Happy birthday Hilliards: The Hilliard Ensemble turns 40

After twenty years of international success, an emotional close to the Officium tour by the Hilliard Ensemble and Norwegian saxophonist Jan Garbarek.

There aren't many - if any - ensembles who will, in a single concert, perform music ranging from Gregorian chant to contemporary, from England to Armenia. The Hilliard ensemble do so with vocal technique that is distinctive and impressive.

Seeing both these ensembles live has been a dream of mine for a few years now, having been brought up with my father’s love of the Hilliard Ensemble’s collaborative recordings with jazz saxophonist Jan Gabarek. And what better place to be transported back in time with these early music experts than the Wigmore Hall.

In 1993, by some strange musical alchemy, a creative partnership was born that has gone on to bear some remarkable fruit. On Officium, stylish jazz and classical label ECM brought together The Hilliard Ensemble – a vocal quartet known for the precision with which it had tackled and animated austere soundworlds from Perotin to Pärt – and Norwegian jazz saxophonist Jan Garbarek.

Saturday evening’s concert saw the coming together of two world-class ensembles from opposite ends of the world: Australia’s national orchestra, the Australian Chamber Orchestra, and the world-renowned British vocal group the Hilliard Ensemble.

It has been nearly twenty years since the Hilliard Ensemble and Jan Garbarek released their first recording, Officium, in which the austere harmonies of medieval sacred music sung by the male voice quartet were augmented by Garbarek’s beautiful, freewheeling saxophone melodies.