Dionysos Now! / Tore Tom Denys

The names of tenor Tore Tom Denys and renaissance composer Adriaen Willaert are usually uttered in a single breath. With his vocal ensemble Dionysos Now! Denys makes it his life’s work to once again put this forgotten Flemish master on the pedestal he deserves. In the 16th century, Willaert was our most important cultural export product, a name that ranked among fellow countrymen Josquin Desprez and Orlandus Lassus. ‘The Michael Jackson of his time,’ is how Denys describes him. For some unaccountable reason, however, his music was lost in the folds of history for centuries… until Dionysos Now! Came nosing around. At DE SINGEL we link his St John Passion to a much later music world: the harpsichord works of György Ligeti which are built on Willaert’s foundations.