Phantasm (music group)
Phantasm is a viol consort based in England. It was founded in 1994 by Laurence Dreyfus. It catapulted into international prominence when its debut CD won a Gramophone Award for the Best Baroque Instrumental Recording of 1997. Since then, they have released eleven further recordings, won several awards, and have become recognised as the most exciting viol consort active on the world scene today. In 2005 Phantasm were named Consort-in-Residence at Oxford University, where they regularly appear at the Holywell Music Room and other University venues.
Critics have called their performances and recordings: 'intoxicating', 'revelatory', 'electrifying', 'interpretations pervaded by a truly burning spirit'.
The history of Phantasm and its recordings was featured on the Early Music Show, BBC Radio 3 with Lucie Skeaping, and they illustrated an audible 'history of English consort music' with BBC Radio 3 presenter Catherine Bott before their appearance at the Lufthansa Festival in London. Along with concerts at Magdalen College, Oxford, and at the Holywell Music Room (Oxford) they appeared in Saltaire Yorkshire on a series sponsored by the Early Music Shop and at the Barcelona Early Music Festival in May 2009 with a concert of Purcell's Complete Fantasies and In Nomines.
Their new CD, the complete five- and six-part works of the Jacobean composer John Ward for Linn Records, is being launched after their final concert at the Utrecht Early Music Festival on 30th August. All are welcome to attend the event, which will include a glass of wine and some words about the recording. The disc follows the success of Phantasm's 2007 CD, John Jenkins's Five-Part Consorts, which was a finalist for the Gramophone Award in Early Music, and for the MIDEM Classical Award in Early Music.]
They have also recorded on the Channel Classics Records, GMN, Simax, and Avie Records labels.
Contents |
[edit] Members
- Laurence Dreyfus, treble viol and director
- Wendy Gillespie, treble viol
- Jonathan Manson, tenor viol
- Markku Luolajan-Mikkola, bass viol
[edit] Discography
- Complete Fantasies for Viols by Henry Purcell - 1996
- Still Music of the Spheres by William Byrd and Richard Mico - 1997
- Art of Fugue by J. S. Bach - 1998
- Byrd Song by William Byrd with Ian Partridge and Geraldine McGreevy - 1999
- Consorts in Four and Five Parts by William Lawes - 2000
- Consort Music by Matthew Locke - 2001
- Consorts in Six Parts by William Lawes - 2002
- Consorts for Viols by Orlando Gibbons - 2005
- Four Temperaments - William Byrd, Alfonso Ferrabosco, Robert Parsons, Thomas Tallis - 2005
- Six-Part Consorts by John Jenkins - 2006
- Five-Part Consorts by John Jenkins - 2007
- William Byrd's "Complete Consort music"; 2011[1]
[edit] Awards
- Henry Purcell's Complete Fantasies for Viols; 1997 Gramophone Award for baroque non-vocal performance.
- Orlando Gibbons's Consorts for Viols; 2004 Gramophone Award for early music.
