NUM 1130

Title: EBORAE MVSICA

Artists: Coro Polifónico Eborae Musica, Pedro Teixeira – conductor

Composers: Frei Manuel Cardoso, Francisco Martins~

The Philippine Mass is a curious, even paradigmatic example of the compositional powers of one of the great names of Portuguese polyphony of the 16th and 17th centuries. Born in Fronteira, in southern Portugal, in early December 1566, Friar Manuel Cardoso was one of the most prolific Portuguese Renaissance composers; he was fortunate, it can be said, to see many of his works published during the era, by Lourenço Craesbeck’s Lisbon printing house. A considerable body of work has thus survived to the present day: a volume of Magnificats, three volumes of masses, and a volume of various works (motets for four to six voices, and two masses, including one for four voices for burial services: responsories and lamentations). The Philippine Mass is to be found at the end of the third book of masses published in 1636. It is based on a melodic theme present throughout the work, with the peculiarity that it features the following words: Philippus Quartus. The mass was written during the reign of Philip IV of Spain (who was, at the same time, Philip III of Portugal), having been commissioned by Matheo Romeus (known as El Capitán), master of the royal chapel of Philip IV, while Cardoso was on a visit to the Madrid court for family reasons.

Cardoso’s brief was to compose a mass for four voices, with a theme to be repeated after an interval of no longer than a single bar, to be sung with vehemence by all the voices in the shortest possible period of time. In the event, he fulfilled Romeus’s request in good time, with the mastery which, inexorably, we now attribute to him; he resisted playing the academic power games which could derive from such a restrictive brief: on the contrary, all sections of the mass breathe lightness, particularly the quieter sections such as the two Agnus Deis and the solistic and genial Benedictus.

To regard the Philippine Mass as a mere device for praising Philip IV would be, at the very least, to err historically. If it is true that the phrase repeatedly heard is Philipus Quartus, Friar Manuel Cardoso reserves for the Agnus Dei II, for five voices, an enigma and basically a departure from Romeus’s wishes. There are twenty bars for four voices singing the liturgical text, while the appearance of a Latin phrase at the top of the sheet indicates that it is to be sung by the fifth voice: Ostende nobis patrem, Philippe, qui videt me, videt et patrem. As a rule, hidden voices in Renaissance music were announced in musical rather than literary terms; besides this, the entrance of this hidden voice is not marked in the composition, which reveals the fact that the musical theme of the fifth voice was that of the mass: only the text was different. The name of Philippus Quartus disappears and, replacing it, Cardoso uses this Latin phrase, containing, it is believed, an enigma or private thought. Taken from the Gospel of St John, the phrase chosen is highly charged with historical meaning considering the circumstances of the era. These words were actually proffered in a celebrated sermon preached in Évora by Father Luís Álvares in 1583 in the presence of King Philip II himself (‘Philip, whosoever sees me, sees my Father’). ‘They were Christ’s words, but the allusion damaged the cause of those who supported the right to representation, violated, yet alive in the most serene person of Senhora Dona Catherine, the then Duchess of Braganza’, records Father António Vieira in a sermon of 1697.

With Portugal still under the Castilian yoke, Friar Cardoso again took up the celebrated phrase with the double meaning 53 years later, in 1636, this time adding the imperative: ‘show us the Father’, as if proclaiming the right of the Braganza male line to the throne, passed down through the Infante Dom Duarte, the son of Dom Manuel, to the Duke of Braganza, Dom John, who was well-known as a friend of Cardoso.

The four voices have now become five, with the musical resolution of the hidden voice, a common compositional practice during the era, of which the work of Friar Manuel Cardoso provides a singular example in Portugal; while this piece shows evidence of normal Renaissance practice, the power of composition demonstrated goes beyond mere music, reaching much greater heights. We may venture that Cardoso, while unfailingly keeping to his brief, dared at the end of the mass to demonstrate his patriotic support for the rightful heir to the throne, Dom John, who four years later became king of Portugal.

The Philippine Mass was clearly not meant to be sung in church; the circumstances of its origin and the constant presence of a non-liturgical phrase are proof of this. However, this does by no means detract from its originality and inherent artistic interest. This is a work of overriding relevance not only in musical terms but also, as we have seen, in historical and social terms. To pass it over in selecting recordings for this collection was therefore unthinkable.

Francisco Martins, who was born in Évora, was less fortunate than Friar Cardoso as far as receiving royal backing for the publication of his musical works is concerned. In fact, João Lourenço Rebelo was the last of the great Portuguese polyphonists to see his works published, and following the withdrawal of the previously generous royal patronage covering the huge costs of publication of music works, those of Francisco Martins had to wait centuries for publication: in recent years they have been transcribed and published. With the exception of Adjuva nos, a motet for Ash Wednesday, all the other pieces in this collection are Holy Week responsories –  works of surprising beauty.

Diogo Dias Melgaz was the last of the great Évora Cathedral polyphonists. Born in the town of Cuba in 1638, he joined the Évora Cathedral Boys’ College at the tender age of nine. Melgaz distances himself from his predecessors by his use of a musical language with a strongly harmonic tendency, while in most pieces he does not abandon the melodism inherent to polyphony labelled “classical”. Functional harmonic (and consequently well-defined) progressions, mostly in consonance with the sense of the text, the regular use of dominant seventh chords, and the frequent presence of chromatic developments align Melgaz – dare we say it – with embryonic Baroque tendencies and distance him from the usual patterns of Renaissance music.

Pedro Teixeira

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