York Early Music Festival - Contre le Temps

Hannah French presents a concert of medieval song given by the young French vocal ensemble Contre le Temps at the National Centre for Early Music - part of last month's York Early Music Festival.

In a secular counterpoint to the York Mystery Plays, this award-winning ensemble draws inspiration from two pivotal medieval texts: Guillaume de Lorris’s Le Roman de la Rose and Machaut’s Le Remède de Fortune. Alternating between monodic stanzas and polyphonic songs from the late 14th and early 15th centuries, a blend of music and poetry revives the allegorical and symbolic world of medieval love, allowing the heartbeat of lovers from the past to resonate with audiences today.

To listen to this programme using most smart speakers, just say "Ask BBC Sounds to play The Early Music Show".