Our August Recording of the Month is Wishing Tree, an enchanting program from The Gesualdo Six and composer-conductor Owain Park that takes these masters of polyphony into less-familiar territory (Hyperion CDA68480).

The natural world is at the heart of this eclectic recital, from Vaughan Williams’ classic take on the folk song Bushes and Briars to a multi-textured arrangement of The Oak and the Ash by Gordon Langford. Stanford’s The Blue Bird is sung with exquisite poise, declares reviewer Tony Way.

“The world of the madrigal pays homage to swans, who are said to sing only as they die,” he says. “Arcadelt’s Il bianco e dolce cigno with its sensual undertone contrasts with Gibbons’ plangent The Silver Swan, sung at a low pitch to emphasise its grave subject matter. Josquin’s chirping cricket, El grillo, and Byrd’s This Sweet and Merry Month of May are dispatched with an appropriately light touch.”

Unusually for The Gesualdo Six, there is only one religious piece here. David Bednall’s Put Out into the Deep recounts the miraculous catch of fish made by Jesus’s disciples with plainchant embedded within a...