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Pater de celis Deus, motet for 6 voicesYear: 16th c.
Though this masterful six-voiced motet begins with an evocation to God the Father of heaven, its complete text, its musical language, and even its compositional structure are unabashedly Trinitarian. The four lines of text quote four Trinitarian litany Responses (as in the Liber usualis, 835) and implore mercy in turn from Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and Holy Trinity. The second part sets four lines of praise to the triune God—a text featured in the festal Office of the Trinity—and appends a final invocation. The version of this motet preserved in a German anthology (printed in homage to the recently-deceased Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I) dates from after La Rue's death, and unfortunately gives no clue as to its genesis. It does, however, showcase the hand of a composer confident in the symbolic resources of his art.
The central musical device embodies in sound the Trinitarian theology: three of the motet's six voices emanate from one, via a strict canon. La Rue selects the intervals fifth and ninth above (instead of the octave) for the subsequent entries of his canon; his contrapuntal writing, despite this added compositional challenge, is nearly flawless. Registral overlap between the middle four voices somewhat obscures the first two canonic voices, but reserves aural space for the third and highest. This arrangement creates an overall effect of continual aspiration, as threefold canonic motives constantly pass through the voices, always upwards into the textural clear sky.
La Rue further underscores his Trinitarian "sermon" in the very structure of the motet. Twice, at the texts "Sancta Trinitas" and "Cum Sancto Spiritu," declamatory melodies momentarily settle the shifting textures. He also articulates the continuous counterpoint by subtle motivic repetitions in the three canonic voices, molding each half of the motet into a triune arch. The prima pars repeats its canonic opening melody, builds to a dense climax halfway (repeating the upper voice's peak), and closes by repeating the final "miserere." The secunda pars, similarly tripartite, even concludes in tripla rhythm, and once again features repetitive final invocations to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
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