Boys' Choir's 'Angelis': Spain's New 'Soul' Music
by Howell Llewellyn
Two years after stunning the music industry with the huge success of the Gregorian chants of the choir of cloistered monks at the Santo Domingo de Silos monastery, Spain is again courting our celestial and musical soul.
First behind the monks were the nuns. A choir of Benedictine nuns from northern Spain entered the charts in December with their own offering of plainsong, although by early February, after five weeks on the charts, the album "Cantate Domino, Alleluya" had climbed to just No. 22. It has sold less than 50,000 units, according to the nuns' Spanish TV label RTVE Música.
Faring much better, though, is a so-called "white voices'' choir from one of the world's best-known monasteries.
El Escorial, located just north of Madrid. El Escorial is a fully functioning religious center and claims one of the world's most prestigious boys' choirs, Elbosco. EMI-Hispavox has decided to tap the spiritual vein, which has been reflected not only by monks and nuns but by such acts as Enigma and Sacred Spirit, by recording the choir within the monastery's walls.
By early February, "Angelis" by Elbosco had spent 10 weeks in the upper regions of the charts, peaking at No. 4, with sales exceeding 150,000 units.
EMI international product manager Boris Aguirreche points out that, unlike other spiritual acts, Elbosco used no pre-recorded material. Instead, the boys' divine voices combine with minimal instrumental backup and an English-language male voice that occasionally lapses into a type of "church-rap".
The boys' choir uses some female voices but their model for 'Angelis" is the sound of the castrated singers of the Italian Middle Ages, rather than the earlier and more biblical Gregorian chant.
"However the music is angelic, and that is why it is selling." says Aguirreche. "The voices of the boys are the wings that lift you to heaven. Over the centuries, astrologers, physicians and architects have attributed magical qualities to El Escorial, and we think this comes across in the recording."
Unlike the Gregorian chants of the monks and nuns, "Angelis" uses rhythms that would not be out of place in any contemporary genre. The 13 tracks even contain hints of trance and techno.
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| Copy of article from Billlboard, 1996, march 9. |
