The Angels, new album by Les Métaboles !

The Angels, the fourth album by Les Métaboles published by the NoMadMusic label, immerses the listener in the splendid tradition of English choirs, from works by Purcell, Byrd and Palestrina, champions of 17th century polyphonic music, to those of Jonathan Harvey, a major figure in contemporary music. This project was supported by the Board of Directors of Mécénat Musical Société Générale. 

Under the leadership of Léo Warynski, the 16 singers of Les Métaboles bring this spiritual music back to life and infuse it with clarity, transparency and intensity, without weighing it down. What an experience to hear all these individual voices that emerge before disappearing into the tightly woven fabric of the group. 

This program, as Christian Leblé rightly notes in the album’s libretto, is not an integral collection of Jonathan Harvey’s spiritual music; it is a labyrinth suspended in time. The composer’s catalogue in this area is wider, and it was not the project of Léo Warynski, who likes to combine eras and styles. Byrd and Palestrina translate the divine through the architectural perfection of their scores. Harvey testifies to a generous inventiveness: the overlapping of the voices, the infinite drone, the unpredictable reservoirs ... He makes mystery mysterious again. He puts the unspeakable into sounds. 

From Winchester to the monks’ refectory of Royaumont where the album was recorded, the Gothic walls of the abbeys resonate with polyphonic, sumptuous music magnified by the acoustics. 

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