musica Dei donum
CD reviews
"A monk's life"
The Brabant Ensemble
Dir: Stephen Rice
rec: July 20 - 22, 2023, Oxford, Oxford Brookes University (Westminster Chapel of Harcourt Hill campus)
Hyperion - CDA68447 (© 2024) (72'21")
Liner-notes: E/D; lyrics - translations: E
Cover, track-list & booklet
Spotify
[in order of appearance]
[Entering the monastic life]
Orlandus LASSUS (1530/32-1594):
[Sponsa Dei] a 6;
Bernhard KLINGENSTEIN (1545/46-1614):
De vita religiosa a 4
[Vespers]
Christian ERBACH (c1570-1635):
Deus in adiutorium a 7;
Carolus ANDREAE (c1570-1627):
Magnificat super Si ignoras te a 6
[Eating and drinking in the monastery]
Cipriano DE RORE (1515/16-1565):
Agimus tibi gratias a 5;
Giovanni Giacomo GASTOLDI (c1553/54-1609):
[Wer wollt den Wein nit lieben?]
[Celebrating the first Mass]
Blasius AMON (c1560-1590):
Sacrificate sacrificium iustitiae a 6;
Orlandus LASSUS:
Missa super Veni in hortum meum a 5 &
Jacob REGNART (c1540-1599):
Os iusti a 5
[Becoming Abbot]
Jacob REINER (1555/60-1606):
Veni Creator Spiritus a 6;
Johannes NUCIUS (c1556-1620):
Vana salus hominis a 5
[Death and reception into heaven]
Jacobus CLEMENS NON PAPA (c1510/15-1555/56):
In te Domine speravi a 5;
Orlandus LASSUS:
[Quis rutilat Triadis] a 8;
Sebastian ERTEL (1550/60-1618):
Aeterno laudanda choro a 8
Sources:
Berg & Neuber, ed., Psalmorum selectorum ... Tomus primus, 1553;
Franciicum, tt haeredes Simonis Tini, ed., Orlandi Lassi, Adriani Havvil, Ac nonnullorum aliorum Musicorum Missae, quatuor, & quinque vocibus decantandae, 1588;
Blasius Amon, Sacrae cantiones, quas vulgo motetas vocant, 1590;
Johannes Nucius, Modulationes sacrae modis musicis, 1591;
Jacob Reiner, Liber motettarum sive Cantionum sacrarum sex vocum, 1603;
Bernhard Klingenstein, Liber primus sacrarum symphoniarum, 1607
Sebastian Ertel, Symphoniae sacrae, 1611
Hene Ashby, Kate Ashby, Eloise Irving, soprano;
Emma Ashby, Claire Eadington, contralto;
Christopher O'Gorman, Toby Ward, William Wright, tenor;
Grantley McDonald, David Stuart, bass
The Brabant Ensemble stands out for often bringing to the listener's attention music by composers that are not that well-known. Examples are Thomas Crecquillon, Antoine de Févin, Lupus Hellinck, Johannes Lupi and Jacquet de Mantua. Add to this recordings of music by composers who are rather well-known by name, but whose music is not mainstream, such as Jean Mouton, and one won't be surprised that many of its discs include a number of first recordings. That is the case with the disc under review as well.
It includes music by two masters of the 16th century that are very well-known: Orlandus Lassus and Jacobus Clemens non Papa. However, both have left such a large corpus of music that it is not hard to find pieces that are seldom, if ever, performed and are not available on disc. It seems that Lassus' Missa Veni in hortum meum has never been recorded before. However, the programme also includes music by composers even those who have a special interest in renaissance polyphony may not have heard of. That is no surprise as during the 16th century a large repertoire has been written for performance in many different places across Europe and in the New World, such as churches and cathedrals, chapels of palaces and monasteries. The latter brings us to the disc under review, which focuses on the music that was or may have been sung in monasteries in southern Germany in the late 16th century.
It was a time in which Germany was divided into two religious 'camps', in the wake of the Lutheran Reformation. As Barbara Eichner, in her liner-notes, puts it: "As the monasteries of the German-speaking countries emerged from the ravages of the Reformation, they found themselves in quite a different religious landscape. Gone were the days of absentee abbots who preferred hunting to chanting, or illiterate monks who feasted rather than fasted. In the wake of the Council of Trent, monks and nuns, friars and sisters, were expected to contribute to the religious regeneration of the Catholic Church, and to find a new sense of purpose for their cloistered existence. Music played an important part in this project, both as a tool of monastic discipline and as a source of spiritual joy."
If one looks at what is performed and recorded in the field of renaissance polyphony, it is mostly what was written by representatives of the Franco-Flemish school for churches and chapels in the southern Netherlands, France and Italy and at the courts of the Habsburg emperors (alongside the different repertoire at the Iberian peninsula and the New World). The music by German composers which was performed by monks during the Liturgy of the Hours is largely unknown. Among them are Bernhard Klingenstein, Carolus Andreae, Blasius Amon, Jacob Reiner and Sebastian Ertel - all composers who seldom or never figure in anthologies, let alone that entire discs are devoted to their oeuvre. The nice thing about this disc is that it is not a sequence of pieces by such composers in random order, but that the repertoire is presented in a context that helps to understand it. The programme is divided into a number of chapters, which together offer a picture of life in a monastery in southern Germany and Austria in the second half of the 16th century.
The first chapter is called "Entering the monastic life". It opens with a piece by Orlandus Lassus: Sponsa Dei. The text points out the central place of Mary: "Beauteous bride of God, mirror of God's chastity, eternal ornament of the stars, Virgin Mary: all hope in you, pray to you. (...) Make the monks of Neresheim never tire of their faith". This latter phrase indicates where this piece was sung: at the Benedictine abbey of Neresheim in Swabia, close to the border between today's Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg. It also sheds light on a wide-spread practice: the creation of contrafacta, pieces whose original texts have been replaced by others. The original text was Pacis amans, which was in praise of emperor Maximilian II on the occasion of his coronation in 1562. The second piece, De vita religiosa by Bernhard Klingenstein, describes the virtues of monastic life: "In the religious life man lives more purely, he falls [in sin] more rarely, he gets up more quickly (...)". Klingenstein worked for most of his life a Kapellmeister at Augsburg Cathedral. The largest source of his oeuvre is a book with 34 motets published in Munich in 1607.
The second chapter is devoted to one of the main parts of the Liturgy of the Hours: the Vespers, which took place in the late afternoon. It opens with the versicle Deus in adiutorium in a setting by Christian Erbach, who is best-known for his organ works; he worked as organist at Augsburg Cathedral. He is an example of a fairly well-known composer, whose vocal music is nearly completely ignored. The versicle is followed by a setting of the concluding part of Vespers, the Magnificat. The composer is Carolus Andreae, who was a monk at the Benedictine abbey at Irsee and was its abbot from 1610 until his death. His Magnificat is based on the motet Si ignoras te by Jacob Reiner, a composer whom we will meet later in the programme. As so many Magnificat settings, it has an alternatim structure. Andreae was influenced by the polychoral style in vogue in Venice; he composed an eight-part Te Deum, and in his Magnificat he frequently splits the six voices into a higher and a lower choir.
The third chapter is less serious, as it refers to the more secular enjoyments of monks, especially during Carnival. After a setting of a benediction said before the meal, Agimus tibi gratias by Cipriano de Rore, we hear a drinking song, Wer wollt den Wein nit lieben?, which is an apparently anonymous contrafact on the dance song Questa dolce sirena by the Italian Giovanni Giacomo Gastoldi.
The mass took a central place in the liturgy, and that is the subject of the fourth chapter. Here we come to the Missa super Veni in hortum meum by Orlandus Lassus, which he composed for performance at the court in Munich, where he was Kapellmeister, but found its way to monasteries as well, for instance St Emmeram in Regensburg and the monastery of Neresheim mentioned above. It is a parody mass, based on a motet by Lassus himself, a setting of a text from the Song of Songs. The Ordinary of the Mass is always the same: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus and Benedictus, Agnus Dei. In between Propers are sung, and these vary according to the day the mass is performed. In this case Stephen Rice has inserted a motet by Jacob Regnart as gradual. Os justi is a setting of verses from Psalm 36 (37). The text was was assigned to the celebrations of a Confessor and could be used for the celebrations on the feast of a local saint or some of the prominent saints of the church, such as St Benedict or St Augustine. Before the mass we hear a motet by Blasius Amon, a Franciscan, who lived in a monastery in Vienna. (The Huelgas Ensemble recently released a disc devoted to his oeuvre, which I hope to review in due course.) This motet points out the importance of the mass, especially the reception of bread and wine in the Eucharist.
Each monastery was headed by an abbot, who was elected by his brothers. "As Augustinian, Benedictine and Cistercian abbots held their office for life, their election was a turning point for their community, and therefore the assistance of the Holy Spirit was invoked to make a good choice" (booklet). Hence the inclusion of the motet Veni Creator Spiritus by Jacob Reiner, mentioned already above. He studied with Lassus and spent his entire life as music teacher and director at the abbey of Weingarten, without taking holy orders. Reiner set only the first two stanzas of the text. His motet is followed by Vana salus hominis by Johannes Nucius, who lived in monasteries in Silesia. The text enphasizes the importance of the help of God, expressed in the cantus firmus: "The Lord is my help". The text may be from the pen of the composer.
The last chapter is devoted to the inevitable end of human life, and therefore that of a monk: death. In most cases we don't know for sure when and where a piece was sung, but that is different with In te Domine speravi by Jacobus Clemens non Papa. "Abbot Gerwig Blarer of Weingarten died in August 1567, and his successor Johann Christoph Raittner noted in his diary: 'When Abbot Gerwig was buried on Sunday afternoon, everything was done in the traditional way, but at the grave In te Domine speravi was sung, as he had wished, with a mixed and mournful voice; I think the author was Clemens non Papa.'" The motet is part of a printed edition of 1553, dedicated to the abbot of Bronnbach. Next we return to Lassus, with another contrafactum: the original text of Quis rutilat Triadis? was Unde revertimini, which was in praise of his employer, Duke Albrecht V, and his wife. The new text is about Mary again: "Who shines first like gold after the godheads of the golden Trinity? After the glowing Trinity, the Virgin Mary sparkles."
The disc closes with a piece in honour of St Benedict: Aeterno laudanda choro by Sebastian Ertel (or Ertl). He was a Benedictine monk, who lived in several monasteries, lastly in the monastery of Garsten, near Steyr (Austria). "Let us sing with the eternal choir at your praiseworthy feast. O Father Benedict, all honour is due to you." The text includes images referring to antique mythology: " O happy victor, you are worthy of lofty Olympus."
The reader will have gathered that this disc is a substantial contribution to our knowledge of music life in the German speaking world of the late 16th century, but also that of monastic life in the Renaissance in general. Although on most occasions the monks may have sung plainchant, especially on important feastdays and special events they may have turned to polyphony. It is also interesting to hear how the material was used, for instance in the creation of contrafacts, when texts were adapted to local needs. This recording shows that there is still much to be discovered. Sebastian Ertel, to mention just one example, has left a substantial oeuvre, which - as far as I know - has never been explored. There seems every reason to do so.
Not only have we here a highly interesting musical documentation of a little-known part of renaissance polyphony, it is performed in excellent fashion by The Brabant Ensemble. I have reviewed several of its discs, and every time I was impressed by the quality of the performances. This is a top-class ensemble which shows a full command of legato, produces a transparent sound, but also does not forget to pay attention to those moments where the composer illustrates the text.
This disc is an indispensable addition to any collection of renaissance music.
Johan van Veen (© 2025)
Relevant links:
The Brabant Ensemble