Cappella Nova - Sacred Music for Mary Queen of Scots

ROBERT CARVER ? (1484/5 - after 1568)
MASS "CANTATE DOMINO" for six voices

1. Gloria - 4.46
2. Credo - 5.01
3. Sanctus - Benedictus - 10.39
4. Agnus Dei - 8.10

ANON.

5. DESCENDI IN HORTUM MEUM - 3.57

DAVID PEEBLES (fl.1530-76)

6. SI QUIS DILIGIT ME - 6.05
7. PSALM 107 - 3.13

JOHN BLACK (c.1520-87)

8. LYTILL BLAK - 1.50

JOHN ANGUS (fl.1562-95)

9. ALL MY BELIEF - 6.52

JOHN BLACK (c. 1520-87)

10. ANE LESSON UPONE THE FEIFTIE PSALME - 2.32

Report upone 'Quhan sall my sorifull siching slaik'
DAVID PEEBLES (fl.1530-76)

11. PSALM 124 - 2.48

JOHN ANGUS (fl.1562-95)

12. THE SONG OF SIMEON - 1.37

It was perhaps Mary's tragedy that she returned to Scotland from France at the time of the Reformation, and that the fanatic John Knox should be the uncompromising leader of the new religion. She did, however, still have many loyal supporters, not least among them the outspoken Catholic apologist Ninian Winzet. Mary's arrival at Leith on Tuesday 19 August 1561 was earlier than expected and accompanied by a thick fog, a fact that subsequently did not go unnoticed. She was installed at Holyrood, and that night was serenaded by a crowd of Edinburgh citizens singing psalms. A French eye-witness in Mary's train, Brantome, criticised its discordancy ("Hé, quelle musique!"), but I wonder if it was not as much the form of the music (ie psalms) that as a Catholic he found so unsympathetic. Mary, meanwhile, generously encouraged further performances.

On Sunday 24 August 1561 Mary attended her first Mass since her arrival in Scotland. This took place in the private chapel in Holyroodhouse, presumably with the musicians of the Chapel Royal in attendance. Knox had been proclaiming for several years now that the celebration of the Mass was idolatry, and this event naturally caused an uproar among the divided nobles of the Scottish court. There are conflicting accounts of what actually happened, but physical force was probably used: Mary's Protestant half-brother Lord James Stewart stood guard at the door (he later pusillanimously and erroneously said it was to prevent Scotsmen from entering), the French priest "could hardly lift the Host at the Elevation" (according to the English envoy Thomas Randolph), and in a letter dated 26 August from Randolph to the English diplomat Sir Nicholas Throckmorton "the rest were at Mr Knox sermound...the Earl of Cassillis was that Sunday at the preachynge, and the Monday at the Masse; it is said that since, he has repented it, and this ys but Twesdaye!"

The anonymous Mass Cantate Domino for six voices (1-4) is recorded in an incomplete set of part- books of about 1550, traditionally linked with Dunkeld Cathedral, but more likely originating in the collegiate chapel of Lincluden, Dumfriesshire. Much has had to be done to complete the music: the bass part is missing throughout and three other voices are more or less fragmentary towards the end. The style of the music is 'British decorative' of the earlier sixteenth century with its characteristic mixture of florid and imitative counterpoint. On closer examination, however, the work may be of Scottish origin: the music is directly related to the five- part Mass Fera pessima by Robert Carver, finest Scottish composer of sacred music in the early sixteenth century. I suggest that the present Mass is a reworking of about 1525 for six voices, possibly by Carver himself, of the earlier five-part composition: much thematic material is common to both works, though the six-part shows a more assured technical command. It is a cyclic Mass in the established tradition: each movement opens with the same head-motif and each is based on the same cantus firmus - a plainsong melody, as yet unidentified. Also, traditionally, the music has been arranged to alternate full and solo sections. It is an impressive work, and if by Carver - it is certainly very good Carver.

A Mass such as this would without doubt have formed part of the repertoire of the Chapel Royal, as would the other two examples of polyphony that are included here: the anonymous motet Descendi in hortum meum, also of the 1520s, arranged according to contemporary practice for organ (I have added some ornamentation) (5), and the motet Si quis diligit me by David Peebles of 1530 (6). Both display the growing use of structural imitation in Scottish music at this time.

What if Mary had approved the Reformed service and even heard one? We know that she certainly advocated religious tolerance on both sides. Although Knox would have limited the music in his service to plain psalm-singing, there is the evidence of the surviving music to show that there was more elaborate church music cultivated at court and song-school levels in the early years of the Reformation. One of Andrew Blackballs anthems was "giffin in propyne [ie as a gift or tribute] to the kyng" in 1569 (the Presbyterian faction being in power at the court of the infant King James VI, probably sung during a service in the Chapel Royal. I have included here three of the most representative musical forms of the Protestant liturgy in Scotland: proper psalm-tune (one tune associated with its metrical psalm text); canticle (eg The song of Simeon); and lessons on the psalms (where the psalm-tune is set imitatively by instruments rather in the manner of 'psalms in reports'). Metrical psalm-tunes and simple settings of them were designed primarily for congregational use, but would also have been performed by trained or even professional choirs such as that of the Chapel Royal.

The sequence opens with the first of two proper psalm-settings by David Peebles (ft 1530-76), illustrating the composer's melodic and harmonic skills wedded to an uncongenial form. Thomas Wood of St Andrews, who collected much Scottish (including the two earlier motets 5 and 6) and other music of the period, relates how this distinguished composer and former member of the Augustinian Priory of St Andrews was commissioned by Lord James Stewart to set the psalm-tunes, "bot he wes not earnest...". Proper psalm-tunes were of international currency and their metrical texts were the work of Scottish and English versifiers. There would have been an organ in the Chapel Royal at Holyrood and a skilled organist, and so I have devised some divisions (variations) for Psalm 107 (7) of the kind that any self- respecting professional keyboard player of that time might have improvised for such an occasion.

John Black (c1520-87) of the Aberdeen song-school has left some very fine instrumental consorts including the delightful miniature Lytill blak (played here on the organ according to one contemporary practice) (8) and some impressive 'lessons' on the psalms. These latter treat the orooer Dsalm-tune as a cantus firmus in the tenor with imitative counterpoints from other instruments. They work equally well sung with organ accompaniment. Ane lesson upone the feiftie psaime (10) is unique in the psalm-tune being combined with themes from Tallis's part-song 'When shall my sorrowful sighing slack?' of about the mid-century (hence the sub-title), a song that was to assume pride of place in several later Scottish manuscript anthologies of part-music.

John Angus (fl1562-95) is best known for his settings of the canticles. These are treated in the same way as metrical psalm-settings, each with its own 'proper' tune, and range from simple chordal arrangements (as in The song of Simeon) (12) to more florid contrapuntal settings (as in The xii Articles of the Christian Fayth) (9). Thomas Wood describes the composer as 'meike Angus', an epithet undeniably reflected in the gentle serenity of The song of Simeon.

The pronunciation of the Latin texts in this recording has been proposed by Dr Alison Wray, and is based on the way that the sounds of Scots English in 1561 might have been transferred to a vernacularized pronunciation of Latin, which was the common practice with other languages throughout Europe at that time. Also, in spite of currency in Scotland of the English bible and English metrical versions of the psalms, readings and performances in Scotland of the Reformed Church materia would obviously have had a distinctly Scottish pronunciation, a feature that has been highlighted in the present recording. For some guidelines to pronunciation of sung Scots (and Anglo-Scots) see 'Music of Scotland, 1500-1700', Musica Britannica XV, Editorial Introduction. I have edited and arranged the music, much of which may be found in MB XV (5, 6, 8, 9, 11), 'Fourteen Psalm-Settings of the Early Reformed Church in Scotland' (12) and The Church Hymnary (3) (7). It is hoped that the Mass and this version of 'Ane Lesson upone the feiftie psalme' will be published soon.