Across the span of his secular oeuvre, Alexander Agricola was capable of many different attitudes toward a secular text. He could echo the joy (Sonnes, muses) or pathos (Adieu m'amour) of a text, add his own commentary upon the poetic speaker's thoughts (A la mignonne), and even use his musical setting to poke ironic fun at the singer (Et qui le dira and S'il vous plaist). In his Soit long ou pres (Whether near or far), he apparently chose to be quite serious. The text of this French Rondeau quatrain speaks of courtly devotion to a distant Beloved in fairly conventional terms. It does, however, artfully infuse the conventional sentiment with strong poetic oppositions: "Whether near or far," "Any woman living or dead," "Sorrow pressed upon me, happiness will arise within me." Agricola's musical setting, too, smacks of convention, yet contains subtle details of craft. He sets the chanson for three voices, the fifteenth century standard; the upper pair mark each poetic line (excepting the first) with brief imitative motifs and each phrase ends with a cadence. Yet in the opening measures, two of the three voices baldly evoke the sense of "near or far" by octave leaps to a great vocal distance. The absence of imitation here emphasizes the text-painting gesture. The composer frustrates the medial cadence by deceptive motion in the bass and a prolongation to a mournful Phrygian half close. At the chanson's conclusion, however, he approaches the final cadence with a strongly rising imitative sequence in the upper voices, punctuated by hocket rests. This surging gesture suits both the text of the verse, which speaks of the rising joy at seeing Her again, and the conclusion of the refrain: "My heart will maintain it [my love]."

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