Franco-Flemish Recording Project
4 Years | 5 Albums
An ambitious project—independent of our regular operations—brought to life by your generosity
“In an America where early music remains a scattered archipelago, the ensemble Blue Heron stands out like a beacon... one of the very few American strongholds devoted to Franco-Flemish polyphony.”
Paolo ScarnecchiaTotal Baroque (2026)
“After such a promising start, perhaps these singers will try their hand at some of the more neglected parts of the repertory. How long will we have to wait for an anthology of Busnoys’ songs, for instance? More, please.”
Fabrice FitchGoldberg (2007, in a review of Blue Heron's very first CD)
The Albums
BHCD1016
Divine Songs: Secular chansons & sacred transformations
Chansons and the motets and masses that borrow their secular tunes. Featuring music by Binchois, Du Fay, Okeghem, Agricola, La Rue, and Bauldeweyn, including several world premiere recordings.
Record: October 2026 ($13,130)
Release: Fall 2027 ($13,050)
Total cost: $26,180
BHCD1017
Binchois: Songs
A selection of chansons, including many never recorded before, by Gilles de Bins, called Binchois. This recording will be made using Scott Metcalfe’s new complete edition of Binchois’s songs.
Record: May & September 2027 ($19,900)
Release: Spring 2028 ($13,750)
Total cost: $33,650
BHCD1018
Johannes Okeghem & Johannes Regis: Complete Motets
Blue Heron has performed all of Okeghem’s music, and will very soon have sung the complete works of Regis as well. This disc presents all of the surviving motets by these two eminent contemporaries.
Record: February & October 2027 ($23,575)
Release: Late Fall 2028 ($13,750)
Total cost: $37,325
BHCD1019
Le rossignol musical / The Musical Nightingale
with Paul O’Dette, lute
Chansons from a superb anthology published in Antwerp in 1597, with music by De Monte, Le Jeune, Pevernage, Sweelinck, and others, as well as music for solo lute performed by the one of the world’s greatest lutenists. This album includes many world premiere recordings.
Record: May 2028 ($22,320)
Release: Spring 2029 ($13,750)
Total cost: $36,070
BHCD1020
Antoine Busnoys: Songs
A selection of chansons—many never previously recorded—by one of the most prolific and successful song composers of the generation after Binchois, Antoine Busnoys, who served Charles the Bold of Burgundy as Binchois had served Charles’s father Philip the Good.
Record: 2028–2029 season ($22,050)
Release: Spring 2030 ($13,750)
Total cost: $35,800