All-female ensembles are decidedly ‘in’: after Vox Feminae, Discantus and Anonymous 4, here comes Tapestry, a four-member Boston-based group, founded as recently as 1994. “Celestial Light” offers yet another tribute to the genius of Hildegard at the dawn of her 900th anniversary. Its originality lies in the bringing together of three points of view, all of them focused on the Abbess: Hildegard’s own chants, both words and music; some near-contemporary motets (thirteenth century), drawn from Notre-Dame in Paris, and Las Huelgas in Spain; and finally, some modern vocal settings of a cluster of Hildegard’s sacred poems. I would buy this recording for one piece alone: the remarkable hymn to the Virgin O tu illustrata, both words and music by Hildegard herself. This is an outstanding performance, such as I have rarely heard, beginning with a smooth legato of utter perfection in a low restricted range, then gradually expanding upwards with ecstasy to reach a top D with amazing control. The high soprano (Cristi Catt) has captured the spirit of Hildegard with extraordinary insight.
The little syllabic two-part conductus that follows, Flos ut rosa floruit, enables one, through its simplicity, to recover somewhat from the power of what has just preceded it. Indeed, the motets are a perfect foil to the outpourings of Hildegard. I cannot quite make up my mind about the modern settings by Robert Kyr, though I do like the idea of drawing together in apposition works of different periods having a certain affinity with one another.'