Missa de Beata Virgine (Josquin)
The Missa de Beata Virgine is a musical setting of the
The Missa de Beata Virgine is unusual among Josquin's masses in that the first two movements are for four voices, and the last three for five, with the fifth voice derived canonically. Like most musical settings of the mass Ordinary, it is in five sections, or movements:
It uses different
The Missa de Beata Virgine was one of Josquin's last three masses, with the others being the
The movements differ in their treatment of the source plainchant. The Kyrie has the chant in all voices, imitatively and paraphrased; the Gloria treats the chant as a cantus firmus, migrating it from voice to voice. Tonally, both movements end on G, and most of their cadences are on G or D. The Credo, the first movement for five voices, ends with a surprising Phrygian cadence on E, and uses canonic techniques more prominently than in the preceding movements. The overall sound is darker and reminiscent of Johannes Ockeghem.[5] The Sanctus is unusual among Josquin's mass movements, for the five voices sing throughout without a break: normally Josquin breaks up the texture with passages in reduced scoring. Yet the texture is light, with the voices singing polyphonically only some of the time. In the closing Agnus, the chant is treated freely, and the texture is similar to that which Josquin used in his chansons. Both the Agnus and Sanctus cadence on C.[6]
The popularity of this mass in the 16th century may be due to its "sensuously appealing" surface texture, one which foreshadows the music of later composers such as
References
- Jeremy Noble: "Josquin des Prez", 12, Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (Accessed March 25, 2007), (subscription access)
- ISBN 0-19-816335-5
- Harold Gleason and Warren Becker, Music in the Middle Ages and Renaissance (Music Literature Outlines Series I). Bloomington, Indiana. Frangipani Press, 1986. ISBN 0-89917-034-X
- ISBN 0-393-09530-4
- ISBN 1-56159-174-2