Jean Richafort - Missa pro defunctis [Huelgas Ensemble]

Missa pro defunctis (Requiem in memoriam Josquin des Prez) Composer: Josquin des Prez (ca. 1450 - 1521) Performers: Huelgas Ensemble, dir. Paul Van Nevel Score editor: Andrew Fysh 0:00 Introitus 4:13 Kyrie 8:53 Graduale 15:18 Offertorium 23:47 Sanctus & Benedictus 27:13 Agnus Dei 30:48 Communio _____________________________________________________________ “The very summit of Richafort’s art is undoubtedly his six-part Requiem. The work is based on two cantus firmi, both of which refer to Josquin Desprez. It was probably written on the death of Josquin (1521) and is in every respect a tribute to the latter’s art. It is here that Richafort’s art is displayed in its highly auditory aspect and will reveal its deeper significance only on listening to the sum of the six calmly evolving sections and not by a merely visual concept of the written score. Assessments of Richafort’s artistic achievement that are based solely on a visual study of his music cannot possibly grasp its real significance and lead to the most flagrantly fallacious judgments. Hence the misguided observation of a well-known American musicologist when he calls ’such composers as Jean Richafort and Pierre de Manchicourt, solid if unexciting (sic!) members of what we will only half-jokingly call a “no-name“ (sic!) generation.’ (Allan W. Atlas, Renaissance Music, New York, 1998, p. 343). The intuitively unhurried tempo and the concomitant expansive breadth of line, the splendidly unstable balance between consonance and dissonance, the pliant Gregorian quality of the melodic lines all of these features are present in the Requiem. The first cantus firmus, which occurs in all the parts of the Requiem, is the Gregorian citation, ’Circumdederunt me gemitus mortis, dolores inferni circumdederunt me’. It is a citation that was also frequently used by Josquin Desprez. This cantus firmus is used in canon only in two tenor parts. In the majestically constructed Graduale and Offertorium Richafort makes additional use in the same tenor parts of the fragment ’C’est douleur sans pareille’ from Josquin’s chanson ’Faulte d’argent’. Around these two cantus firmi Richafort contrives a counterpoint that excels in a balanced building up of meditative melodic lines that are sparingly but effectively coloured by musica ficta and commixtio (the simultaneous use of more than one mode). The Requiem is a perfect example of what his predecessor Franchino Gaffurio described in his Theorica Musice of 1492 (Ch. V, 62): ’..But they say that the human voice, fit in itself and trained by art, is far more fit than the sounds of all instruments to soothe the ears, to calm the passions of the soul itself, to expel feebleness of the body, and to excite motions and to alternate impetuosity.’ “ ~Paul Van Nevel (translated by Derek Yeld) Source: CD booklet _____________________________________________________________ For education, promotion and entertainment purposes only. If you have any copyrights issue, please write to unpetitabreuvoir(at) and I will delete this video.