Asperges me (a5) - Cristóbal de Morales

Performed live as part of the London International Early Music Festival Young Ensemble Competition Final in November 2020.
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Christóbal de Morales (c.1500-1553) is widely considered to be the first international Spanish composer; the greatest before Tomás Luis de Victoria (c.1548-1611). He spent at least ten years in the employ of the Vatican, helped by the preference for Spanish singers among the Spanish popes. His music was incredibly forward-thinking, with rhythm complexity and polyrhythmic passages not dissimilar to textures and techniques found in the then nascent Italian madrigal school.
The Asperges Me is a text commonly sung to plainsong at the beginning of Mass. Morales' setting for five voices keeps the rough shape of the plainsong as a decorated 'cantus firmus' (fixed song) in the first soprano, supported by complex, imitative polyphony in the lower four parts.
In his later life, Morales returned to a previous place of work in Spain, Toledo, as 'maestro de capilla' in mid-1553. He died only a few months later. The musicologist Michael Noone recovered this Asperges Me a5 along with 19 other 'unica' (unique) works by Morales from the Toledo manuscripts (particularly Toledo 25) as recently as 2002.
For many centuries, few scholars were permitted to work in the archives. Much is owed to Michael Noone for his scholarship and reconstruction which brought this music back to life.
Score:
www.uma.es/vic...
Translation:
Thou shalt purge me, O God, with hyssop and I shall be clean: thou shalt wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Have mercy upon me, O God, after thy great goodness.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Sopranos: Fiona Fraser, Caroline Halls
Alto: Elisabeth Paul
Tenor: Oscar Golden-Lee
Baritone: Humphrey Thompson
Director: Toby Ward
Ensemble Pro Victoria
www.ensembleprovictoria.com