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office at (202) 842-6450 or circle@nga.gov for more information.

The Seventy-second Season of

The William Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot Belin

Concerts

National Gallery ofArt

3,006th Concert

Carmina

Vera Kochanowsky, artistic director

Hubert Beckwith, director

June 12, 2014

Thursday, 12:10 pm

West Building, West Garden Court

Admissionfree
Program

“The Cradle of Counterpoint”

Josquin Desprez (c. 1450-1521)

Descendi in ortum meum

Nunc dimittis servum tuum, Domine (Attributed to Josquin)

Jean Maillard (fl. 1525-1572)

Salve Regina

Guillaume Dufay (c. 1397-1474)

Gloria

Antoine Brumel (c. 1460-c. 1512)

Sicut lilium

Loyset Compere (c. 1445-1518)

Chanter ne puis

Pierre de la Rue (c. 1452-1518)

Tous les regretz

Josquin

Raises moy a 4

Raises moy a 6

Brumel

Ave ancilla Trinitatis

Ave Maria

Jean Mouton (c. 1459-1522)

Ave Maria virgo serena

Josquin

Deploration sur la morte d’Ockeghem
Members ofCarolina participating in today’s concert are:

DeeDee Brinkema 

Ron Boucher

Shai Bronshtein

Joshua Cumby 

Michael Donaldson 

Rocky Ebener 

Barbara Hermanson

Mary Hodapp 

Steven Alan Honley

Gregory Hutton

Lani Jacobson

Richard Jacobson

Thomas Kramer

Jody Lee

Carolee Pastorius 

Joseph Price

Stephen Roberts

Lucy Robertson 

John Schaettler 

Ben Wallis

Marjorie Coombs Wellman

Bill Woessner

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The Musicians

CARMINA

Taking its name from a Latin word that can mean either poetry or song,

Carmina is a chamber choir devoted to exploring the diverse musical styles

ofthe Middle Ages through the early baroque. Praised by the Washington

Post and the Baltimore Sun for its “gorgeous tonal balance,” Carmina won a

special grant for new and emerging artistic organizations from the Virginia

Commission for the Arts in 2002. A regular participant in the Washington 

Early Music Festival since 2004, the ensemble was honored in 2013 with a

nomination for the Greater Washington Choral Excellence Ovation Award in

the specialty category of early music. Carmina’s two CDs, A Carmina Sampler

and The Son ofGetron are available through its website, www.carmina.org.

VERA KOCHANOWSKY

Founder and artistic director ofCarmina since its inception in 1997, Vera

Kochanowsky is a graduate ofthe Oberlin and New England conservatories 

ofmusic and holds the doctor ofmusical arts degree from Stanford University. Active as a harpsichord soloist, chamber musician, and private

teacher as well as a conductor, she has performed with the Bach Sinfonia,

the National Gallery ofArt Chamber Players, La Menestrandise, and the 

Washington Kantorei. In 2009 she brought Carmina to the National Gallery

to perform a concert ofseventeenth-century music in honor ofthe exhibition Judith Leyster, 1609-1660. She also founded and conducts Carmina’s

sister organization, the women’s early vocal ensemble Illuminare.

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HUBERT BECKWITH

A member ofCarmina since 1998, Hubert Beckwith became its assistant

director in 2007 and its director in 2012. After receiving his PhD in

musicology from the University of Maryland, he served as the first executive secretary ofthe American Handel Society. Since 1994 he has been

music director at Living Faith Lutheran Church in Rockville, Maryland. A

composer, arranger, and writer on music, Beckwith teaches music history

and literature at George Mason University and often prepares performing

editions for Carmina and Illuminare.

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Program Notes

From the mid-fifteenth to the mid-sixteenth centuries, composers from

the Low Countries and northern France dominated the European musical

scene. Their new style was complex and relied heavily on the interweaving

ofindependent voices in an imitative fashion. One ofthose Netherlandish

composers, Adrian Willaert, was a student ofJean Mouton who spent

most ofhis career in Italy and won the highly coveted position of maestro

di cappella at Saint Mark’s Cathedral in Venice. In the space oftwenty-five

years in that position, Willaert revitalized music in Italy and profoundly

influenced an entire generation ofItalian and other composers.

The spread of contrapuntal style beyond its northern European cradle

was accelerated by the international careers of composers like Willaert, 

but even more so by the invention ofthe printing press. In Venice, where

chant melodies were included in several incunabula (books “in the cradle,”

as items printed before 1500 were called), Ottaviano Petrucci refined typesetting to handle what was then modern notation. In 1501 he issued Harmonice musices odhecaton A (One Hundred Harmonized Chansons, vol. A)

with great success, and followed it less than a year later with Canti B numero

cinquante (Fifty Chansons, vol. B). These collections put the repertoire ofthe

Northern contrapuntal masters within reach of a wider circle ofmusicians.

Like Willaert, the Frenchman Josquin Desprez (often referred to simply

as Josquin) held important Italian posts, most notably in Milan, Rome, and

Ferrarra. Dubbed “the incomparable” by his contemporary Pierre Moulu

(c. 1484-c. 1550), Josquin brought the contrapuntal style to its height. Surprisingly, in his motet Descendi in ortum meum (I Descended into My Garden), 

Josquin sets the opening word Descendi with an ascending melodic figure, 

perhaps suggesting the uplifting sentiment, or the blooming ofthe flowers in

the garden as described in the text.

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Some scholars maintain that Nunc dimittis scrvum tuum (Now Let Thy

Servant Depart [in Peace]) is not by Josquin. Nonetheless, the motet well

represents many aspects ofJosquin’s style: the elegantly flowing vocal lines,

the use of paired imitation (passages for two voices which are later repeated 

by two different voices), and the creation of a new point ofimitation for each

line oftext. Unusual for Josquin is the return ofthe original theme and text

at the conclusion ofthe work.

Very little is known about the life of French composer Jean Maillard,

whose more than 150 compositions feature smooth, well-crafted counterpoint. The fact that a number of his works, including the Salve Regina (Hail,

Queen [of Heaven]) heard today, are found in a Spanish manuscript has 

led some scholars to believe that Maillard may have had a close connection

with Spain. The work relies heavily on pre-existing chant, alternating strictly

between chant and polyphonic counterpoint.

An independent work, not associated with any of Guillaume Dufay’s

complete mass cycles or paired mass movements, Gloria (Glory [to God in

the Highest]) probably dates from his tenure at the Papal Chapel in Rome

(1428-1433). Each section corresponds to a phrase ofthe text and begins 

with a brieffigure of polyphonic imitation, which then breaks down almost 

immediately into independent lines. An interesting feature ofthis piece is

the use offermatas (long notes held at the conductor’s discretion) in several

homophonic passages, most notably in the final Amen section. The work is

also highly distinctive because ofits overall low tessitura (distance between 

the lowest and highest sung notes), and the extremely wide range ofthe 

bass part.

A group ofsecular chansons in today’s program reveals the variety of

styles included in their source, Canti B numero cinquante. Compere’s Chanter

ne puis (No Longer to Sing) embodies a florid style, which he helped pioneer 

in the 1470s, in which the voices, coordinated by imitation, wind through

melismas so long and decorative they can overwhelm the poetry. Notable in

the present setting is the energetic opening, in which a wave offalling scale

motifs cascades through five tonal levels, and the equally surging acceleration

up toward the final cadence.

Tous les regretz (All the Regrets), written no earlier than 1493, displays

Pierre de la Rue’s skill at building melodies from repeated but ever-shifting

motifs. Here he embellishes a slow-moving tune that migrates from voice to

voice. The text comes from a lengthy poem lamenting the departure from 

France of Marguerite ofAustria, who was jilted at age eleven by the composer’s patron, Charles vm, after nine years’ betrothal.

Josquin’s Baises moy (Kiss Me) reflects the new style of chanson—

light, text-centered, repetitive, and appealing to popular taste. Its playful

air and extremely frivolous text belie learned underpinnings: two ofthe 

lines generate the other two through strict canon, each derived voice a

fourth higher than its original. The mourners mentioned in the poem 

include Josquin himself and a number of his contemporaries, including

Brumel, Compere, and Pierre de la Rue (“Pirchon”). Petrucci includes in

Canti B a second version ofthe work for six voices, attributed to Josquin 

in other sources, which adds yet another pair of canonic voices, making

three simultaneous canons in all—an impressive compositional feat.

Like many of his Franco-Netherlandish contemporaries, Antoine 

Brumel worked in Italy, first at the court of Ferrara, and later in service to

Charles vm of France during his occupation ofthat country. Sicut lilium

(Like the Lily), which appears in the Medici Codex, neatly illustrates how the 

Italian focus on text and melody transformed Brumel’s style, which in his 

early works was robust Northern polyphony. After a briefround ofimitation, 

the motet is governed not by the interplay oflines, but by a suave treble 

melody closely wedded to the accents and phrasing ofits text, a verse from 

the Song ofSolomon long used in devotion to the Virgin Mary. The same 

composer’s Ave Maria was composed during his short tenure (1498-1500)

at Notre Dame in Paris, where he served as master ofthe choirboys. It

continued to be performed after his departure, and came to inspire composers who succeeded him, including Claudin de Sermisy (c. 1490-1552) and 

Mouton. Brumel’s Ave ancilla Trinitatis, a more florid work, features at its

conclusion a canonic tour de force in which the middle voice is imitated one

beat later by the top voice in an exact canon at the fifth.

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In his five-voice motet Ave Maria, virgo serena (Hail Mary, Serene Virgin),

French composer Jean Mouton opens with Gabriel’s words ofsalutation

spoken to Mary at the Annunciation. Mouton draws rich sonorities from

the lower three voices, creating a musical serenity mirroring that ofthe 

Virgin. Mouton’s contemporaries greatly admired his work, writing about 

his smoothly flowing melodies, consistent rhythmic and tonal framework, 

and dissonances that are always properly prepared and resolved. The overall

effect is that ofrefined balance, an aesthetic ideal ofthe period.

Deploration sur la morte d’Ockeghem (Lament on the Death ofOckeghem)

is a poignant farewell from Josquin to his deceased elder colleague, Johannes

Ockeghem (d. 1497). Revered among composers ofhis day, Ockeghem was

also known as a fine teacher and generous mentor. Josquin interweaves a

French poem written by Jean Molinet (1433-1507) with the Latin lines from 

the introit from the Mass for the Dead. The mourners mentioned in the poem 

include Josquin himself and a number ofhis contemporaries, including 

Brumel and Compere. Only one voice, the second tenor, carries the chant line

associated with the introit. Josquin assigns extremely slow note values to this 

chant melody, which runs like a thread through the entire work, sustaining its

mood and underpinning its somber harmonies.

Program notes by Vera Kochanowsky and Hubert Beckwith

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