Tallis Scholars Perform With Balanced Precision

Paragons of vocal purity for 25 years now, the Tallis Scholars returned to Los Angeles on Friday with a compact program of the Renaissance sacred music that is their reason for being. Given just days after the Scholars’ 1,000th concert, their Royce Hall agenda paid no special attention to the season, celebrating instead the English ensemble’s distinguished history with a “greatest hits” sort of program.

Ten voices on this tour, the Scholars began with Palestrina’s motet “Surge, illuminare” and “Stabat Mater,” works they released on audio and video discs in conjunction with the 400th anniversary of the composer’s death in 1594. They opened and closed the second half with a mini-survey of their Tudor namesake’s motet writing, ranging from the concise and quietly spectacular “Miserere nostri Domine” to the sprawling but equally striking “Salve intemerata virgo.”

In between the Scholars offered distinctive pieces from Josquin Desprez (“Absalon, fili mi”), Jean Mouton (“Nesciens Mater”) and William Mundy (“Adolescentulus sum ego”). The singing throughout was fully up to the group’s high standard of clarity and poise, each gracefully swelling line emerging from carefully balanced, rhythmically cohesive textures.

Otherwise, the Scholars left characterization completely up to the composers. Founder-director Peter Phillips’ conducting seemed to indicate all manner of accent and expressive nuance that found scant reflection in the singing, as the Scholars sailed in undemonstrative serenity over remarkable examples of sophisticated word painting. Dynamic contrast was also limited, although Phillips built the “Salve intemerata” to impressive climaxes.

The Scholars demonstrated the searing potential of unadorned simplicity, rock-solid intonation and pristine balances with their encore, Henry Purcell’s harmonically pungent anthem “Hear my prayer, O Lord.”