76TH SEASON OF CONCERTS

OCTOBER 29, 2017 / NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART
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Program

Pomerium

Flemish Musical Mastery in the Age of Hieronymus Bosch 

Alexander Blachly, Director

Celebrating Bosch to Bloemaert: Early Netherlandish Drawings 

from the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam

OCTOBER 29, 2017 / 3:30

WEST BUILDING, WEST GARDEN COURT

Orlande de Lassus (1532–1594)

O crux splendidior (6-voice motet)

Jacob Obrecht (c. 1450–1505)

Kyrie, Missa Caput (4-voice motet)

Josquin des Prez (c. 1450–1521)

Inviolata, integra et casta es, Maria 

(5-voice motet)

Guillaume DuFay (c. 1397–1474)

Gloria, Missa Ecce ancilla Domini 

(4-voice motet)

Alexander Agricola (c. 1450–1518)

Ave que sublimaris (3-voice motet)

Cipriano de Rore (c. 1515–1565)

Agimus tibi gratias (5-voice motet) 

Giaches de Wert (1535–1596)

Vox in Rama (5-voice motet)

Intermission

Henricus Isaac (c. 1450–1517)

Reple tuorum corda (3-voice motet)

Nicolas Gombert (c. 1495–c. 1560)

Sanctus, Missa Je suis deshéritée

(4-voice motet)

Josquin des Prez

Stabat mater (5-voice motet)

Loyset Compère (c. 1445–1518)

Agnus Dei, Missa L’homme armé 

(4-voice motet)

Orlande de Lassus

Cum essem parvulus (6-voice motet)

The Musicians

POMERIUM

Pomerium was founded by Alexander Blachly in New York in 1972 to perform music 

composed for the famous chapel choirs of the Renaissance. The name Pomerium—

medieval Latin for “garden” or “orchard”—derives from the title of a treatise by 

the fourteenth-century music theorist Marchettus of Padua, who explained that his 

Pomerium in arte musice mensurate contains the “flowers and fruits” of the art of music.

Widely known for its interpretations of DuFay, Ockeghem, Busnoys, Josquin, 

Lassus, and Palestrina, the fifteen-voice a cappella ensemble has performed for numerous international festivals, including the Festival di Musica Sacra Bressanone e Bolzano, 

the Tage Alter Musik Festival in Regensburg, Germany, the Flanders Festival Antwerp, 

and the Holland Festival Oude Muziek Utrecht.

ALEXANDER BLACHLY / DIRECTOR

Active in early music as both performer and scholar for more than forty years, 

Alexander Blachly earned his post-graduate degrees in musicology from Columbia 

University. He is a recipient of the Noah Greenberg Award given by the American 

Musicological Society to stimulate historically aware performances and the study 

of historical performing practices. Prior to assuming the choral music directorship 

at the University of Notre Dame in 1993, Blachly taught early music and directed 

collegia musica at Columbia University, Sarah Lawrence College, New York University, 

Rutgers University, and the University of Pennsylvania, where for eight years he 

directed the a cappella ensemble Ancient Voices. For fourteen years Blachly directed 

a summer workshop in Renaissance a cappella performance sponsored by the Syracuse 

Schola Cantorum; he has also been on the faculties of the Oberlin Baroque Performance Institute and the Amherst Early Music Festival. In addition to Pomerium, 

Blachly directs the Notre Dame Schola Musicorum and Festival Baroque Orchestra.

Soprano

Kristina Boerger

Martha Cluver

Sarah Hawkey

Chloe Holgate

Dominique Surh

Countertenor

Peter Gruett

Emerson Sieverts

Tenor

Neil Farrell

Patrick Fennig

Michael Steinberger

Christopher Preston Thompson

Baritone

Thomas McCargar

Bass

Peter Becker

Kurt-Owen Richards
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Program Notes

The images in the exhibition Bosch to Bloemaert: Early Netherlandish Drawings from 

the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, currently on view at the National 

Gallery of Art, initially impress us with their extraordinary precision of detail. Even 

when the subject is as charming as Hieronymus Bosch’s pen-and-ink drawing Owl’s 

Nest (c. 1505–1515), our first response is likely wonder at the detailed feathers 

on the central owl’s wing, rather than appreciation of the picture’s larger subject 

matter. The artist’s ability to transfer immediate details of our visual experience 

of the physical world to paper or canvas with such lifelike accuracy was not a talent 

unique to Bosch. On the contrary, it was a skill possessed by every Northern European 

artist of the Renaissance, including those featured in the current exhibition.

Precision of detail was also the prominent characteristic of the music by Netherlandish composers of the time. Their music did not take the world of nature as a 

starting point (there are no bird calls or barking dogs in Netherlandish music), but 

all of the composers in today’s program shared a mastery of minute details of counterpoint and voice-leading that impresses the listener with moment-by-moment 

obedience to the musical “laws of nature.” We will not hear in today’s pieces such 

features of medieval music as clashing dissonances or outré melodic leaps. Nor 

will we find the music arranged in the abstract rhythmic patterns that characterize 

polyphony from the thirteenth century. The default melody is flexible and 

supple, with phrases making an effect comparable to the roundness of a branch 

or the softness of human limbs defined by light and shadow. Such phrases invite 

shapely performance.

Hieronymus Bosch, The Owl’s Nest (detail), c. 1505/1515, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam

Significantly, the Netherlandish visual artists were not content simply to mirror 

nature. Often their drawings and paintings convey a moral message. In the Owl’s 

Nest, the message seems straightforward: the adult owl in the center of the drawing 

is teaching a young bird how to fly, and we almost unconsciously make the connection that for the old to teach the young is “natural,” something that adult humans 

also do for their children. In the famous Haywain Triptych (c. 1485), Bosch conveys 

a more complicated message. In the first place, this brightly colored painting seems 

only tangentially related to the real world. It bears, rather, the aspect of a dream or, 

in the right panel, a nightmare. This is Bosch’s allegory on the destructive nature of 

greed. The hay piled dangerously high on the cart represents wealth, which people 

from various walks of life try to pry loose with pitchforks, or try to clamber aboard 

with a ladder, or claw at with their hands. Ratlike monsters draw the cart toward 

Hell, which is depicted in the right panel, and away from Earthly Paradise in the left 

panel. The Pope and an emperor follow directly behind the haycart. They, too, have 

fallen prey to the hay’s lure. Other people are about to be run over by the cart’s 

wheels or are being crushed by those desperately grabbing what they can. Only the 

musicians atop the haystack and the monk drinking wine in the lower right corner 

seem at peace. The musicians may be captivated by sweet sounds saving them from 

greed, while the monk doesn’t need to worry because the nuns to his left are filling a 

sack with handfuls of hay.

One might imagine that vocal music, with its sung text, could convey a narrative 

message as complex as Bosch’s Haywain Triptych; but only in the last phase of the 

period in which Netherlandish musicians dominated Europe’s musical courts—

when Orlande de Lassus and Giaches de Wert were in their prime in the 1570s and 

1580s—had musical style evolved to the point where melodies and harmonies could 

be directly illustrative of ideas, whether narrative or psychological. The vivid evocation of emotional states by composers active in the later sixteenth century stands in 

marked contrast with all earlier polyphony (some pieces by Josquin excepted). Most 

early Netherlandish vocal music not only lacked the stylistic means to yoke musical 

expression to textual expression (a possibility that composers of the time rarely 

exhibited any interest), but their sacred polyphony focused almost exclusively on the 

setting of ritual texts, such as the Ordinary of the Mass: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, 

and Agnus Dei. Ritual words, whether of the Mass or Office, were heard innumerable 

times throughout the year and expressed only generalized sentiments, such as Christian 

dogma in the Credo, or prayers for mercy on joyful or sad occasions.
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But the Netherlandish composers had another way of anchoring even a liturgical 

text to a specific idea: by the use of a preexistent melody (with its associated words) 

as the foundation for any sort of vocal polyphony, whether Mass Ordinary, Marian 

antiphon, sacred motet with newly written words, or secular song. The sounding of 

the two texts at the same time created a commentary on one by the other, prompting 

nearly the same level of “interpretation” by the listener as that required by the viewer 

of moralizing Netherlandish visual works of art. In today’s program, three pieces 

employ preexistent foundation melodies with their own words in this way: the Gloria 

from DuFay’s Missa Ecce ancilla Domini (the foundation melody being two Marian 

antiphons: Ecce ancilla Domini for the Annunciation and Beata es, Maria for the 

Visitation); Josquin’s Stabat mater (the foundation melody being the rondeau tenor 

of Binchois’s Comme femme desconfortée); and the Agnus Dei from Compère’s Missa 

L’homme armé (the foundation melody being the song L’homme armé).

Even in works on today’s program that do not employ multiple sets of words 

sounding simultaneously—works which therefore require no bitextual “interpretation” by the listener—we still hear the primary defining feature of Netherlandish 

music from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries: the skillful manipulation of melodies interacting in a web of counterpoint to create richly inventive polyphony. Two 

of today’s pieces were originally composed as abstract instrumental studies without 

words, to which sacred words were added early in the sixteenth century: Isaac’s Reple 

tuorum corda (transmitted in most sources as the instrumental carmen La Morra) and 

Agricola’s Ave que sublimaris (a polyphonic study, wordless in most sources, based on 

the tenor of Binchois’s Comme femme desconfortée—the same melody that Josquin 

uses as foundation melody in his Stabat mater). In music by DuFay, the technique 

of pervading imitation, whereby all voices of a piece engage in singing the same 

melodic motifs at different times, often starting on a different pitch of the scale, 

was just emerging. It would soon vie with the related technique of canon, whereby 

more than one voice reads the same notated music, but each interprets it differently, 

following some verbal or other clue. Josquin was the first master of both canon and 

pervading imitation, the hallmarks of his works in all genres. Some notable earlier 

examples had appeared sporadically prior to him, but his consistent approach served 

as the model for serious composition throughout the remainder of the sixteenth 

century. Martin Luther marveled at Josquin’s ability to execute contrapuntal feats, 

and his assessment still rings true: “Josquin can make the notes do as he wishes, while 

other composers must do as the notes demand.”

The two works by Josquin in today’s program illustrate his unusual ability to create 

emotional effects with music composed to a slow-moving foundation melody. His 

Stabat mater, as just mentioned, has the tenor of Binchois’s chanson Comme femme 

desconfortée sounding throughout. The chanson’s words express a lover’s extreme pain 

at losing her lover: “I am like a woman in agony, who has no further hope in life and 

cannot ever be consoled, but wishes for death night and day.” Josquin’s setting thereby 

casts Mary as the forlorn lover, whose loss of her beloved son Jesus causes her unbearable pain. In Inviolata, integra et casta es, Maria, the foundation melody comes from the 

chant sequence Inviolata, integra et casta es, Maria. Josquin has it sounding in canon at 

the upper fifth, with the temporal distance between “dux” (leading voice) and “comes” 

(companion voice) shrinking in each successive large section of the work, from three 

breves (whole notes) in Part I, to two breves in Part II, to one breve in Part III. The 

listener, however, hardly notices this rigidly architectonic ground plan, finding his or 

her attention drawn instead to the beguiling melodic fragments chasing each other 

throughout the piece in the foreground. Thus, the canon remains largely inaudible 

though controlling the work’s harmonies, while the elaborate pervading imitation 

that attracts our attention in the foreground has so graceful and elegant a profile that 

it seems to unfold independently of the ground plan.

The prize for Netherlandish contrapuntal acrobatics in today’s program goes to 

Loyset Compère, whose entire L’homme armé Mass has the famous L’homme armé 

tune (the foundation melody of over forty polyphonic Masses during the Renaissance) sounding in the “wrong” mode on E (the Phrygian), rather than on F (modified Lydian with B-flat) or G (Mixolydian, modified by many composers by the 

addition of B-flat). In Agnus I the tune appears in canon at the half-step, with Final 

on E and Final on F. The verbal instruction for how the “comes” is to read the notes 

differently from the “dux” typically requires some thought to decipher, challenging 

the performers to transform the apparent meaning of the notation as it appears on 

the page. The instruction in Agnus I is “Canon in e la mi,” with the tune notated on 

F for the “dux.” The “comes” is therefore to read the tune a half-step lower, as if 

notated on E. In Agnus III the instruction is “Fuga unius temporis in epithono,” with 

the tune notated on D. Again the “comes” is to read the tune as if the Final is on E, 

but now a whole step higher than notated. Once the puzzle of the instructions has 

been solved, the musical effect of consonant canons at such close pitch proximity 

seems almost miraculous.

Netherlandish contrapuntal virtuosity stands as the musical counterpart to the 

Netherlandish visual artists’ virtuosity in the realm of drawing and painting. Especially in the period under investigation, the more closely we examine Northern art, 

whether visual or sonic, the more admirable and thought-provoking it appears.

Program notes by Alexander Blachly
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O crux splendidior 

O crux splendidior cunctis astris, hominibus

multum amabilis, sanctior universis, quae

sola fuisti digna portare talentum mundi.

Dulce lignum, dulces clavos, dulcia ferens

pondera, salva praesentem catervam

in tuis laudibus congregatam. Alleluja.

Kyrie eleison

Kyrie eleison. 

Christe eleison.

Kyrie eleison.

Inviolata, integra et casta es, Maria

Inviolata, integra et casta es, Maria,

que es effecta fulgida celi porta. 

O mater alma Christi carissima, 

suscipe pia laudum preconia. 

Nostra ut pura pectora sint et corpora

Que nunc flagitant devota corda et ora. 

Tua per precata dulcisona

Nobis concedas veniam per secula. 

O benigna, o regina, o Maria, 

Que sola inviolata permansisti. 

Gloria in excelsis Deo

Gloria in excelsis Deo. Et in terra pax 

hominibus bone voluntatis. Laudamus

te. Benedicimus te. Adoramus te. Glorificamus te. Gratias agimus tibi propter 

magnam gloriam tuam. Domine Deus, 

rex celestis, Deus Pater omnipotens. 

Domine Fili unigenite Jesu Christe. 

Domine Deus, Agnus Dei, Filius Patris. 

Qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis. 

Qui tollis peccata mundi, suscipe 

deprecationem nostram. Qui sedes ad 

dexteram Patris, miserere nobis. Quoniam 

Tu solus sanctus. Tu solus Dominus. Tu 

solus Altissimus, Jesu Christe. Cum Sancto 

Spiritu, in gloria Dei Patris. Amen.

O Cross more splendid

O cross more splendid than all the stars, much

beloved by men, holier than any other, which alone

was worthy to bear the treasure of the world.

Sweet wood, sweet nails, bearing a sweet weight,

save the present congregation gathered here for 

your praise. Alleluia.

Lord have mercy

Lord have mercy.

Christ have mercy.

Lord have mercy.

Inviolate, whole, and chaste are you, Mary 

Inviolate, whole, and chaste are you, Mary, 

the gleaming gate of heaven.

O dearest nurturing Mother of Christ, 

accept our pious prayers of praise.

That our hearts and bodies might be pure

our devout hearts and mouths now entreat.

By Your sweet-sounding prayers, 

grant us forgiveness forever. 

O blessed, O Queen, O Mary,

You alone have remained inviolate.

Glory be to God on high

Glory be to God on high, and on earth

peace to men of good will. We praise you. 

We bless you. We worship you. We glorify you. 

We give thanks to you for

your great glory. Lord God, heavenly

King, God the Father omnipotent.

O Lord, the only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. 

O Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father.

Who take away the sins of the world, have

mercy on us. Who take away the sins of the

world, hear our prayer. Who sit on the right

hand of the Father, have mercy on us. For you

only are holy. You only are the Lord. You only

are the most high, Jesus Christ. With the Holy

Spirit, in the glory of God the Father. Amen.

Tenor:

Ecce ancilla Domini. Fiat michi secundum

verbum tuum. Beata es Maria, que credidisti.

Perficientur in que dicta sunt tibi a Domino.

Alleluya.

Ave que sublimaris

Ave que sublimaris ad sidera notureris,

Virgo polo sumpta, 

Fac nobis propera cuncta dilue peccata,

Virgo super astra levata,

Regnans in celis potentibus 

Ore fideli eterna tribue polo

Conscendere sedem ac requiem

Prelii fessis in arce summo.

Agimus tibi gratias

Agimus tibi gratias, rex omnipotens

Deus, pro universis beneficiis tuis, qui

vivis et regnas per omnia saecula

saeculorum. Amen.

Vox in Rama

Vox in Rama audita est, ploratus et

ululatus multus, Rachel plorans filios

suos, et noluit consolari, quia non sunt.

Reple tuorum corda fidelium

Reple tuorum corda fidelium,

et tui amoris in eis ignem accende,

qui per diversitatem linguarum

cunctarum gentes in unitate

fidei congregasti. Alleluia.

Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus

Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus, Dominus

Sabaoth, pleni sunt celi et terra

gloria tua, Osanna in excelsis.

Benedictus qui venit in nomine

Domini. Osanna in excelsis.

Behold the handmaiden of the Lord. Be it done

unto me according to your word. Blessed are you,

Mary, who believed. What was said by the Lord

to you will be fulfilled. Alleluia.

Hail, who have risen

Hail, Virgin, known for having risen to

the stars, raised up in heaven:

quickly cause us to be cleansed of all sin,

Virgin, you who have been lifted above the stars,

reigning now at the gate in the mighty skies of

heaven eternal. Let the faithful gain

a seat, and grant to those weary in battle

peace in the highest citadel.

We give thanks to you

We give thanks to you, O God,

omnipotent King, for all your blessings;

you, who lives and reigns forever.

Amen.

A voice in Ramah

In Ramah a voice was heard, weeping and

loud lamentation: Rachel weeping for her children;

and she cannot be consoled, because they are no more.

Fill the hearts of your faithful

Fill the hearts of your faithful,

and light in them the fire of your love,

You, who despite the diversity of all

their languages, have brought together

people in unity of faith. Alleluia.

Holy, holy, holy

Holy, holy, holy, Lord God

of hosts, heaven and earth are full of

Your glory. Hosannah in the highest.

Blessed is He who comes in the name

of the Lord. Hosannah in the highest.
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Stabat mater dolorosa

Stabat mater dolorosa 

Juxta crucem lacrimosa

Dum pendebat Filius.

Cuius animam gementem,

Contristatam et dolentem,

Pertransivit gladius.

O quam tristis et afflicta

Fuit illa benedicta

Mater Unigeniti.

Que merebat et dolebat,

Et tremebat dum videbat

Nati penas incliti.

Quis est homo qui non fleret

Christi matrem si videret

In tanto supplicio?

Quis non posset contristari

Piam matrem contemplari

Dolentem cum Filio?

Pro peccatis sue gentis

Jesum vidit in tormentis

Et flagellis subditum.

Vidit suum dulcem natum

Morientem desolatum

Dum emisit spiritum.

Eya mater, fons amoris,

Me sentire vim doloris,

Fac ut tecum lugeam.

Fac ut ardeat cor meum

In amando Christum deum,

Ut sibi complaceam.

The sorrowing Mother stood

The sorrowing Mother stood

weeping near the cross

on which her Son hung.

Her weeping soul,

sorrowful and grieving,

a sword had pierced.

O how sad and afflicted

was that blessed one,

the Mother of the Only-Begotten.

She grieved and mourned

and trembled when she saw

the sufferings of her glorious Son.

Who is the man who would not weep

to see the Mother of Christ

in such agony?

Who would not be saddened

to contemplate the holy Mother

grieving for her Son?

For the sins of His people

she sees Jesus in torment,

subjected to a scourging.

She sees her sweet Son

dying desolate

as He gives up the spirit.

Oh, Mother, fount of love, make

me feel the strength of grief, 

that I may grieve with you.

Make my heart burn

with love for Christ the Lord,

that I may be pleasing to Him.

Virgo virginum preclara,

Jam michi non sis amara,

Fac me tecum plangere.

Fac ut portem Christi mortem

Passionis ejus sortem,

Et plagas recolere,

Fac me plagis vulnerari,

Cruce hac inebriari

Ob amorem filij.

Inflammatus et accensus,

Per te virgo sim defensus

In die iudicij.

Fac me cruce custodiri,

Morte Christi premuniri,

Confoveri gratia.

Quando corpus morietur,

Fac ut anime donetur

Paradisi gloria. Amen.

Tenor:

Comme femme desconfortée,

Sur toutes autres esgarée,

Quy n’ay jour de ma vie espoir,

D’en estre en nul temps consolée,

Mais en mon mal plus agravée

Desire la mort main et soir.

Agnus Dei

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi,

miserere nobis.

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi,

miserere nobis.

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi,

dona nobis pacem.

O Virgin, foremost of virgins,

be not bitter towards me:

make me weep with you.

Make me bear the death of Christ,

the fate of His suffering,

and recall His wounds.

Let me be hurt by [these] wounds,

be inebriated by this cross,

because of love of your Son.

Inflamed and incensed,

may I be defended by you, O Virgin,

on the Day of Judgment.

Cause me to be guarded by the cross,

to be made safe by the death of Christ,

to be blessed by grace.

When my body dies,

cause the glory of paradise

to be given to my soul. Amen.

I am like a woman in agony,

distraught above all others,

who has no further hope in life

and cannot ever be consoled,

but is ever more aggrieved by her misfortune

and wishes for death night and day.

Lamb of God

Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world,

have mercy on us.

Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world,

have mercy on us.

Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world,

grant us peace.
Tenor:

L’homme armé doibt on doubter,

On a fait par tout crier

Que chascun se viegne armer

D’un haubregon de fer.

Cum essem parvulus

Cum essem parvulus, loquebar ut parvulus, 

sapiebam ut parvulus, cogitabam ut 

parvulus, quando autem factus sum vir, 

evacuavi quae erant parvuli: videmus nunc 

per speculum in aenigmate, tunc autem 

facie ad faciem. Nunc cognosco ex parte, 

tunc autem cognoscam sicut et cognitus sum. 

Fides, Spes, Charitas: tria haec: major autem 

horum est Charitas. 

The man at arms ought one to fear;

One hears cried out everywhere

that all should arm themselves

with breastplates of iron.

When I was a child

When I was a child, I spoke like a child,

I knew like a child, I thought like a child.

But when I became a man, I put away

childish things: for now we see through

a mirror unclearly, but then

face to face. Now I know in part,

then I shall know even as I am known.

Faith, Hope, Charity, these three: but the

greatest of these is Charity.

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Board of Trustees, National Gallery of 

Art, Washington

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Cover Hendrick Goltzius, The Sense of 

Hearing from the Series the Five Senses 

(detail), c. 1595/1596, Museum Boijmans 

Van Beuningen, Rotterdam