Guillaume de Machaut (c. 1300-77) was both a recognized poet and composer during his lifetime. As did many of his contemporaries, he held simultaneous positions at courts and in a number of churches. His compositions reflect that diversity, ranging from pieces for the entertainment of the court to those composed for the services of the Roman Catholic Church. His Notre Dame Mass is of great historical importance. Before this time, composers often created settings based on one of the five text of the Mass ordinary, the chants that are included in all celebrations of the mass regardless of the time of year, that were polyphonic (musical settings containing simultaneous independent melodies). Josquin’s composition is the first unified treatment of all five movements of the ordinary by a known composer. Machaut took great care to link the five movements with musical ideas. Since the fourteenth century, the five movements of the mass ordinary have been regarded as an inseparable entity, and composers referred to writing settings of all five sections as “composing a Mass.” The Settings of the Mass contain some of the greatest choral music ever written.
In this recording, the four voice parts are sung by male soloists as would have been appropriate in a fourteenth-century church setting. Religious symbolism of the trinity is present at many levels. The text to the original chant, a prayer for peace and mercy, is tri-partite, whether in this setting or in the original monophonic Gregorian chant. Josquin’s music for Agnus Deiis in triple meter, in which beats are grouped in threes, and he preserves the tri-partite structure of the text in the music by repeating the first section as the third. Complex rhythmic patterns contribute to the complicated texture. The upper two parts are more rhythmically active than the lower voices, a common characteristic of fourteenth-century music. The two lower parts move in longer notes and play a supporting role. The second to lowest voice of the Agnus Dei, the tenor, is based on a Gregorian chant, which Machaut set to an unchanging rhythmic pattern in long notes. The rhythmically altered chant, or cantus firmus, creates a musical framework that cannot be recognized by the listener but represents yet another level of religious symbolism as the melodies to Gregorian chants are themselves religious objects thought to have been created by God.
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00:00: |
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi: miserere nobis. |
Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of the world, have mercy on us. |
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01:08: |
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi: miserere nobis. |
Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of the world, have mercy on us. |
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02:24 |
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi: dona nobis pacem. |
Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of the world, grant us peace. |
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03:36 |
End |
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