News from HMSC

We are delighted to have been awarded a grant by the Continuo Foundation in the first round of their support for freelance historical performers affected by the Coronavirus pandemic. We will be using the funds to film a concert performance of our brand new 40th anniversary recital programme, Merchants of Venice, to be broadcast in September 2021. We are immensely grateful to the Continuo Foundation for their support, and are very much looking forward to welcoming you to the online concert later this year.

'HMSC: They're unbelievable!'

Audience member, USA

'If there was any question that HMSC is the pre-eminent early brass group, that question should have been laid to rest. It was like watching one brain in 8 bodies! Very impressive.'

Audience member, Berkeley

'The qualities of His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts have been established for many years, particularly in relation to sound-quality and agility in the improvised ornamentations. The ensemble generates a real sensation of splendour'
Early Music

About HMSC

His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts is a group of virtuoso wind players who specialise in playing Renaissance and Baroque music in historically appropriate styles on original instruments.

The noble sound of cornetts and sackbuts was among the most versatile instrumental colours available to composers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It was heard in many musical contexts: in consort or in alternation with voices in the extravagant liturgy of the great Italian and Spanish churches - above all the Basilica of St Mark's in Venice; in aristocratic entertainments such as the intermedii of northern Italy or the masques of Jacobean England; and in the ceremonial and devotional music for the courts and free cities of Lutheran Germany.

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