Past Programmes

Musica Secreta and Celestial Sirens The rise of the great convent choirs of Italy is told in music from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries celebrating the Virgin Mary. Anonymous laude – the private devotional music of the nuns – are performed alongside music found in the Brenzoni-Maffei manuscript from late fifteenth-century Verona, the Biffoli-Sostegni manuscript from sixteenth-century Florence, … Read more

An entrancing introduction to the sound of the late medieval and early renaissance convent, with newly recovered music from the convents of Verona, Florence, and Ferrara. Anonymous works from convent manuscripts appear alongside works by the most illustrious composers of the age: Hildegard of Bingen, Binchois, Josquin des Prez, Suor Leonora d’Este, Cipriano de Rore, Giovanni … Read more

Musica Secreta and Celestial Sirens with SARAH DUNANT, NIAHM CUSACK and DEBORAH FINDLAY Directed by Nick Renton A vibrant and compelling mix of visual drama, spoken word and live music, Sacred Hearts, Secret Music conjures the atmosphere of a sixteenth-century convent, where the tranquility of centuries is suddenly threatened by internal divisions and spiritual scandal. A young … Read more

Musica Secreta and Celestial Sirens Music by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, Cristobal Morales, Tomas Luis de Victoria, Paulo Isnardi, Marcantonio Ingegneri and Suor Leonora d’Este Join Musica Secreta and Celestial Sirens to bring in the May with chant, polyphony and song. Mirroring the May Carnival (Calendimaggio) outside the convent walls, sixteenth-century Italian nuns had music … Read more