Lumina Vocal Ensemble was founded in Adelaide in 1999. Their performances range from music of the Mediaeval to the Renaissance and later, Lumina has also established a niche nurturing Australian composers, including performing dozens of World Premieres.
Biography[]
Lumina Vocal Ensemble has developed an international following via recordings and the internet. With five CDs published and over 180 tracks available online, Lumina is listened to by over 400 people every day and has had over 750,000 hits on YouTube. Lumina’s most popular tracks are those from the mediaeval and Renaissance periods, but contemporary Australian music is also getting a steady exposure.
Lumina has released five CDs on the LVE label, the first being the 2007 Music for the soul (2007), featuring spiritually-uplifting music from the middle ages to present day. Composers include Guillaume Dufay, Josquin des Prez, Henry Purcell, Antonio Lotti, Clare Mclean, Anna Pope and Stephen Leek. Their second CD Mediæval Magic focuses on music from the 12th to 16th centuries, including Hildegard of Bingen, Richard the Lionheart, Anon, Guillaume de Machaut, Gilles Binchois and John Dunstable.
The 2009 CD Lay a garland - music of love and loss features music appropriate for funerals, including by Anne Boleyn, Josquin des Prez, Thomas Weelkes, Orlando Gibbons, Giacomo Carissimi, Robert Lucas Pearsall, William Harris, Saam Thorne & Ralph Vaughan Williams. Also released in the same year, England vs France explores music from the duelling countries which includes early mediaeval works and a specially commissioned work about the Battle of Agincourt by Anna Pope. Other composers in the CD include the ubiquitous Anon, Albert of Paris, Guillaume Machaut, John Dunstable, Gilles Binchois, Guillaume Dufay, John Taverner, Nicolas Gombert, Henry VIII, Claudin de Sermisy, Ralph Vaughan Williams and Francis Poulenc.
Lumina’s most recent CD Australian Soundscapes features entirely Australian music dating from the last two decades. Many of the works were especially written for the choir and the 2009 Adelaide Fringe Festival performances of ‘Australian Soundscapes’. The CD comprises live recordings of these concerts, featuring yidaki (didgeridoo) soloist John Packham, and including a range of effects such as vocal harmonics and improvisation. Composers include Diana Sautelle, Clare Maclean, Sarah Hopkins, Rachel Sag, Anna Pope and Stephen Leek.
Other excursions into interpreting and promoting contemporary music in Australia have included composers’ workshops in which 18 specially-written choral works by 14 different composers have been developed and showcased. Some of the choral effects explored in these workshops included pitched harmonic solo work, beat-boxing, working with a synthesiser, improvisation and aleatoric singing.
Members[]
Current Members
- Anna Pope - vocals
- Kenneth Pope - vocals
- Tim Muecke - vocals
- Rachel Sag - vocals
- Saam Thorne - vocals
- Rosemary Byron-Scott - vocals
- Clive Conway - vocals
- Bernard Mageean - vocals
Former Members
- James Scott - vocals
- Penny Dally - vocals
- Matthew Winefield - vocals
- Chris Guntner - vocals
- Angela Randall - vocals
- Carolyn Wilkins - vocals
Discography[]
- Music for the soul - (2007)
- Mediæval Magic - (2008)
- Lay a garland - music of love and loss - (2009)
- England vs France - (2009)
- Australian Soundscapes - (?)
- Lumina Greatest Hits - (2012)
- A Medieval Christmas - (2013)