Magdalena Consort:

The Magdalena consort, founded in 2008 by baritone Peter Harvey, is acclaimed for its virtuoso chamber performances of sacred vocal music from Monteverdi to Bach. The group has more recently collaborated with musicologist Bill Hunt in a continuing project to re-create the sound world of the 17th Century English consort anthems, in combination with viol and wind consorts and using appropriate voice allocations.

Historically appropriate forces

The group aims to use the vocal and instrumental forces for which this music was originally written; the instrumental band varies in size from single strings to a small chamber orchestra, while choral movements are frequently sung by the soloists alone - 'one voice per part'. It is this which gives the Magdalena Consort its distinctive sound: an intense choral texture with strong contours in the individual musical lines.