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Marian Music

Marian Music: Gregorian chant, polyphony and Spanish popular song

1. Marian Gregorian chants

Gregorian chant —monodic, modal, unaccompanied— is the original
voice of the Latin Church praying to Mary. The Liturgia
Horarum establishes four major Marian
antiphons that close Compline and rotate according to the
liturgical season. Official versions in the Antiphonale Romanum and
Liber Usualis.

1.1 Alma Redemptoris Mater (Advent — 2 February)

Attribution: Hermann Contractus (Reichenau,
1013-1054).

Latin text: > Alma Redemptoris Mater, quae
pervia caeli porta manes, et stella maris, succurre cadenti, surgere qui
curat, populo: tu quae genuisti, natura mirante, tuum sanctum Genitorem:
Virgo prius ac posterius, Gabrielis ab ore sumens illud Ave, peccatorum
miserere.

English: > Loving Mother of the Redeemer, who
remain the open gate of heaven and star of the sea, come to the aid of
your people who fall yet strive to rise again. Before the wonder of
heaven and earth you bore your holy Creator, and remain ever a Virgin.
Receive the greeting of the angel Gabriel and have mercy on sinners.

Season: First Vespers of the First Sunday of Advent →
the Presentation of the Lord (2 February).

Polyphonic settings of the text: Palestrina, Victoria (for 5 and 8 voices),
Dufay, Josquin.

1.2 Ave Regina Caelorum (Lent — the Triduum)

Latin text: > Ave, Regina caelorum, ave,
Domina Angelorum, salve radix, salve porta, ex qua mundo lux est orta.
Gaude, Virgo gloriosa, super omnes speciosa; vale, o valde decora, et
pro nobis Christum exora.

English: > Hail, Queen of heaven and Lady
of the angels; hail, root, hail, gate, through whom the Light came into the world.
Rejoice, glorious Virgin, lovely beyond all others; hail, gracious
maiden: pray to Christ for us.

Season: 2 February → Wednesday of Holy Week (in recent
use until Holy Thursday).

Antiphon of penitential recollection. More austere than the
Salve.

1.3 Regina Caeli (Eastertide)

Latin text: > Regina caeli, laetare,
alleluia: Quia quem meruisti portare, alleluia, Resurrexit, sicut dixit,
alleluia. Ora pro nobis Deum, alleluia.

English: > Queen of heaven, rejoice, alleluia;
for he whom you were worthy to bear, alleluia, has risen
as he said, alleluia. Pray for us to God, alleluia.

Season: the Easter Vigil → Pentecost. It replaces the
Angelus during Eastertide (Benedict XIV, Annus qui,
1749).

Mozart set it as an early work (Regina Coeli K.
276).

1.4 Salve Regina (Ordinary Time / per annum)

Attribution: traditionally to Hermann Contractus;
others attribute it to Pedro de Mezonzo (bishop of Compostela, †1003).

Latin text: > Salve, Regina, Mater
misericordiae, vita, dulcedo et spes nostra, salve. Ad te clamamus,
exsules filii Hevae. Ad te suspiramus, gementes et flentes in hac
lacrimarum valle. Eia ergo, advocata nostra, illos tuos misericordes
oculos ad nos converte; et Iesum, benedictum fructum ventris tui, nobis
post hoc exsilium ostende. O clemens, o pia, o dulcis Virgo
Maria.

English: see the «06_oraciones.md» block.

Season: the Monday after Pentecost → the Saturday before
the First Sunday of Advent.

It was sung by Saint Bernard of Clairvaux at Speyer (1146)
three times before the image; the Cistercians incorporated it into their
processions.

Polyphonic settings: Josquin, Victoria, Palestrina, Lassus, Charpentier,
Pergolesi, Schubert, Brahms, Liszt, Poulenc, Pärt.

1.5 Other Marian Gregorian pieces

  • Ave Maris Stella: hymn of Marian Vespers,
    attributed to the monk Paul the Deacon (8th c.).
  • Magnificat (the eight tones): Lk 1:46-55, sung
    each evening at Vespers.
  • Stabat Mater: sequence for the Friday of Sorrows,
    attributed to Jacopone da Todi (13th c.). Most famous setting: Pergolesi
    (1736).
  • Sub tuum praesidium: the oldest known Marian
    prayer in Christianity (Rylands Papyrus 470, c. 250).
  • Inviolata, Salve Sancta Parens, Tota Pulchra es:
    complementary Marian Gregorian repertoire.

2. Marian polyphony of the Renaissance and Baroque

2.1 The Spanish school

Cristóbal de Morales (Seville c. 1500 – Málaga
1553). Chapel master of Toledo Cathedral and a singer in the
Sistine Chapel. Magnificat on the eight tones (Venice
1545), Marian motets (Tota pulchra es, Ave Maria),
Missa Ave maris stella.

Francisco Guerrero (Seville 1528-1599). The most
Marian of the Spanish polyphonists. Master of Seville
Cathedral. Canciones y villanescas espirituales (Venice 1589)
with Marian pieces in Spanish. Two books of Magnificats (1563),
Ave Virgo sanctissima, Salve Regina, Surge propera
amica mea. He made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

Tomás Luis de Victoria (Ávila c. 1548 – Madrid
1611). The summit. Chaplain to the Empress María of Austria at the
Descalzas Reales. Marian works: – Magnificat on the eight tones
in a simple version and for double choir – Missa Ave maris stella
(1576), Missa Salve Regina (1592) – Missa Alma Redemptoris
Mater, Missa Ave Regina caelorum – Motets: O magnum
mysterium, Ave Maria (for 4 and 8 voices), Vere
languores, Sancta Maria succurre miseris, Salve
Regina for 5, 6 and 8 voices – Officium Defunctorum (1605) for
the Empress

Complete works edited by Felipe Pedrell (1902-1913) and reissued
by the CSIC under Higinio Anglés.

2.2 The Roman school

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525-1594).
Stabat Mater for double choir (8 voices), Missa Assumpta est
Maria (for 6), Missa de Beata Virgine, and abundant Marian
motets.

Orlando di Lasso (Flanders 1532 – Munich 1594).
Magnificat on the eight tones, Salve Regina for 6 voices,
Litaniae Lauretanae (one of the first cycles on the
Litany of Loreto).

2.3 The Baroque

  • Claudio Monteverdi — Vespro della Beata
    Vergine     (1610). A masterpiece of the early Baroque.
  • Antonio Vivaldi — Stabat Mater RV 621
    (1712).
  • Giovanni Battista Pergolesi — Stabat Mater
    (1736). His last work, written as he was dying. A fundamental
    piece.
  • Johann Sebastian Bach — Magnificat BWV 243
    in D major (1733).
  • Antonio Caldara — Stabat Mater (c.
    1725).
  • Marc-Antoine Charpentier — Salve Regina,
    Litanies de la Vierge.

3. Romantics and moderns

  • Gioachino Rossini — Stabat Mater (1841).
    Operatic.
  • Giuseppe Verdi — Laudi alla Vergine Maria
    in the Quattro pezzi sacri (1898), on Canto XXXIII of
    Dante’s Paradiso.
  • Antonín Dvořák — Stabat Mater op. 58
    (1877), after the death of his three children.
  • Anton Bruckner — Ave Maria WAB 6 (1861),
    Tota pulchra es WAB 46, Virga Jesse WAB 52.
  • Gabriel Fauré — Tantum ergo, Salve
    Regina     op. 67 no. 1, Ave Maria.
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart — Regina Coeli K.
    276, Litaniae Lauretanae K. 109 and K. 195, Sub tuum
    praesidium     K. 198.
  • Franz Schubert — Ellens dritter Gesang D.
    839 (1825). Originally NOT a liturgical Ave Maria: it is the
    prayer of Ellen Douglas, a character of Walter Scott. It has been sung with the
    Latin text of the Ave Maria since the 19th century.
  • Charles Gounod — Ave Maria (1853),
    a melodic overlay on the Prelude in C major of Bach’s
    Well-Tempered Clavier I.
  • Edward Elgar — Ave verum, Ave
    Maria    , Ave maris stella.
  • Arvo Pärt — Magnificat (1989), Stabat
    Mater     (1985), Salve Regina (2002). Tintinnabuli
    style.
  • Francis Poulenc — Litanies à la Vierge
    Noire     (1936), after his conversion at Rocamadour.

4.1 Ave Maria

Correct attribution: music by Cristóbal
Oudrid (Badajoz 1825 – Madrid 1877), from the zarzuela El
molinero de Subiza (premiered in Madrid on 21 December 1870,
libretto by Luis de Eguílaz). Lyrics adapted by Mariano Méndez
Vigo.

Military adoption: in 1872, the midshipmen of the
training frigate Asturias in Ferrol began to sing it after
Sunday Mass. In 1942 the Ministry of the Navy commissioned Camilo Pérez
Monllor to make the official harmonization. Today it is the anthem of the Spanish Navy.

Text: > Hail, Star of the seas, / of the
seas, Rainbow of eternal joy. / Hail, O Phoenix of beauty, / Mother
of Divine Love. / In your people’s sorrows,
your mercy gives consolation; / fervently may our cry rise to Heaven, /
to You, to You. / Hail, Mother, Hail, hail, Star of the seas, /
Mother of the seas.

4.2 The Salve of El Rocío and Marian sevillanas

Sevillanas to the Virgin of El Rocío (Almonte), the Macarena, La Esperanza
de Triana, the Virgin of La Cabeza. The well-known Dios te salve Rocío
was composed by Zita Soler Reyes.

4.3 Pilar

An a cappella song «de palo seco» (unaccompanied) that rises as the
images pass in Holy Week processions. Documented origin:
Franciscan couplets of the 16th-17th centuries. A mixed musical substrate:
echoes of the Islamic muezzin, Sephardic psalmody and liturgical
chant. The flamenco saeta dates from c. 1840.

4.4 Glädjeämnen / Goigs

A medieval strophic form (rooted in the Provençal troubadour dance):
refrain + heptasyllabic stanzas + envoi. Documented since the
Crónica de Ramon Muntaner (13th-14th c.). In Catalonia, Valencia,
Aragon and the Balearics, every parish, hermitage or shrine has its own
goigs to the local title. The Amics dels
Goigs Association has existed since 1854. The Goigs del Roser are the most
popular in Catalonia.

4.5 Notable regional hymns

  • Jota to the Virgin of El Pilar: «The Virgin of El Pilar says
    / that she does not want to be French, / that she wants to be captain /
    of the Aragonese troops». A popular couplet of the 19th century (Peninsular
    War, 1808).
  • Virolai (Montserrat): «Rosa d’abril, Morena de la
    serra». Text by Jacint Verdaguer (1880), music by Josep Rodoreda i
    Santigós, winner of the competition for the Millennium of Montserrat (20 February
    1880, among 68 compositions). It is sung daily at noon by the
    Escolania of Montserrat.
  • Asturian Salve marinera («Salve, Madre, en la
    tierra de Asturias»): a popular hymn to the Virgin of Covadonga.
  • Hymn to the Virgin of El Pilar («Bendita y alabada»):
    popular in Aragon.

4.6 The Lourdes hymn — «Ave, ave, ave María»

Original lyrics: Abbé Jean Gaignet (Vendée), 1873,
on the occasion of a pilgrimage to Lourdes. Melody taken from a hymn
by Louis Lambillotte (1842). Later extended versions reach up to 68
stanzas (a complete account of the 18 apparitions). Best-known Spanish
adaptation: the Jesuit Juan Iruarrízaga.

4.7 Hymn to Our Lady of Fátima — «Avé de Fátima»

Lyrics by Afonso Lopes Vieira, music by Rui
Coelho. It appeared in the Fátima pilgrim’s manual in 1926.
Its litanic structure (Ave, Ave, Ave Maria as the people’s
response) links it to the Lourdes hymn.

5. Chants for the sung Rosary

The sung Rosary was a deeply rooted tradition in Hispanic families and
confraternities. The practice has been established since the late 16th century
(Dominicans). The Rosary of the Dawn (Rosario de la Aurora)
—a sung procession at daybreak in Castilian and Andalusian towns— is a
typical expression.

Repertoire: – «Salve, Madre» (a refrain between
mysteries) – «Es María la blanca paloma» (Castile) – «Mira el rocío»
(Almonte) – «Dios te salve, María» sung (a popular syllabic melody) –
«Ave María de Lourdes» among dozens.

The Litany of Loreto is sung at the end with the Gregorian melody
of the simple Kyrie or with popular harmonizations.

6. Chants of the month of May

May becomes established as the «month of Mary» in the 18th century (the
Jesuit Annibale Dionisi, Il mese di Maggio, 1725) and spreads in
Spain in the 19th.

  • «Venid y vamos todos, con flores a porfía» —
    the best-known version by the Jesuit Nemesio Otaño
    (1880-1956). The signature chant of the offering of the
    flowers    .
  • «Oh Virgen del Pilar bella» — Aragon.
  • «Reina y Madre» — widespread in Spain.
  • «Salve Madre, en la tierra de Asturias» —
    Covadonga.
  • «Con flores a María» — a refrain common to several
    melodies.
  • «María, llena de gracia» — Kiko Argüello, the
    Neocatechumenal Way.

7. Public-domain resources

IMSLP scores (public domain)

  • imslp.org/wiki/Category:Victoria,_Tomás_Luis_de — complete works
  • Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater P. 77
  • Palestrina’s Alma Redemptoris Mater
  • 16 Magnificats by Victoria
  • Palatssångboken (engelska)

Recordings on the Internet Archive

  • Liber Usualis 1961, 1913 and 1949 — complete PDFs
  • 102 Cantos Gregorianos — the Monks of Silos
  • Facsimile of Victoria’s Missae, Magnificat, Motecta, Psalmi

Gregorian resources online

  • GregoBase — scanned Gregorian scores
    (gregobase.selapa.net)
  • Corpus Christi Watershed — Gregorian PDFs (ccwatershed.org)
  • Éditions de Solesmes (solesmes.com) — interpretive reference
  • gregorian-chant-hymns.com — hymns in square notation

Traditional Spanish songbooks

  • Fundación Joaquín Díaz (funjdiaz.net) — database of Castilian
    folklore
  • Higinio Anglés, Monumentos de la Música
    Española     (CSIC, from 1941)
  • Samuel Rubio, La polifonía clásica
    (El Escorial, 1956)
  • Miguel Manzano, Cancionero Leonés (3 vols,
    1988-1991)
  • Felipe Pedrell, Cancionero Musical Popular
    Español     (4 vols, 1918-1922)
  • Diego Catalán, Romancero Tradicional
    (Seminario Menéndez Pidal, CSIC)

Free choral and polyphonic music

  • ChoralWiki / CPDL (cpdl.org) — scores for several voices in the public
    domain

Källor

Academic and monastic – Liber Usualis,
Solesmes, 1961 edition – Graduale Romanum, Solesmes, 1974 –
Antiphonale Romanum, Solesmes – Higinio Anglés, La música
en la Corte de los Reyes Católicos, CSIC, 1941-1965 – Samuel Rubio,
La polifonía clásica, Biblioteca «La Ciudad de Dios», El
Escorial, 1956 – Samuel Rubio, Técnica, estilo y expresión de la
polifonía de Cristóbal de Morales, CSIC, 1969 – Felipe Pedrell,
Cancionero Musical Popular Español, Boileau, 1918-1922 – Miguel
Manzano, Cancionero Leonés, Diputación de León, 1988-1991

Verified digital resources – IMSLP, CPDL,
Internet Archive, Solesmes, GregoBase – Corpus Christi Watershed –
Fundación Joaquín Díaz – Abbey of Montserrat – Centro Andaluz de
Documentación del Flamenco – Palacio del Rosario – Lourdes

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