Les voyages d’Orphée
Normandy, Flandre, Provinces Unies…
This new program was conceived by Thomas van Essen following various discussions in view of the Norman Millennium celebrations – European Year of the Normans 1027–2027. As early as 2026, we will have the pleasure of premiering this program in Antwerp (Belgium) at the Amuz – Laus Polyphoniae festival. Indeed, Les voyages d’Orphée fits perfectly within the theme of the festival Voices of Europe circa 1600. Continent of counterpoint. We will then tour it from June 2027 in Normandy and the United Kingdom.
Off we go on this new adventure, resolutely Norman and European!
Notes
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-flemis polyphony and the other in a new, expressive 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.
Musical direction: Thomas van Essen & Volny Hostiou
7 singers, 6 musicians , 1 organist
François Ménissier, orgue
Elodie Fonnard, cantus (sexta pars)
Esther Labourdette, cantus
Caroline Marçot, alto (quinta pars)
Renaud Tripathi, tenor
Vincent Lièvre-Picard, tenor
Thomas Van Essen, tenor & bassus
Roland ten Weges, bassus
Eva Godard & Marleen Leicher, cornets, flûtes à bec
Krzysztof Lewandowski, cornet tenor, dulcianes, cervelas
Claire McIntyre & Aurélie Serre, sacqueboutes
Volny Hostiou, serpent
Broadcast
FIRST PUBLIC PERFORMANCE – August, Saturday 22nd 2026
Laus Polyphoniae – AMUZ
Anvers (Belgium)
Monday, 7 June 2027
Norman Millennium – Delegation of Flanders in France
Abbaye aux Dames
Caen (14)
July 2027
Norman Millennium – NCEM York Early Music Festival
York Minster
York (England)