Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (c. 1525 – 1594) was
an Italian Renaissance composer of sacred music and the
best-known 16th-century representative of the Roman
School of musical composition. He had a long-lasting
influence on the development of church and secular
music in Europe, especially on the development of
counterpoint, and his work is considered as the
culmination of Renaissance polyphony.
Palestrina was born in the town of Palestrina, near
Rome, then part of the Papal States...(+)
Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (c. 1525 – 1594) was
an Italian Renaissance composer of sacred music and the
best-known 16th-century representative of the Roman
School of musical composition. He had a long-lasting
influence on the development of church and secular
music in Europe, especially on the development of
counterpoint, and his work is considered as the
culmination of Renaissance polyphony.
Palestrina was born in the town of Palestrina, near
Rome, then part of the Papal States. Documents suggest
that he first visited Rome in 1537, when he is listed
as a chorister at the Santa Maria Maggiore basilica. He
studied with Robin Mallapert and Firmin Lebel. He spent
most of his career in the city.
Palestrina left hundreds of compositions, including 105
masses, 68 offertories, at least 140 madrigals and more
than 300 motets. In addition, there are at least 72
hymns, 35 magnificats, 11 litanies, and four or five
sets of lamentations. The Gloria melody from
Palestrina's Magnificat Tertii Toni (1591) is widely
used today in the resurrection hymn tune, Victory (The
Strife Is O'er).
His attitude toward madrigals was somewhat enigmatic:
whereas in the preface to his collection of Canticum
canticorum (Song of Songs) motets (1584) he renounced
the setting of profane texts, only two years later he
was back in print with Book II of his secular madrigals
(some of these being among the finest compositions in
the medium). He published just two collections of
madrigals with profane texts, one in 1555 and another
in 1586. The other two collections were spiritual
madrigals, a genre beloved by the proponents of the
Counter-Reformation.
One of his most important works, the Missa Papae
Marcelli (Pope Marcellus Mass), has been historically
associated with erroneous information involving the
Council of Trent. According to this tale (which forms
the basis of Hans Pfitzner's opera Palestrina), it was
composed in order to persuade the Council of Trent that
a draconian ban on the polyphonic treatment of text in
sacred music (as opposed, that is, to a more directly
intelligible homophonic treatment) was unnecessary.
However, more recent scholarship shows that this mass
was in fact composed before the cardinals convened to
discuss the ban (possibly as much as 10 years before).
Historical data indicates that the Council of Trent, as
an official body, never actually banned any church
music and failed to make any ruling or official
statement on the subject. These stories originated from
the unofficial points-of-view of some Council attendees
who discussed their ideas with those not privy to the
Council's deliberations. Those opinions and rumors
have, over centuries, been transmuted into fictional
accounts, put into print, and often incorrectly taught
as historical fact. While Palestrina's compositional
motivations are not known, he may have been quite
conscious of the need for intelligible text; however,
this was not to conform with any doctrine of the
Counter-Reformation, because no such doctrine exists.
His characteristic style remained consistent from the
1560s until the end of his life. Roche's hypothesis
that Palestrina's seemingly dispassionate approach to
expressive or emotive texts could have resulted from
his having to produce many to order, or from a
deliberate decision that any intensity of expression
was unbecoming in church music, reflects modern
expectations about expressive freedom and
underestimates the extent to which the mood of
Palestrina's settings is adapted to the liturgical
occasions for which the texts were set, rather than the
line-by-line meaning of the text, and depends on the
distinctive characters of the church modes and
variations in vocal grouping for expressive effect.
Performing editions and recordings of Palestrina have
tended to favour his works in the more familiar modes
and standard (SATB) voicings, under-representing the
expressive variety of his settings.
Source: Wikipedia
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni_Pierluigi_da_Pa
lestrina).
Although originally composed for Chorus (SATB), I
created this Arrangement of the "Missa Sanctorum
meritis" for (2 Violins, Viola & Cello).
