Happy the reviewer whose prayers are answered! Last year I enthusiastically welcomed “Ballades a III chans” (Arcana, 1/96), the Ferrara Ensemble’s first excursion into the weird and wonderful land of late-fourteenth-century mannerism known as Ars subtilior. “Please,” I wrote, “could we have some more?” And we have. “Fleurs de Vertus” offers a second (and far more generous) helping of this fascinating music. What I wrote at the time applies here as well. The contralto Lena Susanne Norin makes another mystifying contribution (for instance in the sub-aquatic depth of Solage’s S’aincy estoit), but this time other singers in the ensemble are allowed more space, most notably the soprano Kathleen Dineen. The range of options for scoring is wider than on the previous disc, and the purely instrumental performances are also more convincing. The tiny Bobik blazen, rendered on three very bright plucked strings, is a peculiar delight.
What strikes me with perhaps greater force this time around is just how eccentric these performances are. That isn’t surprising, to judge from previous anthologies by the ensembles PAN, Organum and Huelgas (to name only three). This repertoire usually elicits extreme responses from artists. And although these performances are very accurate, the music’s fearsome rhythmic edge takes on an engaging nebulousness (emphasized no doubt by the acoustic). The difference in tone can be appreciated by comparing Gacian Reyneau’s Va t’en, mon cuer with the version recorded by Gothic Voices (“The Garden of Zephyrus”, Hyperion, 6/85). In short, few groups have been so successful in making this elusive repertoire their own. Well, Arcana, what about it? Jamais deux sans trois....'