The Tallis Scholars - Renaissance Giants (2006)

The title of the Tallis Scholars' two-disc set Renaissance Giants is a little intimidating; to some, it may conjure up visions of Godzilla-sized Galileos or Cosimo de Medicis trampling around, flattening the elegant facades and cathedrals of Florence and Pisa under their stocking feet. Nevertheless, it is not that; rather, Renaissance Giants is a collection of major works by six composers -- Tallis, Taverner, Josquin, Palestrina, Byrd, and Victoria -- who were considered, among a few others, the guiding lights of the Renaissance period. Renaissance Giants is a little unusual in that collections of this kind usually consist of short pieces that illustrate the works of many composers, as was The Best of the Renaissance, a 1999 Philips "Duo" that likewise drew upon the catalog created by the Tallis Scholars for their own Gimell label in the 1980s and 1990s. Gimell's Renaissance Giants departs from this model entirely, and in selecting long, expansive works that illustrate the glory and majesty of renaissance sacred music, this more accurately reflects the Scholars' own wishes in terms of compiling a commercially necessary greatest-hits package. These recordings were made between 1984 and 1993 and considered state of the art both as performances and recordings; despite the passage of some time since then, they do not seem dated in the least. If you are a listener well acquainted with the work of the Tallis Scholars, then chances are you will have most to all of these recordings already. However, if one is relatively new to the field of Renaissance sacred choral music and in need of a reliable and enjoyable CD collection to get started with it, one can hardly expect to find a better introduction than Renaissance Giants. -- Uncle Dave Lewis