If you search for de Victoria's Masses or you survey the literature dealing with his music you could easily assume that he only ever wrote one Requiem - the one dating from 1605, in fact he wrote two and the 1605 composition owes a very heavy debt to the 1583 one. Whenever I tell people this it almost always comes as a great surprise to them which in turn surprises me. Tomás Luis de Victoria was a Catholic priest a product of the counter-reformation as it unfolded in Spain. If there is one man whose music epitomises the counter-reformation de Victoria is that man. His illustrious predecessors Francisco Guerrero and Cristóbal de Morales had made notable contributions to the genre, a genre which had been a well-established part of Spanish religious culture since at least the latter part of the Middle Ages. It's not surprising that Victoria wrote more than one setting of the Requiem or the Missa pro defunctis to give it its proper title on the contrary it would have been astonishing if de Victoria had _not_ made the composition of a Missa pro defunctis one of his earliest compositional tasks. De Victoria pubished this first setting first in 1583 and then re-issued it in 1592 as a part of his programme of publishing a complete set of Masses for the liturgical year and special occasions. (It's also the basis of his far better known 1605 setting). It's a four-part (SATB) paraphrase setting of Mass whose taut lines and crystal clarity are exactly what you might expect from this dedicated composer-priest who was passionate about his faith and determined to uphold its musical tenets as laid out by the Council of Trent and other Church writings and teachings of the counter-reformation. To this end de Victoria sets the: 1. Introit, 2. Kyrie, 3. Gradual, 4. Offertory "Domine Jesu Christe," 5. Sanctus, 6. Agnus Dei I-III, 7. Communio "Lux aeterna". Of the Mass for the dead. To which he appended the Responsory "Libera me" from the burial service in the 1583 version and a further two Responsories this time from the Office of Matins, "Peccantem me" and "Credo quod Redemptor" to the 1592 version. (Because they're so little known I've decided to include these responsories in this video). All the movements have plainchant incipits, and, if you listen closely, you will hear the complete Gregorian chant for the Requiem Mass being paraphrased in the soprano voice in every movement except for the last two ("Peccantem me" and "Credo quod Redemptor") where you'll hear it in the tenor. I said above that it's a very taut piece of music and so it is but it's also a very smooth, in fact downright suave piece of music with a very rich harmonic palette. It's a piece that repays repeated listening - the more you listen to it the more you'll hear such things as how he tinctures his melodies throughout with alterations in pitch (accidental inflections) particularly in the sharpward direction, and his repeated use of melodies that sketch a diminished fourth. It's also a far brighter piece than you might from a Requiem throughout this setting. This brightness and musical optimism may seem surprising to those who are familiar only with his 1605 requiem or who consider it to be a part of the same musical continuum inhabited by, say, Morales' 1544 Requiem. But again it's not really all that surprising when you think about it. Victoria's 1605 Missa pro defunctis was written as a personal statement of grief and loss following the death of his well-loved patron. His earlier setting was written as part of his very ambitious scheme to provide music for the entire liturgical year and it expresses the optimism and forward looking nature of that movement which accorded so well his own nature and beliefs. Enjoy :-). markfromireland Score available from here: http://www.uma.es/victoria/partituras.html#requiemacuatro The CPDL page is here: http://www0.cpdl.org/wiki/index.php/Missa_Pro_defunctis_a_4_%28Tom%C3%A1s_Luis_de_Victoria%29 Summary: Tomás Luis de Victoria (c.1548 -- 1611): Missa pro defunctis a 4 Performers: Ensemble plus ultra, Michael Noone (conductor). Photo: Sepulchre of the martyrs Vicente, Sabina, and Cristeta, Avila Cathedral the sepulchre dates to fourth century, the carved and painted canopy covering it to the fourteenth century.

• published: 20 Oct 2013
• views: 214