Music of the sixteenth century.

THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART
Concert for Members
Music of the Sixteenth Century
Yale University School of Music
Collegium Musicum
Paul Hindemith, Director
MONDAY, JUNE4, 1951 AT 7:30 AT THE CLOISTERS

ON "AUTHENTIC" PERFORMANCE
TO US MUSEUM PEOPLE the word "patina" implies a problem of eminent practical importance. That more or less opaque layer of dirt, varnish, or oxidation clouding the surface of Romanesque chalices, Donatello bronzes or Titian canvases""how should we regard it? Should we respect it as the venerable dust and sediment of the centuries, attesting to the age of the object and increasing its value aesthetic and otherwise; Or is it to be regarded as merely an obnoxious veil that hides the face of a work of art from the eager eyes of later generations; And if the latter, should we then remove it as well as we can, only to be surprised, or even shocked, by the recovered brightness or colours revealed by the original surface. And to turn from one unanswered question to another: does patina exist in the field of music; Are musical masterworks of the past clouded by something like patina; At first thought we are tempted to deny this, for it may seem that scores which have come down to us embody the clear and complete expression of the composer's intention. Actually, however, they represent only a skeleton of the work, a guide for the performer which not only left him much freedom of interpretation but also omitted all those elements of performance which, at the time, were taken for granted. But what is taken for granted by one century may not be by the next. Practices and conditions of performance continually change throughout musical history. There are, for instance, the instruments of a given period with their specific timbre and their peculiar playing methods, to mention only one of the elements which we know fairly well and therefore can attempt to revive. But there are also many things about past performances, such as articulation, tempo, degree of rubato, dynamics, method of singing (nasal, falsetto, etc.) on which we do not always have accurate information. Considering the inevitable distortion inflicted upon an old work by the different conditions of a modern performance, one wonders to what extent the work can be "restored," that is, performed under its original conditions. Our eclectic times are devoted as probably no other before, to the understanding of the past. At least, we like to give ourselves the illusion that we know how each period before us enjoyed its art and its music. We try for "authentic" performances, free of patina, just as they must have been under the very eyes and ears of the composer. This ideal is a quite recent one. Neither Bach nor Mozart would have been troubled by such purist considerations. Bach was not reluctant to make free transcriptions of works by Vivaldi and Corelli; Mozart took even more liberties with the works of Handel, among them the "Messiah," and "Acis and Galathea." He did not hesitate to make sweeping changes in the scores, to replace the keyboard instrument that provided the continuo with a whole orchestral group, to introduce clarinets which had not existed in Handel's time, to make radical cuts and even to change the harmony. Likewise when he transcribed keyboard fugues of J. S. Bach for string trio, he found it quite permissible to replace the preludes Bach had written for these fugues by new ones of his own composition. Now, from our modern, "correct" and purist point of view, to what extent is it possible to perform old music so that it sounds as it did at the time when it was written? Can we turn back the wheel of time? Much can be done. W e can try to reproduce the old timbre by rebuilding or repairing the old instruments; we may even find musicians willing to practice on them for months or years and singers to sing in the old style; we can secure a room with acoustical conditions similar to those of the original presentation; we can also gather a mass of information about style of performance from old treatises and other sources. But there still remains one important factor of performance that can never be duplicated; this is the listener. Our ears, conditioned by Wagner and Debussy, by Jazz and Stravinsky, do not hear Palestrina and Gesualdo as did their contemporaries. Chroma which may have shocked or tickled the worshippers in the Sistina or in San Marco is commonplace to audiences of the "Rosenkavalier"; and a true Haydn adagio would probably sound unbearably slow to New York listeners of today. Yet with all these limitations it is probably music of all the other arts that transports us most directly and magically into bygone epochs. B y recreating the music of an earlier age we seem to reach its very heart, to perceive its atmosphere, to share its particular sensibilities, to comprehend its emotional idiom. Such conjuration requires more than diligence and warmth; it requires imagination and hypnotic power, the qualities of a pioneer. But pioneers""in music as in other fields of creation""are concerned, and rightfully so, with today and tomorrow, not with yesterday. Few have Janus-heads. Brahms, though a profound historian of music and editor of old music, was only moderately successful as a conductor of those gems which he so devotedly put into the programs of the Vienna Singverein. Thus, it is a rare coincidence and a great opportunity for us when a master of contemporary art, like Paul Hindemith, bestows his imaginative powers upon the revival of the treasurers of the past.
EMANUEL WINTERNITZ
Curator of Musical Collections

NOTE
Among the wind instruments from the Museum's collection used in tonight's performance are a few very old ones, obsolete for centuries and probably quite unknown even to professional musicians. T w o of them are illustrated below by woodcuts from Praetorius, Syntagma musicum, de organographia, Wolfenbuttel, 1618.
The cromorne, or Krummhorn (1), a curved wooden tube of cylindrical bore carved in halves and covered with leather. It is played with a double reed, like the oboe. This reed, however, is not grasped and controlled by the lips of the player but is hidden in a wooden capsule, which receives the wind from the player's mouth through a hole. Because of its timbre its name was transformed in France to cor morne. In Carpaccio's altarpiece in the Accademia in Venice there is an angel playing the cromorne. The shawm (2), an ancestor of the modern oboe, which also has a double reed. Shawms, like most other instruments in the Renaissance, were made in sets covering the whole range from treble to deep bass.
THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART
DEPARTMENT OF MUSICAL ACTIVITIES

WHILE THE COMPOSERS of Catholic church music generally wrote complete masses, it was always the custom in the church to perform single movements from their masses as fancy dictated, filling in the vacancies with Gregorian music specified for the particular service, or combining the work of one man with that of another, producing a kind of composite mass. The Gregorian sections [which are enclosed in brackets] of the mass to be performed are taken from the service for the Feast of the Holy Trinity according to the Graduale Romanum. They are sung by male choir.

Introit
[Benedicta sit sancta Trinitas, atque indivisa Unitas: confitebimur
ei, quia fecit nobiscum misericordiam suam.
Domine Dominus noster: quam admirabile est nomen
tuum in universa terra. Gloria Patri, et Filio, et Spiritui
Sancto. Sicut erat in principio, et nunc, et semper, et in
saecula saeculorum. Amen.]

( A ) WILLIAM BYRD(I 543-1623) Kyrie
Kyrie eleison. Christe eleison. Kyrie eleison.
COLLECTED V O C A L WORKS OF W I L L I AM BYRD,
ED. E. H. FELLOWES, V. I
Byrd, a devoted Catholic, wrote both Latin and English church services. His three masses, one for three voices, one for four and one for five, seem to have been first published in the second edition (1610) of the second book of his Gradualia, a book of Latin motets. They appear there interleaved, without date or title page. From the time signature (¢) used in the five part mass, from which this Kyrie is taken, it has been deduced that this A Composite Mass mass was written about 1590, for a different signature is used after 1605. O f the three masses, the one in five parts is perhaps the greatest, certainly the richest in texture. Each short section is based on a different phrase which is taken up by the voices in turn.

( B ) PHILIPPUS DE MONTE (1521-1603) Gloria
[Gloria in excelsis D e o . ] Et in terra pax hominibus bonae
voluntatis. Laudamus te. Benedicimus te. Adoramus te.
Glorificamus te. Gratias agimus tibi propter magnam
gloriam tuam. Domine Deus, Rex caelestis, Deus Pater
omnipotens, Domine Fili unigenite Jesu Christe. Domine
Deus, Agnus Dei, Filius Patris. Qui tollis peccata mundi,
miserere nobis. Qui tollis peccata mundi, suscipe deprecationem
nostram. Qui sedes ad dexteram Patris, miserere
nobis. Quoniam tu solus Dominus. Tu solus Altissimus,
Jesu Christe. Cum Sancto Spiritu, in gloria Dei Patris.
Amen.
DE MONTE, COMPLETE WORKS, ED. VAN DEN BORREN, V . 24

Philippus de Monte, born at Malines (or perhaps Mons) in Flanders, was one of the many musicians who travelled from the Low Countries to Italy and other European countries. For some time he was Imperial Kapellmeister to Emperor Maximilian II in Vienna, but he died at Prague in the service o f Maximilian's successor, Rudolph II. A very modest person, he had the reputation while still in his thirties, of being "unquestionably the best composer in the whole country" (Bavaria?). Besides over twelve hundred madrigals, he wrote seven books of motets and two books of masses. This Gloria comes from a mass entitled " C um sit omnipotens rector Olympi" printed at Antwerp in 1587; the material is taken from the composer's five part motet of the same name, published in Venice in 1584. A sixth voice was added by de Monte.
Gradual
[Benedictus es, Domine, qui intueris abyssos, et sedes
super Cherubim. Benedictus es, Domine, in firmamento
caeli, et laudabilis in saecula.]
Alleluia
[Alleluia. Benedictus es, Domine, Deus patrum nostrorum,
et laudabilis in saecula.]
( c ) G I O V A N N I P I E R L U I G I Credo
D A P A L E S T R I N A (1525-1594)
( S I X - P A R T CHORUS)
[[Credo in Unum Deum.] Patrem omnipotentem, factorem
caeli et terrae, visibilium omnium, et invisibilium.
Et in unum Dominum Jesum Christum, Filium Dei
unigenitum. Et ex Patre natum ante omnia saecula. Deum
de Deo, lumen de lumine. Deum verum de Deo vero.
Genitum, non factum, consubstantialem Patri: per quern
omnia facta sunt. Qui propter nos homines, et propter
nostram salutem descendit de caelis. Et incarnatus est de
Spiritu Sancto ex Maria Virgine: Et homo factus est.
(FOUR-PART CHORUS)
Crucifixus etiam pro nobis: sub Pontio Pilato passus et
sepultus est. Et resurrexit tertia die, secundum Scripturas.
Et ascendit in caelum: sedet ad dexteram Patris.
(FOUR-PART CHORUS)
Et iterum venturus est cum gloria, judicare vivos et
mortuos: cuius regni non erit finis. Et in Spiritum Sanctum,
Dominum, et vivificantem: qui ex Patre Filioque
procedit. Qui cum Patre et Filio simul adoratur, et conglorificatur:
qui locutus est per Prophetas.
( S I X - P A R T CHORUS)
Et unam sanctam catholicam et apostolicam Ecclesiam.
Confiteor unum baptisma in remissionem peccatorum.
Et exspecto resurrectionem mortuorum. Et vitam venturi
saeculi. Amen.
PALESTRINA, COMPLETE W O R K S , ED. CASIMIRI, V . I

Palestrina remains, to the layman, the best known of all composers of the Catholic mass. This Credo is taken from the fourth edition (1591) of his first book of masses, originally published in 1554. The mass, entitled Sine Nomine, may be based on a secular tune, so far unidentified, in defiance of the rules laid down by the Council of Trent. Highly polyphonic in structure, it nevertheless defers to the desire of the Church that the words be made as clear as possible by homophonic treatment""as at "Et in Unum Dominum," "Et ex Patre natum" and "Et incarnatus est." There are six vocal parts, producing an effect of extraordinary richness.
Offertory
[Benedictus sit Deus Pater, unigenitusque Dei Filius, Sanctus
quoque Spiritus: quia fecit nobiscum misericordiam
suam.]
( D ) ANDREA GABRIELI (c. 1510-1586) Sanctus
Sanctus, Dominus Deus Sabaoth: Pleni sunt caeli et terra
gloria tua. Hosanna in excelsis. Benedictus qui venit in
nomine Domini. Hosanna in excelsis.
I. CLASSICI MUSICALI ITALIANI, ED. D'ALESSI, V. 5
Gabrieli was born in Venice and was singer and organist at St. Mark's. The influence of conditions there, so favorable, with its two organs, to experiments in antiphonal singing and divided choirs, is plainly seen in this Sanctus, divided into three separate choirs, which unite with remarkable effect at the words "Pleni sunt caeli" and again at "Hosanna."
( E ) JACOB HANDL(1550-1591) Agnus Dei
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi: miserere nobis.
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi: dona nobis pacem.
DENKMALER DER TONKUNST IN OESTERREICH, V . 42
Little is known of this composer, whose name is sometimes spelled Hahnel (Jacobus Gallus). He was born in Krain, Austria, became in 1579 Kapellmeister to the bishop of Olmütz and later cantor in the church of St. Johann am Ufer in Prague, where he died. His four books of masses were printed in Prague in 1580. This Agnus Dei forms part of a mass entitled "Elisabethae impletum est tempus." It is for two choirs which are used antiphonally to some extent.
INTERMISSION
II
JACOB HANDL Mirabile mysterium
Mirabile mysterium, declarator hodie, innovantur naturae,
Deus homo factus est, id, quod fuit, permansit, et quod
non erat, assumpsit, non commixtionem passus, neque
divisionem.
DENKMALER DER T O N K U N S T I N OESTERREICH, V . 6
This five-part motet is found in a collection of Latin motets for the church year, the Opus Musicum, the first part of which was published in Prague in 1586. It exhibits a chromaticism extraordinary for the time, and obviously used for expressive purposes, as for example to underline the "mirabile mysterium" of the opening phrase. Another picturesque detail occurs at the words "Deus homo factus est" where each voice falls a whole octave from the word "Deus" to "homo" to describe the descent from Heaven of the Godhead.
CARLO GESUALDO(1560-1613) Itene ò miei sospiri
Itene ò miei sospiri
Precipitate il volo
A Lei che m'e cagion d'aspri martiri
Ditele per pieta del mio gran duolo
C'hormai ella mi sia
Come bella ancor pia
Che Tamaro mio pianto
Cangero lieto amoroso canto.
L'ARTE MUSICALE IN ITALIA, ED. TORCHI, V . IV
The turbulent career of Don Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa, is wellknown; particularly the story of his hiring assassins to kill his wife and her lover. Toward the end of his life, having remarried happily, he was over- I come with remorse and had himself scourged three times a day by a devoted band of followers. Living for the latter part of his life in the luxurious court of the Este at Ferrara, he was a lutenist, singer and composer of madrigals which were, i f anything, beyond the most modern tendencies of the day. He is particularly daring in his use of chromatics to express anguish, as at the words "del mio gran duolo, , and "sospiri" where the actual word is broken in two to express the sighing of the text. This madrigal was published at Genoa in the year of his death.
WILLIAM BYRD Two instrumental fantasies
COLLECTED W O R K S , ED. FELLOWES, V . 17
The English Fancy or Fantasie flourished about 1550 for slightly over one hundred years. Originally such compositions were played by "consorts of viols" and were an early manifestation of chamber music; an excellent medium for intelligent amateurs, who were apparently rife in Elizabethan England. Most of the famous madrigal composers wrote Fantasies for viols as a matter of course; Byrd's compositions in this field are for three, four, five or six instruments. The first of those played this evening, for quintet, starts with a short prelude in which the instruments enter by imitation: at a change of meter the Fantasie proper begins: it is based on a short four measure phrase, which is answered by one of two measures, and this phrase, with its answer, forms the basis for the entire composition, being repeated, with slight variations, twenty-two times usually in a low voice. Monotony is very cleverly avoided by variation of the motif. The second Fantasie, in six parts, follows a different procedure, developing several different phrases in turn, with some astonishing freedom of rhythm (the different viols sometimes playing simultaneously in different meters) and introducing as a climax to the first part a fragment of the gay old English tune "Greensleeves": the theme of the final part, in an almost-minuetlike rhythm, suggests another highly popular tune, "Walsingham."
ORLANDO DI LASSO Lagrime di SanPietro.
(15 3 0/2-1594)
Ogni occhio del signor lingua veloce,
Parea che fuss' et ogni occhio de suoi
Orecchia intent' ad ascoltar sua voce.
"Piu fieri," parea dir, "son gli occhi tuoi
De l'empie man che mi poranno in croce,
Ne sento colpo alcun che si m'annoi,
Di tanti ch'el reo stuol in me ne scocca,
Quant il colpo ch'uscio della tua bocca."
Ah quanti gia felici in giovanezza,
Reco l'indugio tuo lunghi tormenti,
Che se inanzi al venir de la vecchiezza
Sciolti fusser del mondo, più contenti
Morti sariam, poiche non ha fermezza
Stato alcun che si temi o si paventi,
Ond' io vita a ragion di te mi doglio,
Che stessi meco e stai piu che non voglio.
DAS CHORWERKE, E D . BLUME V . 34, 38
These two spiritual madrigals are taken from a cycle of twenty, based on the verses of an Italian poet, Luigi Tansillo. Lasso set them in the very last year of his life and they were published in 1595, after his death. They form a striking contrast to some of his earlier work which is frankly Rabelaisian. But Lasso was a man of great versatility; completely at home in light-hearted music and unparalleled in his ability to suggest perturbation of spirit""as at the words "che si temi o si paventi" in the second madrigal. These compositions are for seven voices, and the low range and thick texture produce an unusual gravity very expressive of the general character of the poems. Alfred Einstein calls the work "an enormous c y c l e . . . an old man's work, comparable in its artistry, its dimensions, its asceticism only to the Musical Offering and the Art of Fugue."

CLAUDE LE JEUNE(c. 153?-1600) L'aspre fureur
L'aspre fureur de mon mal vehement
Si hors de moy m'estrange et me retire
Que j e ne scay si c'est moy qui soupire,
Ny en quel point m'a reduit mon tourment.
Suis-je mort? non, j ' a y trop de sentiment,
Je sen trop bien mon douloureux martire;
Suis-je vivant? las! j e ne le puis dire,
Estant prive d'ame et d'entendement.
LES MAITRES MUSICIENS DE LA RENAISSANCE FRANtJAISE,
ED. EXPERT, V. l6
Le Jeune is said to have been born at Valenciennes, to have spent his life at Paris, and to have become a Huguenot. He set Calvinist psalms in the Huguenot manner. He was also capable of writing chansons of great delicacy and charm, frequently very flexible in rhythm (sometimes he omitted bar-lines in his attempt to follow the metrical structure of the poems). This particular chanson comes from a volume of Melanges printed in 1585, possibly reprinted from an earlier edition of 1582.

ORLANDO DI LASSO Im lant zu Wirtenberg
Im lant zu Wirtenberg, so gut
Im herbst mon drauben schneiden thut,
Den wein thut man ausspressen.
Da was ein esel, hoch von mut,
Der suff sich vol v om weine gut
Und hielt sich gar vermessen.
Da das der Herr des weins ersach
Beim richter fiert er grosse klag
Wolt haben zalt sein weine.
Der richter fragt on als gefer,
Ob auch der esel gsessen wer;
Der ander sprach: Herr, neine.
Der richter lacht und sprach: mein mon,
Der esel dir nichts zalen kon,
Das kanstu selbst ermessen;
Dann sein Herr gibt im gar kein Ion
So hat er nur ein ehrtrunck thon,
Dieweil er nit ist gsessen.
SAMTLICHE WERKE, V. 18, ED. SANDBERGER
Lasso's first book of compositions to German words, from which this j o l ly song is taken, did not appear until 1567. He had grown up speaking French, and his travels in Italy had given him a command of Italian; he had written Italian madrigals from 1555, but he probably did not learn German until he entered the service of Duke Albert of Bavaria in 1556. It was to Duke Albert's son that he dedicated this first book of German songs, in which religious pieces and songs in praise of wine live peacefully side by side. Lasso's editor thinks that he discovered this anecdote in a chronicle of 1560 and turned it himself into verse. There are plenty of humorous musical touches, as on the words "der suff sich v o l , " "grosse" and "lacht"; throughout Lassus, by homophonic treatment, takes care that his listeners shall hear the words and get the point of the story.

ANDREA GABRIELI Battaglia
PART I: Instruments
PART II: Chorus and Instruments
Alia battaglia, ò forti cavalieri,
Venite tutti meco arditamente,
E de nemici nostri audaci, e fieri,
Domiam col ferro l'orgoliosa mente,
Su trombette suonate:
Fan falifali fan fon fan.
E voi guerrieri ferite,
E amazzate la vil gente:
Che vinta con suo danno,
E nostra gloria, a noi
Lascia fuggendo la vittoria.
I MONUMENTI DELL' ARTE ISTITUZIONI MUSICALE
ITALIANA , ED. BENVENUTI, V. I
On the title-page of Gabrieli's Dialoghi musicali, which appeared in 1592 at Venice, special notice is given to the two battles in eight voices, which form a delightful feature of the book. The first of these battles is for instruments only, the second for voices probably accompanied by instruments. Each battle is divided into two sections, the first of which shows the gradual coming

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Soloists
VIOLA DA BRACCIO: Paul Hindemith
James Yannatos
VIOLA DA GAMBA:
(TENOR) Lee Howard, Eckhart Richter
(BASS) Charlotte Durkee
Hans Schmettau
TRUMPET: John Glasel
ENGLISH HORN: Alan Williams
BASSOON: Irwin Michnick
TROMBONE: Arthur Kelly
William Skelton
Leonard Sperry
Richard Bowen Stark
John Leonard Strauss
John Swing
William Francis Toole, Jr.
Merl W. Vought
Glenn Flournoy Welsh
Yehudi Wyner
James Yannatos
RECORDERS:
(SOP) William Skelton
(ALTO) Mary Lou Skelton
(TENOR) Robert Barker
(BASS) John Swing
SHAWM: Chester Krulak
KRUMMHORN: Keith Wilson
LUTE: Jack Pidgeon
DRUMS: Robert Cecil
Collegium Staff
General Management: Donald Loach.
Program planning: David Brown, Thomas Goodman, Lee Howard, Eckhart Richter.
Preparation of instruments: Lee Howard.
Preparation of Music: Easley Blackwood, Charlotte Durkee, Lee Howard.
Editors of the weekly bulletin, "Commemoratio brevis":
Ned Chapman, George Sinclair.
Title page arranged by Gillett Griffin.

WNYC archives id: 73931