous different backgrounds,
although some of them certainly have elements in common. But basically this is a disc
of vocal music by composers most of whom Im fortunate to have known personally,
and almost all the works on this CD are first recordings.
Paul Hillier

Recording producer and sound engineer: Preben Iwan. Recorded 2006-2015 in Garnisons Kirke, Copenhagen
Ars Nova Copenhagen is a group of 12 singers. The members, and former members, who participated in these recordings are
listed in alphabetical order by voice group.
sopranos: Kate Macoboy, Hilde Dolva, Hanna Kappelin, Ann-Christin Wesser Ingels, Louise Skovbch, Else Torp
altos: Signe Asmussen, Ellen Marie Christensen, Rikke Lender, Linna Lomholt, Kristin Mulders, Elenor Wiman
tenors: Paul Bentley-Angel, Christian Damsgaard, Kasper Eliassen, Ivan Hansen, Tomas Medici, Jakob Skjoldborg, Lus Toscano
basses: Thomas Kirbye, Asger Lynge Petersen, Henrik Lund Petersen, Jakob Soelberg
organ: Christopher Bowers-Broadbent (on Walking Song)
percussion: Mathias Friis-Hansen, David Hildebrandt (on Know What Is Above You)

Executive producers: Michael Gordon, David Lang, Kenny Savelson and Julia Wolfe
Label manager: Bill Murphy | Cantaloupe sales manager: Adam Cuthbert
Art direction: Denise Burt / elevator-design.dk. Image of moon by Kaarina Dillabough (CC BY-SA 2.0)
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ARS NOVA COPENHAGEN
Conducted by PAUL HILLIER

1. HOWARD SKEMPTON Rise up my love 10:07

2. MICHAEL GORDON He saw a skull  8:01

3. DAVID LANG when we were children  7:46
4. KEVIN VOLANS Walking Song (organ)  6:16
5. PABLO ORTIZ Five Motets
i) In Monte Oliveti  2:38
ii) O vos omnes  1:21
iii) Laboravi in gemitu meo  2:19
iv) Haec dies  1:38
v) Epithalamica  2:13

6. LOUIS ANDRIESSEN Un beau baiser  4:08

7. GABRIEL JACKSON Lhomme arm  7:46

8. HOWARD SKEMPTON More sweet than my refrain  3:25
9. STEVE REICH Know what is above you  3:07

10. STEVE REICH Clapping Music (vocal arr. by Paul Hillier)  3:24
11. TERRY RILEY Mexico City Blues chorus 193  7:19
HOWARD SKEMPTON Rise up my love
Howard Skempton is one of a group of British composers who
in the 1980s were identified as experimental, in the sense
that they wrote tonal music that was often intimate in scale,
avoided the rhetoric of modernism, and were inspired by
Satie, Cage, and Reich while not necessarily imitating them
to the extent of being labeled as minimalists. I commissioned
this lovely choral work for the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber
Choir when I was their artistic director. I still fondly remember
receiving the score in the post at my summer house, and being
very moved by the tender sensuality of the music. The words
are from the Song of Solomon.
i) Rise up my love, my fair one, and come away. For lo, the
winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear
upon the earth. The time of singing of birds is come, And the
voice of the turtle is heard in our land; The fig-tree putteth
forth her green figs, And the vines with the tender grapes give
a good smell. O my dove, that art in the clefts of the rock, In
the secret places of the stairs, Let me see thy countenance, let
me hear thy voice; For sweet is thy voice, and thy countenance
is comely. Rise up my love, my fair one.
ii) How fair is thy love, my sister, my spouse! How much better
is thy love than wine! And the smell of thine ointments than all
spices!
iii) My beloved is gone down into his garden, to the beds of
spices, to feed in the gardens, and to gather lilies.
iv) How fair and how pleasant art thou, O love, for delights! I
am my beloveds and his desire is toward me.
MICHAEL GORDON He Saw a Skull
This was specially composed for the twelve voices of Ars Nova.
MG writes:
The singers are divided into three groups of four voices,
with each group singing major and minor harmonies that are
approached by glissando. The text is taken from a short saying
by Rabbi Hillel found in the Talmudic tractate Pirke Avot.
He saw a skull floating on the water. He said to the skull,
Because you
drowned others, they drowned you. And they who drowned
you will themselves
be drowned.
DAVID LANG when we were children
DL writes: The director Francesca Zambello asked me to write
something for choir, as a companion piece for a staging of my
work the little match girl passion. I wanted to make something
that shared the spiritual questioning of the passion, and was
also somehow appropriate for children. I remembered this
famous line from Saint Paul: When I was a child, I spake as a
child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when
I became a man, I put away childish things. That is the King
James version. Of course, this line wasnt originally in English.
Paul was born a Jew in what is now Turkey, he worshipped in
Hebrew and he spoke Greek. This famous Christian line must
have gone on an interesting journey to get to King James, and
to us. I compiled all the differing translations into English that I
could find, I cut them up into phrases and I alphabetized them,
creating a kind of catalog of its meaning, as it changes from
translation to translation.
I am done with childish ways
I did away with childish things
I do not act like a child anymore
I felt as a child
I gave up childish ways
I gurgled and cooed like any infant
I had done with what belonged to
the child
I had the intelligence
I had the understanding of a child
I have finished with childish ways
I have made useless the things of
the babe
I have no more use for childish ways
I have outgrown childish ways
I have put away childish things
I left those infant ways for good
I no longer used childish ways
I put an end to childish ways
I put aside childish things
I put away childish things
I put away the things of a child
I put childish ways behind me
I put the ways of childhood behind me
I reasoned as a child
I reasoned like a child
I set aside childish ways
I set aside the things of a child
I set aside those childish ways
I spake as a child
I spake as a little child
I spoke and thought and reasoned as
a child
I spoke as a child
I spoke like a child
I stopped doing things like a child
I stopped those childish ways
I talked and felt and thought like a
little child
I talked like a child
I thought as a child
I thought as a little child
I thought like a child
I understood as a child
I understood as a little child
I understood like a child
I used to speak like a child
I used to speak like a child, think like
a child, reason like a child
I avoided those things that were of
a little child
Ive put an end to childish things
and have put them aside
and I made plans like a child
and reasoned like a child
and when I have become a man
argued like a child
as a babe I was reasoning
as a babe I was speaking
as a babe I was thinking
as children do
but, when I became a man
but now that I have become a man
but when I became a man
but when I became an adult,
but when I grew up
but when I was made a man
but when we grew up
just so
my childish speech and feeling and
thought have no further
significance for me
my speech, feelings, and thinking were all
those of a child
now I am a man
now that I am a man
now that I am an adult
now that I am become a man
now that I have become a man
reason like a child
since I became a man
the thoughts of a child
think like a child
thought like a child
we quit our childish ways
we thought and reasoned
when I became a man
when I became an adult
when I grew up
when I was a babe
when I was a child
when I was a little child
when I was an infant at my mothers breast
when we were children
KEVIN VOLANS Walking Song
Volans was born in 1949 in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa.
He is now an Irish citizen. Walking Song was originally written
for flute, harpsichord and clappers; the organ version played
here was made in 1986 and premiered in Dublin by Gerald
Barry. I have often programmed this work in the company
of vocal works like the ones on this CD, so it seems to me
to belong here.
organ: Christopher Bowers-Broadbent
3. Laboravi in gemitu meo, lavabo per singulas noctes lectum
meum, lacrimis meis stratum meum rigabo.
I am weary with my groaning, all night I make my bed swim, I
water my couch with tears.
4. Haec dies quam fecit Dominus: exultemus et laetemur in
ea. Alleluia. Confitemini Domino quoniam bonus quoniam in
saeculum misericordia eius.
This is the day which the Lord made: let us be glad and rejoice
in it. Alleluia.
Praise the Lord, for he is good for his mercy endures for ever.

5. Epithalamica dic sponsa, cantica, intus quae conspicis dic

PABLO ORTIZ Five Motets
foris gaudia et nos laetificans, de sponsa nuntia cuius te refovet
semper praesentia. Adulescentulae, vos chorum ducite, cum
Ortiz is from Argentina and teaches at U.C. Davis, which is haec praecinerit, et vos succinite. Amici sponsi vos vocarunt
where the two of us became friends. Most of these motets nuptiae, et novae modulos optamus dominae. Epithalamica dic
were written there along with another work, Notker, which has sponsa, cantica, intus quae conspicis dic foris gaudia.
also been recorded by Ars Nova Copenhagen. Both works
Your wedding song , O bride, utter it! Tell aloud the joys you
are published by Theatre of Voices Edition. Pablos style is a
gaze upon from within, and, gladdening us, give tidings of
mystery to me, and yet the results are always limpidly clear
the bridegroom, whose presence means new life for you, for
and expressive. He is a specialist on the tango and has written
ever! Young maidens, sing! Dance! When the bride, begins
many wonderful works that emerge from that tradition.
her song, join in! The bridegrooms friends have called you to
the nuptials, and we wait to hear the songs sung by the new
1. In Monte Oliveti oravit ad Patrem: Pater, si fieri potest,
mistress. Your wedding song
transeat a me calix iste: Spiritus quidem promptus est, caro
autem infirma. Fiat voluntas tua.
On the Mount of Olives he prayed for his father: Father, if it be
possible, let this cup pass away from me. The spirit indeed is
ready, but the flesh is weak. Your will be done.

2. O vos omnes, qui transitis per viam, attendite et videte si

est dolor similis sicut dolor meus.
O all you that pass by, behold and see if there be any sorrow
like unto my sorrow.
LOUIS ANDRIESSEN Un beau baiser
The Dutch composer Louise Andriessen (b. 1939) has been
a mentor to several of the composers on this recording. This
little song however is not entirely typical of his wonderfully
aggressive euro-minimalism. Its a setting of a stanza from
Alfred de Mussets Madame de Marquise. The poem is
addressed to Madame de Dudevant, better known as George
Sand, with whom de Musset had an affair in 1833-4 (a few years
before her longer liaison with Chopin). The song was originally
part of Andriessens music-theatre work George Sand.
Donne-moi, ma belle matresse,
Un beau baiser, car je te veux
Raconter ma longue dtresse,
En caressant tes beaux cheveux.
Give me, my lovely mistress, a lovely kiss, for I want to tell you
about my long distress while caressing your lovely hair.
GABRIEL JACKSON Lhomme arm
Lhomme arm was a famous 15th-century song used as
the melodic basis for many Mass settings throughout the
Renaissance. Gabriel Jackson is an English composer whose
distinctively rhapsodic musical language has in part grown
out of a deep love of late medieval English music. Here the
material is counterpointed by solo voices singing Robert
Palmers poem How Long, O Lord? The poem was published in
1917 in an anthology of war poetry called The Muse In Arms;
Palmer had been killed the previous year.
Recorded live by Danish Radio
solos: Else Torp, Signe Asmussen, Tomas Medici
Lhomme arm doibt on doubter.
On a fait partout crier
que chascun se viegne armer
dun haubregon de fer.
Lhomme arm doibt on doubter.
The armed man should be feared. It has been proclaimed
everywhere that each man shall arm himself with a coat of
iron mail.
How long O Lord, how long before the flood
Of crimson-welling carnage shall abate?
From sodden plains in West and East the blood
Of kindly men streams up in mists of hate,
Polluting Thy clean air: and nations great
In reputation of the arts that bind
The World with hopes of Heaven, sink to the state
Of brute barbarians, whose ferocious mind
Gloats oer the bloody havoc of their kind,
Not knowing love or mercy. Lord, how long
Shall Satan in high places lead the blind
To battle for the passions of the strong?
Oh, touch Thy childrens hearts, that they may know
Hate their most hateful, pride their deadliest foe.
Robert Palmer (1888-1916)
HOWARD SKEMPTON More sweet than my refrain
Howard brought this as a gift when he visited us in our summer
house the April before last. It is dedicated to my wife Else and
me, and our mutual friend Elizabeth Carmack who was also
present for her god-daughters birthday.
More sweet than my refrain
Was the first drop of April rain.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)
STEVE REICH Know What Is Above You
Written in 1999 and scored for three sopranos, one alto,
and three small tuned drums. The text is from the Pirkei
Avot. SR writes: The excerpt may seem judgmental to our
contemporary American sensibility. For much of the twentieth
century, the scientific worldview has increasingly described us
only as molecules of various substances electrically charged for
a longer or shorter lifetime. In contrast, this text suggests that
we are not alone, that an Eternal Being cares about us, that our
every thought, word and deed has its effect on our character,
our soul, and on the soul of those around usand that it all
really matters.
percussion: Mathias Friis-Hansen, David Hildebrandt
Know what is above you, an eye that sees, an ear that hears,
and all your deeds recorded in a book.
STEVE REICH Clapping Music
(arranged for voices by Paul Hillier)
SR: In 1972, I composed Clapping Music out of a desire to
create a piece of music that would need no instruments at
all beyond the human bodyOne performer remain[s] fixed,
repeating the same basic pattern throughout, while the second
moves abruptly after a number repeats, from unison to one
beat ahead, and so on, until he is back in unison with the first
performer.
PH: A few years ago, using a simple pattern of scales and
arpeggios, I made an arrangement of this work for voices
to which the composer has kindly given his consent. There
is no text.
TERRY RILEY Mexico City Blues
Terry Riley wrote this choral piece in 1993 and gave me a copy
when, shortly afterwards, I got to know him. I was teaching at
UC Davis at that time, and I drove up to his place in the Sierras
to record him speaking some John Cage passages for a CD I
was making.
Jack Kerouac wrote Mexico City Blues while living in that
city during the mid-1950s. The book was published in 1959,
prefaced with this note:
I want to be considered a jazz poet
blowing a long blues in an afternoon jam
session on Sunday. I take 242 choruses;
my ideas vary and sometimes roll from
chorus to chorus or from halfway through
a chorus to halfway into the next.
Chorus 193 is a continuation of Chorus 192.
The following phrases from 192 may clarify
where 193 is coming from:
O thou who holdest the seal/
of powerO thou sustainer O thou
purifierender of sufferingOm!...Thou
perfectly enlightened, enlighten all sentient
beingsPerfect in Pity and Intelligence/
(segue 193).

193rd Chorus
Who has accomplished,
And is accomplishing,
And will accomplish,
All these words
Of mystery,
Svaha,
So be it,
Amen.
Numberless roses arranged,
The milk of merriment
without the curds,
The Pleased Milk
of Humankindness
The Frowns of worried saints,
The helpless Hands of Buddha
burning,
The Crown Prince of the Lotus
Blossom Sky,
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