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cantoLX, B’Rock Orchesta and conductor Frank Agsteribbe present Antwerp Requiem c. 1650, an album showcasing the exceptional wealth of musical life in Antwerp in the age of Rubens. Philippus van Steelant’s recently-rediscovered Requiem settings are unique in their exuberant splendour, tied to a funerary culture that embraced the glory of life. B’Rock Orchestra is one of today’s most forward-thinking period orchestras with a desire for encounter and exchange. The ensemble returns to Pentatone after having released Schubert’s complete symphonies with conductor René Jacobs between 2018 and 2022. cantoLX approaches vocal music with stylistic excellence and vocal purity. Their artistic leader Frank Agsteribbe was one of B’Rock’s founders, and brings the two ensembles together for this recording. cantoLX and Agsteribbe both make their Pentatone debut. “When I was looking for repertoire for a new album recording with cantoLX in 2020, I asked musicologists Stefanie Beghein and Eugeen Schreurs to provide me with scores by the Antwerp composer Philippus van Steelant. We had already worked together in the past on requiem music by Fiocco and Brehy (The album Flemish Requiem) and both had suggested to have a look at the requiems by van Steelant. While browsing through the scores of the Miserere and both requiem masses, I fell from one surprise into another: it felt like seeing paintings by Rubens in the score — the grand design of this music, full of exuberant contrasts and colours, immediately reminded me of that other great Antwerp artist from that period. It also reminded me of the rich tradition of Monteverdi and Schütz — apparentlyVan Steelant was well acquainted with the music of his time. The world-famous 17th-century Antwerp paintings and the equally famous Antwerp harpsichords of the time are thus finally given a musical counterpart. It was clear that we had to perform and record this music. Because a project of this magnitude could not be carried by cantoLX alone, the baroque orchestra B'Rock was prepared to join us. Having been one of the founders of this orchestra, I found it a logical choice to invite them after almost 10 years of absence. It particularly made sense as discovering new music is intrinsic to B'Rock's mission – especially when it comes to Flemish music. In the end, we were able to make this recording at the end of January 2022 – at a time when the Omicron variant of the Covid19 virus pushed infection numbers to its highest peak ... It is a miracle that the group of singers and musicians managed to make it through that particularly intense week of rehearsals and recordings. The motivation was also very high, because we all shared the same amazement and enthusiasm discovering this music.” - Frank Agsteribbe