Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina died on 2 February 1594. Several months earlier, a collection of 68 motets was published. Although it appeared at the end of 1593 it is generally thought that these motets were composed over a period of years. Many have interpreted this publication as a summation of Palestrina’s life’s work. It was the last of the many publications that appeared during his lifetime.
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Pueri Hebraeorum vestimenta by Simão dos Anjos
The city of Évora, Alentejo, Portugal, is known for its musical history regarding the great Portuguese masters of polyphony of the first half of the seventeenth century. Names like Fr. Manuel Cardoso, Duarte Lobo, Filipe de Magalhães are known throughout the world as leading figures with biographical and professional relations with Évora Cathedral.
Continue readingThe motet Ave gratia plena by Cornelis Verdonck
Flemish composer and singer Cornelis Verdonck was born in Turnhout sometime during the year 1563 and died in Antwerp on 5 July 1625. He was a choirboy at Antwerp Cathedral and in 1572 was enrolled as a singer at the court of Felipe II of Spain being colleague to other singers of Flemish origin such as Peeter Cornet and Philippe Rogier. In 1580 he was enrolled with two other singers in Douai University. Verdonck was a pupil of Séverin Cornet in Antwerp, who included one of his works in each of his three 1581 publications. He returned to Madrid in 1584 as a singer of the royal chapel where he remained until 1598. In 1599 he was already back in Antwerp and later in that year he took an active part in the preparations for the entry of Achduke Albert in that city, composing a motet for that occasion. His 1603 book of madrigals suggests that Verdonck was then at the service of Cornelis Pruenen nephew, Johannes Carolus de Cordes, governor of Wichelen and Serskamp, the dedicatee of the publication. He also held a prebend at Eindhoven until 1622.
Continue readingThe motet O magnum mysterium by Cristóbal de Morales
Many sixteenth and seventeenth-century composers have set the text O Magnum mysterium with wonderful polyphonic results, such as Willaert, Gabrieli, Palestrina, Victoria, and, Morales only to name a few. In Portugal during this period we find at least three settings of this text – all as responsories – by Pedro de Cristo, Duarte Lobo and Estêvão Lopes Morago respectively, being the Cristo setting the most widely known.
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