Les voyages d’Orphée
Normandy, Flandres, Provinces Unies…
The programme Les voyages d’Orphée was proposed, conceived and designed by Thomas van Essen, musical director of the ensemble Les Meslanges, following various discussions in preparation for the 2027, European year of the Normans celebrations. Contact was made with Bart Demuyt, director of AMUZ and Laus Polyphoniae in Antwerp, Belgium, who appreciates the ensemble’s work, and this was decisive for the future of the project.
With Les voyages d’Orphée fitting perfectly with the theme of the festival “Voices of Europe circa 1600. Continent of counterpoint, taking place in August 2026, it was agreed to create this programme ahead of the 2027 Normandy celebrations and to give its first performance in Antwerp on 22 August 2026.
Notes
In the 1600s, at the end of the Renaissance and the dawn of the 17th century, being compared to Orpheus was a privilege enjoyed by great musicians.
In the first decades of the 17th century, music travelled faster and further than ever. Composers from the Low Countries moved southwards, prints circulated and styles merged. Jehan Titelouze (c. 1563-1633), who was born in Saint-Omer and worked at Rouen Cathedral, embodies this trend. He stands at the crossroads of the Renaissance and the Baroque, with one foot in Franco-French polyphony and the other in a new, expressive, French musical language. Les Meslanges places Titelouze at the centre of a programme that brings the intricate international network of musicians, styles and repertoire to your ears. Masses, motets, hymns and canticles alternate with organ music, in dialogue with works by Orlandus Lassus and other contemporaries from the Low Countries. The big revelation is a recently rediscovered mass by Titelouze himself: an impressive musicological discovery and a rare glimpse of the vocal oeuvre of a composer we know best as a pioneer of organ music. Fasten your seatbelts for Les Voyages d’Orphée: a lively snapshot of Europe in transition.
Laus Polyphoniae
Musical direction: Thomas van Essen & Volny Hostiou
Broadcast
FIRST PUBLIC PERFORMANCE – August, Saturday 22nd 2026
Laus Polyphoniae – AMUZ
Anvers (Belgium)