Lamentations - Roland de Lassus

Announcement: program modification (August 25, 2024)

Due to the illness of singer Rebecca Leggett, the “Lamentations - Roland de Lassus” concert originally scheduled for this evening (August 25, 2024) will unfortunately be cancelled. As a replacement, Paul Agnew and the artists of Les Arts Florissants will perform the following program: 

Purcell at Prayer 
Sacred music by Henry Purcell 

We thank you for your understanding and wish you a very pleasant concert.  

Referred to as ‘the divine Orlande’ by Ronsard and ‘the Belgian Orpheus’ by his successors, Roland de Lassus (1532-1594) was one of the most prolific composers of the late Renaissance. Blessed with an exceptional voice, he first rose to fame as a singer, before devoting himself to a musical style that gave pride of place to vocality. 

This programme for solo voices, performed here for the very first time, features a selection of his most emblematic sacred pieces, including his famous Prophetiae Sibyllarum, in which the various facets of his musical creativity are on display. 

To do them justice and reveal all their subtleties, Paul Agnew and his loyal team of singers draw on their experience of the madrigals and a cappella vocal music of the Italian fifteenth century, whose connections with the work of Lassus are astonishing.

And after the concert, do not miss the "Meditation at the Dawn of Night" (included in the ticket)!