Theatre of Voices, 2019 - credit Reinhard Wilting (2)

Theatre of Voices is a

vocal ensemble A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which ...

founded by baritone

Paul Hillier Paul Douglas Hillier OBE (born 9 February 1949) is an English conductor, music director and baritone. He specializes in both early and contemporary classical music, especially that by composers Steve Reich and Arvo Pärt. He was a co-foun ...

in 1990;www.paulhillier.net
. Retrieved March 9, 2012. it focuses on early music and

new music New music may refer to: Musical styles and movements Pre-20th century * Ars nova, musical style in 14th-century France and the Low Countries * '' Le nuove musiche'', collection of monody by Giulio Caccini * New German School, music style in late 1 ...

. The ensemble was formed by

while he was teaching at the

University of California, Davis The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a public land-grant research university near Davis, California. Named a Public Ivy, it is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The inst ...

, as an avenue to performing more contemporary music while his other group, the

Hilliard Ensemble The Hilliard Ensemble was a British male vocal quartet originally devoted to the performance of early music. The group was named after the Elizabethan miniaturist painter Nicholas Hilliard. Founded in 1974, the group disbanded in 2014. Althoug ...

, focused primarily on early music. Originally based in the United States, members of the group originated from both the United States and England. After Hillier's move to Copenhagen in 2003, membership in the group became more international, with members drawn from Denmark, Poland, England, and the United States. Its main focus nowadays is on new music, though very often interwoven with various kinds of early music, reflecting Hillier’s lifelong devotion to these two ends of the musical spectrum. Together Hillier and Theatre of Voices have enjoyed close collaborations with numerous composers and instrumental ensembles: Arvo Pärt, Steve Reich,

Terry Riley Terrence Mitchell "Terry" Riley (born June 24, 1935) is an American composer and performing musician best known as a pioneer of the minimalist school of composition. Influenced by jazz and Indian classical music, his music became notable for ...

, John Cage, the

Kronos Quartet The Kronos Quartet is an American string quartet based in San Francisco. It has been in existence with a rotating membership of musicians for almost 50 years. The quartet covers a very broad range of musical genres, including contemporary classic ...

Ingram Marshall Ingram Douglass Marshall (May 10, 1942May 31, 2022) was an American composer and a onetime student of Vladimir Ussachevsky and Morton Subotnick. Early life and education Marshall was born in Mount Vernon, New York. He was the son of Bernice Do ...

John Adams John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, attorney, diplomat, writer, and Founding Father who served as the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before his presidency, he was a leader of t ...

Karlheinz Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th-century classical music, 20th and early 21st-century ...

Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen (21 November 1932 – 27 June 2016) was a Danish composer. Biography Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, and was the son of the sculptor Jørgen Gudmundsen-Holmgreen. He studied at the Royal ...

London Sinfonietta The London Sinfonietta is an English contemporary chamber orchestra founded in 1968 and based in London. The ensemble has headquarters at Kings Place and is Resident Orchestra at the Southbank Centre. Since its inaugural concert in 1968—givi ...

Michala Petri Michala Petri (born July 7, 1958) is a Danish recorder player. Her debut as a soloist was in 1969. She is the step-granddaughter of Danish actress Ingeborg Brams. Biography Petri, who began playing the recorder at the age of three, is noted for ...

Jóhann Jóhannsson Jóhann Gunnar Jóhannsson (; 19 September 1969 – 9 February 2018) was an Icelandic composer who wrote music for a wide array of media including theatre, dance, television, and film. His work is stylised by its blending of traditional orchest ...

Fretwork Fretwork is an interlaced decorative design that is either carved in low relief on a solid background, or cut out with a fretsaw, coping saw, jigsaw or scroll saw. Most fretwork patterns are geometric in design. The materials most commonly use ...

, Phantasm, Concerto Copenhagen,

Kaija Saariaho Kaija Anneli Saariaho (; ; born 14 October 1952) is a Finnish composer based in Paris, France. During the course of her career, Saariaho has received commissions from the Lincoln Center for the Kronos Quartet and from IRCAM for the Ensemble Inte ...

Peter Sellars Peter Sellars (born September 27, 1957) is an American theatre director, noted for his unique contemporary stagings of classical and contemporary operas and plays. Sellars is professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where ...

, David Lang, Michael Gordon, Pablo Ortiz,

Heiner Goebbels Heiner Goebbels (born 17 August 1952) is a German composer, conductor and professor at Justus-Liebig-University in Gießen and artistic director of the International Festival of the Arts Ruhrtriennale 2012–14. His composition ''Stifters Dinge ...

, the Smith Quartet, Meta4 String Quartet,

Helena Tulve Helena Tulve (born 28 April 1972) is an Estonian composer. Born in Tartu, she studied composition at the Tallinn Secondary Music School under Alo Põldmäe and from 1989 to 1992 at the Estonian Academy of Music with Erkki-Sven Tüür, being th ...

Sunleif Rasmussen Sunleif Rasmussen (born March 19, 1961 in Sandur in the Faroe Islands) is the foremost Faroese composer of classical music. Biography Rasmussen studied in Norway, then returned to Tórshavn in the Faroes as a music teacher and jazz pianist. Fro ...

John Luther Adams John Luther Adams (born January 23, 1953) is an American composer whose music is inspired by nature, especially the landscapes of Alaska, where he lived from 1978 to 2014. His orchestral work '' Become Ocean'' was awarded the 2014 Pulitzer Prize ...

, and many more. In 2010—the group’s 20th anniversary year—Theatre of Voices received a Grammy Award for David Lang’s ''

The Little Match Girl Passion ''The Little Match Girl Passion'' is a choral work by David Lang, based on the 1845 Hans Christian Andersen story, "The Little Match Girl". It is influenced by Johann Sebastian Bach’s '' St Matthew Passion'' (1727) and won the Pulitzer Prize f ...

''. Theatre of Voices has also moved into the film world. Tracks from more than thirty CD recordings are used on movie soundtracks such as ''

La Grande Bellezza ''The Great Beauty'' ( it, La grande bellezza ) is a 2013 art drama film co-written and directed by Paolo Sorrentino. Filming took place in Rome starting on 9 August 2012. It premiered at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival where it was screened in com ...

'' and ''

Arrival Arrival(s) or The Arrival(s) may refer to: Film * ''The Arrival'' (1991 film), an American science fiction horror film * ''The Arrival'' (1996 film), an American-Mexican science fiction horror film * ''Arrival'' (film), a 2016 American science ...

'', and the ensemble has worked on film projects with Danish documentarist Phie Amboe and Oscar-nominated Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson. During 2018 the ensemble featured in Kaija Saariaho's opera ''Only the Sound Remains'' with performances at Palais Garnier in Paris, Teatro Real in Madrid and Lincoln Center. There were also orchestra productions with

BBC Philharmonic The BBC Philharmonic is a national British broadcasting symphony orchestra and is one of five radio orchestras maintained by the British Broadcasting Corporation. The Philharmonic is a department of the BBC North Group division based at Med ...

and London Symphony Orchestra. In January 2019 Theatre of Voices gave a sold-out concert in the new

Elbphilharmonie The Elbphilharmonie (; "Elbe Philharmonic Hall"), popularly nicknamed Elphi, is a concert hall in the HafenCity quarter of Hamburg, Germany, on the Grasbrook peninsula of the Elbe River. It is among the largest in the world. The new glassy con ...

great hall in Hamburg, which included the world premiere of Michael Gordon’s new work ''A Western'', based on the film '' High Noon''. The group records with Harmonia Mundi USA and

Dacapo Records Dacapo Records is a Danish classical music and new music record label. It was founded in 1989 to promote the classical and new music of Denmark and represents itself as "the Danish National label" ("Danmarks nationale pladeselskab"). The board in ...

. The ensemble also tours internationally. The ensemble's membership varies according to the needs of the specific project they are working on; however the members listed below are most consistently involved.

Notable members

- baritone *

Christopher Bowers-Broadbent Christopher Bowers-Broadbent is an English organist and composer. Biography Christopher Bowers-Broadbent was born on 13 January 1945. He was a chorister in the Choir of King's College, Cambridge, and went on to study organ and composition at ...

- organ * Else Torp, soprano * Miriam Andersén, mezzo * Signe Asmussen, mezzo * Chris Watson, tenor *

Julian Podger Julian Podger (born 1966) is an English tenor who has appeared mostly in concert in historically informed performance. He took part in the 2000 Bach Cantata Pilgrimage. He also sings in vocal ensembles, and directs his own ensemble, Trinity Baro ...

, tenor *

, recorder

Discography

William Byrd William Byrd (; 4 July 1623) was an English composer of late Renaissance music. Considered among the greatest composers of the Renaissance, he had a profound influence on composers both from his native England and those on the continent. He ...

: ''Motets & Mass for 4 Voices'' (1994). *

Orlande de Lassus Orlande de Lassus ( various other names; probably – 14 June 1594) was a composer of the late Renaissance. The chief representative of the mature polyphonic style in the Franco-Flemish school, Lassus stands with Giovanni Pierluigi da Pale ...

: ''St. Matthew Passion; Paschal Vigil'' (1994). *''Carols From the Old & New Worlds'' (1994). *''Proensa'' (1994) - various medieval. * Joan Airas de Santiago and King Dinis I of Portugal: ''Cantigas from the Court of Dom Dinis'' (1995) - ''

Cantigas de Santa Maria The ''Cantigas de Santa Maria'' (, ; "Canticles of Holy Mary") are 420 poems with musical notation, written in the medieval Galician-Portuguese language during the reign of Alfonso X of Castile ''El Sabio'' (1221–1284). Traditionally, they a ...

'' and songs. *Thomas Tallis: ''Lamentations, Motets, String Music'' (1996)- works by

Thomas Tallis Thomas Tallis (23 November 1585; also Tallys or Talles) was an English composer of High Renaissance music. His compositions are primarily vocal, and he occupies a primary place in anthologies of English choral music. Tallis is considered one ...

* Steve Reich: ''Proverb/Nagoya Marimbas/City Life'' (1996) *''The Age of Cathedrals'' (1996) - various

Notre Dame school The Notre-Dame school or the Notre-Dame school of polyphony refers to the group of composers working at or near the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris from about 1160 to 1250, along with the music they produced. The only composers whose names hav ...

composers. * Arvo Pärt: ''De Profundis'' (1997). *''Carols from the Old & New Worlds, Vol. 2'' (1998). * John Cage: ''Litany for the Whale'' (1998). *''Monastic Chant: 12th & 13th Century Monophonic Chant'' (1998). *''Home to Thanksgiving'' (1999). *''Hoquetus'' (1999) - medieval

Hocket In music, hocket is the rhythmic linear technique using the alternation of notes, pitches, or chords. In medieval practice of hocket, a single melody is shared between two (or occasionally more) voices such that alternately one voice sounds wh ...

s. * Arvo Pärt: ''I Am the True Vine'' (2000). *

: ''Kingdom Come; Hymnodic Delays; Fog Tropes II for String Quartet and Tap'' (2001) *''Fragments'' (2002). *''The Cries of London'' with

: ''

Stimmung ''Stimmung'', for six vocalists and six microphones, is a piece by Karlheinz Stockhausen, written in 1968 and commissioned by the City of Cologne for the Collegium Vocale Köln. Its average length is seventy-four minutes, and it bears the work nu ...

'' (Copenhagen Version). Else Torp, Louise Skovbæch, Clara Sanabras, Wolodymyr Smishkewych, Kasper Eliassen, Andrew Hendricks; Ian Dearden, sound diffusion. (recorded 2006). Harmonia Mundi CD HMU 807408. (2007). * David Lang: ''

'' (2009) with Ars Nova (Copenhagen) *''Mixed Company'' (2012) with

*''Buxtehude and his Circle'' (2016; recorded in 2013). *''Green Ground'' (2016) with

: ''Arrival'' (2016) from the film ''

'' *''Jóhann Jóhannsson: Orphée'' (2016) *''In Dulci Jubilo – Music for the Christmas season by Buxtehude and friends'' (2017) *''Jóhann Jóhannsson: Englabörn & Variations'' (2017) *''Mary Magdalene'' (2018) from the film '' Mary Magdalene'' *''Jóhann Jóhannsson and Yair Elazar Glotman: First and Last Men'' (2020) *

References

External links

*
on Goldberg web
{{Authority control American choirs Danish choirs Early music choirs Contemporary classical music ensembles Musical groups established in 1992