Credo & other sacred music.pdf

Gombert EIGHT-PART CREDO . MEDIA VITA . HAEC DIES

LUGEBAT DAVID ABSALON and other motets HENRY’S E IGHT

NICOLAS GOMBERT

VAE, VAE, BABYLON . SALVE REGINA ‘DIVERSI DIVERSA ORANT’

T HE LOST GENERATION’ is a fitting label by which music

motets (more than a quarter of which are Marian), and some

eighty chansons and other secular pieces. As is common

during this period there are many misattributions and a

number of cases of doubtful authenticity. From 1529

Gombert’s works found their way into print: major collections

of his motets were published in Venice in 1539 and 1541, while

it was common for miscellaneous printed collections of

Masses, motets and chansons to contain at least one work by

Gombert up until well beyond his death. In his Declaración of

1555, Juan Bermudo encouraged lutanists to play the music

‘del profundo Gomberto’; the large number of extant

manuscript and printed intabulations for lute and for organ

(among which are transcriptions of otherwise unknown pieces)

suggests that this advice was heeded.

It is difficult to know how literally one is to read Finck’s

description of Gombert as a ‘pupil of Josquin’. He may well

have studied with the ageing composer since the region of his

birth is not very distant from Condé, where Josquin spent his

later years, and there is every reason to suppose that

Gombert’s musical education occurred at the hands of a

master. But, as Finck noted, Gombert’s style is very different

from what went before him: ‘He avoids rests.’ This is the most

immediate contrast with the music of Josquin, who typically

engages in paired imitations in alternation, the complement of

voices being employed toward the conclusion of one line of

words before a pair of voices takes up the next point of

imitation. Gombert, on the other hand, involves all voices in his

imitations, sustaining the full texture, introducing the new point

(with the next line of text) while the other voices are still

bringing the previous line to its conclusion. In this way he

combines the continuous texture of Josquin’s teacher,

Ockeghem, with the imitative technique of Josquin himself –

‘both full of harmonies and imitations’.

The eight-part Credo 1 comes down to us in a publication

of 1564. It is a powerful work, masterly in technique,

monumental in structure, rich in texture, containing much

antiphonal writing between opposing groups of four voices.

historians have designated those composers whose work

spans the period from the death of Josquin Desprez in

1521 to the advent of Orlande de Lassus during the later

1550s. Among the rich diversity of composers of this time –

including Clemens non Papa, Adriano Willaert, Jachet di

Mantua, Costanzo Festa, Ludwig Senfl and Cristóbal de

Morales – it is Nicolas Gombert who was singled out as the

leading light by the theorist and composer Hermann Finck in

1556: ‘Yet in our very time there are innovators, among whom

is Nicolas Gombert, pupil of Josquin of blessed memory, who

shows all musicians the way, nay more, the exact path to the

desired imitative manner and to refinement; and he composes

music entirely different from the past. For he avoids rests,

and his composition abounds in both full harmonies and

imitations.’

Of Gombert’s life we know little. He was born in French

Flanders in a village west of Lille around 1500. In 1526 he

travelled to Spain to become a singer in the court chapel of

Emperor Charles V and was granted benefices in Courtrai and

Béthune. In 1529 Charles V appointed him Master of the

Children of the Chapel, a post that was to involve him in much

travel throughout western Europe. After 1538, however, his

name disappeared permanently from the imperial court

records. From the humanist Hieronymus Cardanus we learn

that Gombert had been condemned to the galleys of a trireme

for having violated a choirboy. While fettered he composed the

‘swan-songs’ (perhaps his later Magnificat settings) which

moved the Emperor to pardon him and grant him a prebend in

Tournai. A letter from Gombert to Ferrante Gonzaga, Gran

Capitano to Charles V, written in Tournai in 1547, is our sole

remaining biographical document. The date of his death is

unknown: he was clearly understood to be alive when Finck

wrote of him in 1556, but he was dead by the time Cardanus

published his account in 1561.

Gombert’s extant works include eleven Masses, a separate

Credo, eight Magnificat settings, over one hundred and sixty

‘

Gombert’s word-setting, primarily syllabic, avoids the pictorial

but ensures appropriate declamation and mood. Noteworthy

are the handling of ‘et sepultus est’ and the avoidance of any

regular cadence at ‘non erit finis’. Since independent settings

of the Credo are not uncommon we need not search for lost

movements of a complete Mass. The first motif, however, is

related to the opening of the motet Lugebat David Absalon bm ,

preserved in the same print.

Haec dies quam fecit Dominus 3 is the gradual of the

Easter Mass. Gombert’s setting, included in the first book of

his five-part motets published in Venice in 1539, derives its

imitative points from the plainsong melody. Scored for low

voices, it is a solemn rather than exuberant setting of the text.

The six-voice Qui colis Ausoniam 4 is an occasional work

composed for the treaty signed in Bologna in 1533 by

Charles V, Pope Clement VII and a number of other Italian

rulers. Subsequently published in Venice in 1539, it is an

appropriately festive setting of a text by Nicolaus Grudius.

The Salve regina , labelled ‘Diversi diversa orant’

(‘Different people pray different things’) 6 , is included in the

second book of four-part motets, published in Venice in 1541.

This is an exceptional work employing seven Marian texts and

paraphrases of their plainsong melodies. The cantus para-

phrases ‘Salve regina’, one of the four great antiphons of the

Blessed Virgin Mary. The altus begins with another of these

antiphons, ‘Ave regina caelorum’, which is followed by the

shorter antiphon ‘Beata mater’. The tenor commences with the

sequence for the Purification, ‘Inviolata, integra et casta es,

Maria’, and proceeds to the antiphon ‘Hortus conclusus es’,

formerly associated in some traditions with the Assumption.

The bassus first paraphrases yet another of the great Marian

antiphons, ‘Alma redemptoris mater’, and finally the prayer

‘Ave Maria’. The resulting quodlibet is something of a tour de

force in which Gombert forsakes his usual imitative technique

in order that, at any one time, four different melodies – each

re-shaped by rhythmic alteration and various melodic

elaborations and accretions – are sung simultaneously.

Another of Gombert’s Marian motets, the five-voice

O beata Maria 7 , was published in the first collection of

1539. The opening provides some of Gombert’s most original

imitative technique, the response to the motif mi-ut-fa-mi

being sol-mi-la-sol. (Although it is possible, through

application of musica ficta and in the name of identical

solmization, to eradicate this conflict, there seems to be no

authority for doing so, the whole principle of identical

solmization being founded on very shaky evidence.)

Vae, vae Babylon 8 is from the second volume of four-

part motets. Its text is adapted from a number of verses in the

eighteenth chapter of Revelation. The setting is for low voices

and the style is declamatory, befitting the prophecies of doom.

The eleventh-century Media vita in morte sumus bl has

disappeared from all but the Dominican breviary, where it is

the antiphon to the Nunc dimittis on the third Sunday in Lent.

Gombert’s setting, published in the first volume of six-part

motets in Venice in 1539, adheres closely to the plainsong

melody for its polyphonic material. It is a particularly fine

example of Gombert’s style as described by Finck: its textures

are rich, its imitations generally overlap one another, and the

six voices have little rest. Gombert was sufficiently attracted to

the melody (and his motet derived from it) to re-shape the

material in his outstanding five-voice Missa de Media vita .

The eight-voice motet Lugebat David Absalon bm is

attributed to Josquin in the 1564 print, but its style points to

his pupil. The work is a contrafactum , each of whose two

sections originated as a chanson , the first of these attributed

to Gombert in its unique source (though the same music with

less comfortable text also circulated under other names), the

second apparently no longer extant in its original form, though

the use of an existing melody makes possible the identification

of the original text. Who may have been responsible for the

present form of Lugebat is not known, but the marriage of

music and text is a most felicitous one, resulting in an

impassioned portrayal of David’s lament.

In 1626 Francisco Correa de Arauxo published his Facultad

organica , in whose preface he included a brief chapter on the

‘punto intenso contra remisso’, or what we would call the

simultaneous false relation. Gombert, he claimed, made the

most and best use of the device. Research of the past few

years confirms that this trait, generally recognized as English,

was an integral part of the musical language of Josquin,

Gombert and their contemporaries; and indeed, nowhere do we

find its use more prolific, more varied or more compelling than

in the music of Gombert.

The works on this disc have been edited by the present

writer in accordance with the findings of his musica ficta

research.

Henry’s Eight

Henry’s Eight is named as a tribute to Henry VIII, the founder

of Trinity College, Cambridge. The group, originally comprising

eight gentlemen of Trinity College choir, grew out of a common

desire to highlight the neglected wealth of sixteenth- and

seventeenth-century men’s vocal music.

As it presented music to audiences throughout Britain, the

group’s reputation grew, attracting singers from a wider

sphere. Henry’s Eight has appeared live on national radio and

has undertaken tours to a number of countries, including

America, Germany and Southern Africa.

Jonathan Brown

Jonathan Brown was born and raised in Toronto and came to

England in 1993 as Organ Scholar of Clare College, Cambridge.

As an organist he has given recitals throughout the United

Kingdom, while as a singer he has performed with leading

ensembles such as the Academy of Ancient Music and the

Finzi Singers. Increasingly in demand as a choral conductor,

Mr Brown was appointed director of Henry’s Eight in 1996.

We would like to express our sincere thanks to John

O’Donnell for the preparation of the editions and also for his

encouragement and general guidance throughout this project.

If you have enjoyed this recording perhaps you would like a catalogue listing the many others available on the Hyperion and Helios labels. If so, please

write to Hyperion Records Ltd, PO Box 25, London SE9 1AX, England, or email us at info@hyperion-records.co.uk , and we will be pleased to post you

one free of charge.

The Hyperion catalogue can also be accessed on the Internet at www.hyperion-records.co.uk

1 Credo in unum Deum, Patrem omnipotentem,

I believe in one God, the Father Almighty,

factorem caeli et terrae,

maker of heaven and earth,

visibilium omnium et invisibilium.

and of all things visible and invisible.

Et in unum Dominum Jesum Christum,

And in one Lord Jesus Christ,

Filium Dei unigenitum.

the only begotten Son of God.

Et ex Patre natum ante omnia saecula.

Begotten of his Father before all worlds,

Deum de Deo, Lumen de Lumine,

God of God, Light of Light,

Deum verum de Deo vero.

very God of very God,

Genitum non factum, consubstantialem Patri:

begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father,

per quem omnia facta sunt.

by whom all things were made.

Qui propter nos homines,

Who for us men

et propter nostram salutem descendit de caelis.

and for our salvation came down from heaven.

Et incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto

And was incarnate by the Holy Ghost

ex Maria Virgine et homo factus est.

of the Virgin Mary and was made man.

Crucifixus etiam pro nobis sub Pontio Pilato:

And was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate:

passus et sepultus est.

he suffered and was buried.

Et resurrexit tertia die,

And on the third day he rose again

secundum scripturas. Et ascendit in caelum:

according to the scriptures. And ascended into heaven:

sedet ad dexteram Patris.

he sitteth on the right hand of the Father.

Et iterum venturus est cum gloria

And he shall come again with glory

iudicare vivos et mortuos:

to judge both the quick and the dead:

cuius regni non erit finis.

whose kingdom shall have no end.

Et in Spiritum Sanctum, Dominum et vivificantem,

And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord the giver of life,

qui ex Patre Filioque procedit.

who proceeds from the Father and the Son.

Qui cum Patre et Filio simul adoratur,

Who with the Father and the Son is worshipped

et conglorificatur: qui locutus est per Prophetas.

and glorified: who spake by the prophets.

Et unam sanctam catholicam et apostolicam Ecclesiam,

And I believe in one holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church,

Confiteor unum baptisma in remissionem peccatorum.

I acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.

Et expecto resurrectionem mortuorum.

And I look for the resurrection of the dead,

Et vitam venturi saeculi. Amen.

and the life of the world to come. Amen.

2 Haec dies quam fecit Dominus :

This is the day which the Lord hath made:

exultemus et laetemur in ea.

let us rejoice and be glad in it.

3 Haec dies quam fecit Dominus :

This is the day which the Lord hath made:

exultemus et laetemur in ea.

let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Confitemini Domino, quoniam bonus,

O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is gracious,

in saeculum misericordia eius.

and his mercy endureth for ever.

PSALM 118: 24, 106: 1

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