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When the emperor
Charles V chose Plus Ultra as his motto, he signaled the dawn
of an age of discovery that would re-interpret the legendary Pillars
of Hercules as a gateway to expanded horizons rather than, as his
predecessors had thought, the limiting borders of the Mediterranean
and the known world. Simply by discarding Non from the motto
Non Plus Ultra, Charles V leant his imperial blessing to
voyages of geographical and cultural discovery that continue to this
day; with the stroke of a pen ‘thus far, no further’ became ‘thus
far, and further’. It was this spirit of discovery, of
unveiling musical treasures from the past, of exploring uncharted
polyphonic waters, that led Michael Noone and Warren Trevelyan-Jones
to found, in 2001, the Ensemble Plus Ultra.Their quest is the
promotion of historically-aware performances of recently-discovered
liturgical marvels of the Renaissance. Comprising “a crack squad of
the finest British early music singers” (Early Music Today),
the group is distinguished from other early music ensembles by its
innovative performances of recently-unearthed treasures.
Hitherto unknown
compositions by Morales, discovered by Michael Noone in the archives
of Toledo Cathedral, were the focus of the group’s widely-acclaimed
debut recording on the Glossa label, Morales en Toledo. It
was followed by the first ever recording dedicated solely to the
music of Fernando de las Infantas, the Spanish-born composer and
theologian who settled in Rome in the 1560s and who published three
volumes of motets in Venice a decade later. Michael Noone’s
discovery of a cache of early works composed by Francisco de
Guerrero formed the kernel of the group’s Missa Super flumina,
a CD that brought together the renowned wind players of His
Majestys Sagbutts and Cornetts and the Spanish plainsong
specialists Schola Antiqua.
Whilst Spanish
music is the mainstay of Plus Ultra’s repertoire, they are equally
at home performing music of other nations. One of their Glossa CDs
presents a world première recording of a recently-discovered setting
of the Song of Songs by the celebrated Renaissance theorist
Gioseffo Zarlino (1517-90), edited by Cristle Collins Judd, and
another CD presents the musical canons of Atalanta Fugiens
(1617) a book of alchemical emblems by Michael Maier (1569-1622),
the personal physician to the Habsburg Emperor Rudolph II. The
group’s recent recording for Musica Omnia of selections from William
Byrd’s Gradualia inaugurates their exploration of works by
major composers that were related to or influenced by the Jesuits.
All of Plus Ultra’s CDs are available on iTunes, and we warmly
welcome visits to our website
http://www.ensembleplusultra.com |
 
Michael Noone
studied music at King’s College, Cambridge, and has taught at the
Australian National University, Cornell University, and the University
of Hong Kong. Noone has released more than a dozen CDs of liturgical
music, his recent recording of Guerrero’s Missa Super flumina
Babylonis (“a recording of impeccable taste and scholarship”—The
Independent on Sunday) being named among WGBH’s Top Ten Classical
CDs of 2007. He is currently recording a series of ten CDs of the music
of Tomás Luis de Victoria for the DGG (Archiv) label with
the Ensemble Plus Ultra. In 2007 he was honoured by Spain’s King Juan
Carlos from whom he received the coveted Premio Real Fundación
for his research, publications and performances. In 2007 Noone
was elected to the Real Academia de Bellas Artes y Ciencias Cientificas
de Toledo and has been selected to direct a major research project based
on the uncatalogued music manuscripts of the Spanish primatial cathedral
in Toledo. He teaches music at Boston College.
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