The Clerks' Group, Edward Wickham - The Essential Ockeghem (2006)

Compiled from a series of nine recordings, this disc called The Essential Ockeghem by the Clerks' Group led by Edward Wickham is an ideal single-disc introduction to the work of the late Medieval master. There's the breadth of the repertoire -- with two spiritual motets, three secular songs, a six-movement mass sequence drawn from six different masses, plus an excerpt from his Requiem, every facet of the composer's sublime artistry is amply represented -- and there're the depth of the performances -- with a cool tone, a clear ensemble, an immaculate technique, and an impeccable sense of style, Wickham's one-to-a-part choir sings Ockeghem's counterpoint as if the vocalists were born singing it. But if you've never heard the composer before, the real reason to hear this disc is to hear the music, or, to be more precise, to experience the music. Because, even coming from a time that implicitly and devoutly believed that music was the art that could touch the infinite, Ockeghem's music was manifestly in touch with something far beyond the merely physical sensation of sound. At its best -- and this disc is all "best" -- Ockeghem's music has a glowing luminosity and a glorious numinosity that seems otherworldly, and in the right performance -- and this disc has nothing but "right" performances -- it can make the ineffable tangible and evanescent incarnate. The greatest Western sacred music of later times, be it by Palestrina, Monteverdi, Bach, Beethoven, Bruckner, or Feldman, does not surpass Ockeghem's, and anyone who doesn't know it yet and feels the least inclination toward the ineffable and the infinite is urged to try this disc. Gaudeamus' digital sound is as real as the blood in your veins.