Motet

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J. S. Bach's Baroque music era motet, entitled Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf
(BWV226)

In

Johannes de Grocheo believed that the motet was "not to be celebrated in the presence of common people, because they do not notice its subtlety, nor are they delighted in hearing it, but in the presence of the educated and of those who are seeking out subtleties in the arts".[2]

Etymology

In the early 20th century, it was generally believed the name came from the Latin movere (to move), though a derivation from the French mot ("word", or "phrase") had also been suggested. The Medieval Latin for "motet" is motectum, and the Italian mottetto was also used.[3] If the word is from Latin, the name describes the movement of the different voices against one another. Today, however, the French etymology is favoured by reference books, as the word "motet" in 13th-century French had the sense of "little word".[4][5][6][7] In fact, the troped clausulas that were the forerunner of the motet were originally called motelli (from the French mot, "word"), soon replaced by the term moteti.[8]

Medieval examples

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The earliest motets arose in the 13th century from the

secular motets. These were two- to four-part compositions in which different texts, sometimes in different vernacular languages, were sung simultaneously over a (usually Latin-texted) cantus firmus usually adapted from a melismatic passage of Gregorian chant on a single word or phrase. It is also increasingly argued that the term "motet" could in fact include certain brief single-voice songs.[10]

The texts of upper voices include subjects as diverse as courtly love odes, pastoral encounters with shepherdesses, political attacks, and many Christian devotions, especially to the Virgin Mary. In many cases, the texts of the upper voices are related to the themes of the chant passage they elaborate on, even in cases where the upper voices are secular in content.[11] Most medieval motets are anonymous compositions and significantly re-use music and text. They are transmitted in a number of contexts, and were most popular in northern France. The largest surviving collection is in the Montpellier Codex.[12]

Increasingly in the 14th and 15th centuries, motets made use of repetitive patterns often termed panisorhythmic; that is, they employed repeated rhythmic patterns in all voices—not only the cantus firmus—which did not necessarily coincide with repeating melodic patterns. Philippe de Vitry was one of the earliest composers to use this technique, and his work evidently had an influence on that of Guillaume de Machaut, one of the most famous named composers of late medieval motets.

Medieval composers

Other medieval motet composers include:

Renaissance examples

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Renaissance music
Overview
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The compositional character of the motet changed entirely during the transition from medieval to

Guillaume Dufay was a transitional figure in this regard, writing one of the last important motets in the medieval, isorhythmic style, Nuper rosarum flores, in 1436.[13][14] During the second half of the fifteenth century Motets stretched the cantus firmus to greater lengths compared to the surrounding multi-voice counterpoint, adopting a technique of contemporary 'tenor masses'.[15] This obscured the cantus firmus' rhythm more than in medieval isorhythmic motets. Cascading, passing chords
created by the interplay of voices and the absence of an obvious beat distinguish medieval and renaissance motet styles.

Motet frequently used the texts of antiphons and the Renaissance period marked the flowering of the form. The Renaissance motet is polyphonic, sometimes with an imitative counterpoint, for a chorus singing a Latin and usually sacred text. It is not connected to a specific liturgy, making it suitable for any service.

Motets were sacred

Canticum Canticorum are among the most lush and madrigal-like, while his madrigals using Petrarch's poems could be performed in a church. Religious compositions in vernacular languages were often called madrigali spirituali
, "spiritual madrigals". These Renaissance motets developed in episodic format with separate phrases of the text given independent melodic treatment and contrapuntal development.

Secular motets, known as "ceremonial motets",[17] typically set a Latin text to praise a monarch, music or commemorate a triumph. The theme of courtly love, often found in the medieval secular motet, was banished from the Renaissance motet. Ceremonial motets are characterised by clear articulation of formal structure and by clear diction, because the texts would be novel for the audience. Adrian Willaert, Ludwig Senfl, and Cipriano de Rore are prominent composers of ceremonial motets from the first half of the 16th century.[17]

Renaissance composers

The motet was one of the preeminent forms of Renaissance music. Important composers of Renaissance motets include:

In the latter part of the 16th century,

If Ye Love Me" by Thomas Tallis serves the demand of the Church of England for English texts, and a focus on understanding the words, beginning in homophony
.

Baroque examples

In

Louis XIV's son; its text by Pierre Perrin
begins:

Plaude laetare Gallia
Rore caelesti rigantur lilia,
Sacro Delphinus fonte lavatur
Et christianus Christo dicatur.

("Rejoice and sing, France: the lily is bathed with heavenly dew. The Dauphin is bathed in the sacred font, and the Christian is dedicated to Christ.")

In France, Pierre Robert (24 grands motets), Henry Dumont (grands & petits motets), Marc-Antoine Charpentier (206 different types of motets), Michel-Richard de La Lande (70 grands motets), Henry Desmarest (20 grands motets), François Couperin (motets lost), Nicolas Bernier, André Campra, Charles-Hubert Gervais (42 grands motets), Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, François Giroust (70 grands motets) were also important composers. In Germany, too, pieces called motets were written in the new musical languages of the Baroque. Heinrich Schütz wrote many motets in series of publications, for example three books of Symphoniae sacrae, some in Latin and some in German. Hans Leo Hassler composed motets such as Dixit Maria, on which he also based a mass composition.

J. S. Bach's compositions

Main article: List of motets by Johann Sebastian Bach

Six motets attributed to

colla parte. Lobet dem Herrn is for SATB with basso continuo
.

The funeral

Ich lasse dich nicht, BWV Anh 159
, Bach's authorship is debated.

18th century

Later 18th-century composers wrote few motets. Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach composed an extended chorale motet Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, combining Baroque techniques with the galant style. Mozart's Ave verum corpus (K. 618) is this genre. Rameau, Mondonville and Giroust also wrote grands motets.

19th century

In the 19th century, some German composers continued to write motets.

motets in Latin. Most of these compositions are a cappella and some, such as Edward Elgar
's three motets Op. 2, are accompanied by organ.

20th century

In the 20th century, composers of motets have often consciously imitated earlier styles. In 1920, Ralph Vaughan Williams composed O clap your hands, a setting of verses from Psalm 47 for a four-part choir, organ, brass, and percussion, called a motet. Carl Nielsen set in Tre Motetter three verses from different psalms as motets, first performed in 1930. Francis Poulenc set several Latin texts as motets, first Quatre motets pour un temps de pénitence (1938). Maurice Duruflé composed Quatre Motets sur des thèmes grégoriens in 1960, and Notre Père in 1977. Other examples include works by Richard Strauss, Charles Villiers Stanford, Edmund Rubbra, Lennox Berkeley, Morten Lauridsen, Edward Elgar, Hugo Distler, F. Melius Christiansen, Ernst Krenek, Michael Finnissy, Karl Jenkins[18] and Igor Stravinsky.

21st century

Dave Soldier (Motet: Harmonies of the World, with rules from Johannes Kepler), Sven-David Sandström,[20] Enjott Schneider,[21] Ludger Stühlmeyer[22] and Pierre Pincemaille.[23]

References

  1. ISBN 9780520210813
    .
  2. ISBN 9781580441650
    (pbk).
  3. ^ William Henry Grattan Flood (1913). "Motet" . In Herbermann, Charles (ed.). Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
  4. ^ "motet". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.) entry "Motet".
  5. ISBN 0674375017
    .
  6. ISBN 978-0-393-93125-9
    .
  7. ISBN 978-0-19-866212-9
    .
  8. ^ a b Ernest H. Sanders and Peter M. Lefferts, "Motet, §I: Middle Ages", The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell (London: Macmillan Publishers, 2001).
  9. ISBN 978-1-56159-263-0
    . Retrieved 17 November 2018.
  10. doi:10.1093/mq/85.4.644
    .
  11. S2CID 162143719
    .
  12. S2CID 193246052
    .
  13. ^ Alec Robertson and Denis Stevens, eds., A History of Music, Volume 2 (New York: Barnes and Noble, Inc., 1965), 85.
  14. ^ Edgar H. Sparks, Cantus Firmus in Mass and Motet 1420–1520 (New York: Da Capo Press, 1975), 86.
  15. ^ Leeman L. Perkins and Patrick Macey, "Motet, §II: Renaissance", The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell (London: Macmillan Publishers, 2001).
  16. ^ The Hilliard Ensemble, Palestrina: Canticum canticorum, Motets Book IV; Spiritual madrigals (Virgin Classics, 1994; sound recording liner notes)
  17. ^ a b Blanche Gangwere, Music History During the Renaissance Period, 1520–1550 (Westport, CT, Praeger Publishers: 2004), pp. 451–54.
  18. ISBN 978-1-78454-028-9
    .
  19. ISBN 978-3-00-039887-2
    ,
  20. ^ Kammerchor Hannover "Bach vs. Sandström" (2014) Verband Deutscher Konzertchöre.
  21. ISBN 978-3-00-039887-2
    .
  22. Frauenkirche Dresden
    .
  23. ^ Three motets (Pater Noster; Ave Maria; Ave Verum), published with A coeur joie editions: Website of A coeur joie editions

Further reading

External links
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