Josquin Deprez acquired a sort of superstar status when, in 1502, the Duke
Ercole d’Este retained his services for his magnificent court at Ferrara for 200
ducats per year, the highest sum ever paid to a musician there. About that time
the duke specifically requested a musical setting of the 51st Psalm. Josquin
complied with one of his most monumental and original compositions.The motet is unusual, first of all, in that it sets the entire psalm, and, because
the 51st Psalm is such a long one, the organization of the composition elicited
additional oddities: its setting into three sections rather than one or two; its use
of the first line, Miserere mei, Deus, as a refrain that punctuates the end of each
verse; above all, the setting of that refrain to a nearly monotonic reciting tone,
whose pitch traverses the mode (scale) of the piece note by note downward in
the first section, upward in the second, and down five steps in the last, finally
coming to rest on the note A, the tonic of this immense construction.The monotone of this refrain does more than just outline the mode. With it
Josquin renews and reforms the technique of the cantus firmus, which meant
using a repeating fragment of Gregorian chant as the framework for a motet. In
Gregorian tradition, psalms did not have their own independent compositional
settings; rather, they were chanted to monotonic recitation tones, which varied
according to the antiphons that introduced them. Thus there is no traditional
melody for Psalm 51. So Josquin invents one that has the authentic stamp of a
psalm melody and at the same time can exhibit the tonal organization.As the refrain moves through the various tones of the mode the harmonic
environment must change to fit. These wondrously subtle tone qualities, along
with Josquin’s ever inventive use of the choir, now in two-voice pairs, now in
full imitation, make this incomparably expansive work one of the very richest
in the motet repertory.-Joseph P. Swain
Giovanni da Palestrina’s setting of the beginning of Psalm 42 was published in 1581 in
Venice. If Josquin’s motet is a monument, Palestrina’s is the divinely crafted pearl of
great price. The impression is one of effortless simplicity, and yet the contrapuntal
technique underlying it is truly prodigious. The first section is made of just three melodic
ideas, each one shorter than the last, which thus provide a subtle acceleration. The
second section shows similar economy, but perhaps more overt expression at its
conclusion when the soprano line suddenly proclaims the last idea in high notes
(lacrymae – “tears”) over a much lower, dissonant texture. Slowly, the other voices
are persuaded to imitate this descending, mournful motion as the sound dies away.-Joseph P. Swain
By the time of Johann Sebastian Bach, motet composition was decidedly old-fashioned.
But antique styles interested Bach intensely, particularly as objects for study, so his
corpus of six works oriented exclusively for choir in the great motet tradition should not
surprise us unduly. Lobet den Herrn is the only one for four voices and its date of origin
is unknown; perhaps it is a youthful work. Even so Bach transforms the central motet
aesthetic and sound entirely with the musical language of the high Baroque, including the
typical rhythmic drive and modern harmony. This work quotes no Lutheran chorale, but
the lyrical central section (Denn seine Gnade) mimics the texture of one, much as Josquin
imitates Gregorian psalmody with the invention of his refrain.-Joseph P. Swain