Robert Hunt
About the composer
Almost nothing is known about the English composer Robert Hunt (early 16th century). The Peterhouse partbooks are the only extant source of music by Robert Hunt. The partbooks are named Peterhouse after Peterhouse in Cambridge, where the books were kept for some time, and are now preserved in the Cambridge University Library. They are handwritten manuscripts, all written on paper. Only two pieces by Hunt survive: his Ave Maria and his Stabat Mater.
About the Stabat Mater
| Date: | ca. 1525 |
| Performers: | Mixed choir |
| Length: | 17.51 minutes |
| Particulars: | Hunts Stabat Mater (and the other compositions from the Peterhouse partbooks) could only be performed thanks to the recomposition of the missing parts by the English musicologist Nick Sandon. In Hunts Stabat Mater both tenor and treble parts are lost, so two-fifths of the polyphonic texture have been restored by Sandon. |
| Textual variations: | Like medieval English composers as Ashwell, Brown, Cornysh and Davy Hunt uses a text that differs greatly from the original. The first eight stanzas are the same, but the other 12 are replaced by 6 others, not only with a different content, but also with a different rhyme scheme (aaac, bbbc). These stanzas can be found at: https://stabatmater.info/latin/ |
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Information about the recording
| CD1: | BHCD1005 Music from the Peterhous Partbooks, Vol. 4 |
| More info: | The Stabat Mater by Robert Hunt was on the list of Missing CDs for a long time. Thanks to the great support by Robert and Kathy Lee I could delete Robert Hunt from the list and add this CD to the site. Robert and Kathy were so kind to to give the CD to me as a present! Many thanks! |
| Choir: | Blue Heron Choir |
| Conductor: | Scott Metcalfe |
| Soloists: | Shari Wilson, treble |
| Other works: | Nicholas Ludford, Ave cujus conceptio |
| Code: | HUN 01 |
