"When David Heard à 5" by Thomas Tomkins

Live performance by Cantores Musicæ Antiquæ, Jeffery Kite-Powell, director, on December 3, 2000, at St. Thomas More Co-Cathedral, Tallahassee, Florida
Members of the ensemble:
April Fisk and Courtney Malone, first sopranos
Sara Balduf and Denise Karnes, second sopranos
Kari Kistler, Kathleen Phipps, and Laura Moore, altos
Adam Ackerman and Jeremy Skelton, first tenors
Jason Jewell and Matthew Roberson, baritones
Russell Blenis and Christopher Peterson, basses
In the interest of providing a more historically accurate performance of this music, the Cantores Musicæ Antiquæ have added the element of historical pronunciation. Our chief source for both earlier English and Anglo-Latin has been Timothy J. McGee's "Singing Early Music: The Pronunciation of European Languages in the Late Middle Ages and Renaissance" (Indiana University Press, 1996).
The main differences between this pronunciation and our modern concept of Latin are fairly subtle. Many long [i] sounds ("incipit"), when contained in unstressed syllables, are pronounced short, as in the modern English "dip." The [c] in "civitas" is pronounced as an [s], rather than the modern hard "ch" sound. Many long vowels are shortened: "sunt," "in," and "inter" are all pronounced with short vowels.
The pronunciation of sixteenth-century English can actually be compared to a common American conception of a modern Irish or Scottish brogue, with its many slight differences in vowel and consonant sounds. For instance, a most interesting feature of early English is the pronunciation of the words be, me, and the like, to rhyme with our modern day. In the madrigal "Phyllis, I fain would die now," the [g] in give is pronounced with a [j] sound, because it precedes the letter [i]. There are other slight differences between modern and early pronunciation of English, and we hope you will enjoy listening for (and to!) them.
CANTORES MUSICÆ ANTIQUÆ [Singers of Early Music] was formed in the fall of 1989 with the intent to perform music from 1200-1650 in a historically informed manner. The group consists of eight to twelve singers, often one on a part, and includes undergraduates, masters, and doctoral students. Some students are voice majors, while others study music education, choral conducting, theory, or musicology.
After our inaugural concert, my friend and colleague, Douglass Seaton, sent a letter to Dean Bob Glidden praising the ensemble, as seen in this excerpt:
"There is no question that this was by far the best early-music performance I have heard since I came to Florida State. Indeed, it was perhaps one of the best three or four musical experiences I have had in Tallahassee, and having recently been to England and heard some of the finest early-music choirs in the world, I would have to say that the Cantores Musicæ Antiquæ last night were as fine as any of them."
Following our performance at the Florida American Choral Directors Association at Rollins College, Winter Park, in 1994, the Director of Choral Activities at the University of Miami (Jo-Michael Scheibe), and the Artistic Director of the Miami Bach Society (Donald Oglesby) co-wrote the following lines to Dean Jon Piersol about our performance:
"It was truly an outstanding performance of the highest professional caliber, worthy of comparison to groups like the Tallis Scholars. The standing ovation accorded the group by the members of ACDA testifies to the strength of the ensemble's performance. We [. . . ] hope you can make it possible for these singers to be heard on recording and in concert throughout the nation. They bring credit to the choral music activities of FSU and our state."
Many of the singers from earlier years are currently professors, performers, or administrators at colleges and universities around the country and abroad, including (those of which I am aware) Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, New York, Wisconsin, Australia, Iceland, and Norway.
JEFFERY KITE-POWELL, professor emeritus of The Florida State University College of Music and director of the Early Music Program (1984-2013), edited and contributed to "A Performer's Guide to Renaissance Music" (IUP, 2007), edited and translated Michael Praetorius's "Syntagma Musicum III" (OUP, 2004), and edited the second edition of "A Performer's Guide to Seventeenth-Century Music" (IUP, 2012). He served as president of Early Music America (1998-2001) and was awarded the Thomas Binkley Award for Outstanding Achievement by a Collegium Director (2003). On his retirement, colleagues and former students from across the country contributed to a book entitled "Hands-On" Musicology: Essays in Honor of Jeffery Kite-Powell (Steglein Press, 2012).