Recent Researches in the Music of the Renaissance

Orlando di Lasso
The Complete Motets 10
The Four-Language Print for Four and Eight Voices (Munich, 1573)
Edited by Peter Bergquist
 

R 102	ISBN 0-89579-323-7	(1995) xxiv+125 pp.	$51.00
	ISBN 978-0-89579-323-2 (13-digit)

This volume departs from the usual practice of the series in including Lasso's settings of some vernacular texts in addition to motets. Adam Berg issued the so-called "Four-Language Print" in 1573; it contains six Latin motets, six German lieder, six French chansons, and six Italian madrigals, all for four voices, and one eight-voice dialogue in each of the four languages. This edition publishes the collection integrally for the first time. The four-voice compositions are concise, containing representative examples of Lasso's best work in each language. Five of the madrigals form a cycle drawn from Ariosto's Orlando Furioso. The eight-voice motet, "Unde revertimini," is said to have been performed with another text, "Unde recens reditus," at the French court. An attempted reconstruction of "Unde recens reditus" is an appendix to this volume, and it indicates strongly that "Unde revertimini" is the text to which the music was originally composed.

Music Sample

Contents
Quare tristis es, anima mea?
Quid estis pusillanimes
Domine, secundum actum meum
Fallax gratia
Eripe me de inimicis meis
Honorabile est inter omnes
Ein Esel und das Nüßbawmholtz
Annelein, du singst fein
Auß gutem grundt
Es thut sich als verkeren
Wem soll man jetzund trawen?
Audite nova!
Un jeune moine
Si du mal'heur vous avies cognoissance
Si ie suis brun
Quant un cordier cordant
Qui bien se mire
Sces tu dir l'ave
Di persona era tanto ben formata
Sotto duo negri e sottilissimi archi
Sotto quel sta, quasi fra due vallete
Bianca neve è il bel collo
Mostran le braccia sue misura giusta
Spesso in poveri alberghi
Unde revertimini
Nun grüß dich Gott, mein Mundlein rot
Di moi mon cueur
S'una fede amorosa

Music Publishers' Associtation Paul Revere Award, 1996.