This is the second of the three projected records of 13th‑century conductus arising from the research of Mark Everist’s team at the University of Southampton. Like its predecessor (A/12), it is performed entirely by the three voices of John Potter, Christopher O’Gorman and Rogers Covey-Crump – musicians who are entirely inside the style and manage to present everything with impeccable taste and purity. Those who enjoyed the first disc will equally enjoy this.</p>

<p>One of the challenges in recording a repertory like this is putting it into a coherent programme that makes a kind of sense to listeners but is musically responsible. So there are two gently presented themes: one is that they include all the ‘performable’ music in a manuscript in Worcester College, Oxford, of definite English origin. The other is that they perform four of the pieces in two different ways. John Potter opens and closes the disc with the monophonic <i>Bulla fulminante</i>, first in free rhythm and then metrically; and Christopher O’Gorman does the same with <i>Veste nuptiali</i>. This reflects the continuing uncertainty about how to understand the notation of the time. And probably most listeners would conclude that the metrical versions are easier to hear and love but that the free versions actually sound a lot more metrical than the performers perhaps intended. Nobody is likely to have any trouble believing that there is a wide range of truth between those two extremes (both of which could have been made much more extreme). In the case of <i>Dic Christi veritas</i> and <i>Ave, tuos benedic</i>, the two performances reflect two different versions of the music. But spreading these different performances across the disc makes for a varied musical experience while leaving the opportunity for listeners who want to study more to compare the versions more directly.