Parallel Worlds

With Parallel Worlds, Czech composer Jan Jirasek provides a portal into his intricately textured and resonant choral music. These works are enhanced by Czech children's choir Jitro, whose singers imbibe Jirasek's delicate and earnest compositions with authority, maturity, and captivating grace. A varied collection of Jirasek's sacred and secular choral music, Parallel Worlds reveals the composer's affinity for non-traditional sounds, as well as vocal forms rooted in Renaissance and Medieval traditions. These subtle, period-based influences are most evident in the nuances of compositions such as works like Missa Propria that evoke the voice-leading techniques of Italian Renaissance composer Carlo Gesualdo. Most obvious of these subtleties is Jirasek's contrast of polyphony and monophony in Missa Propria and Si, Vis, Amari, Ama, which use chant-like melodies scored for the entire choir. These moments strongly recall the structural role of Gregorian chant in Medieval, Renaissance, and eve