Twice in Jean Mouton's lifetime, the Royal chapel of his patron the King of France took an occasion of state to mingle with another world-class musical establishment. In 1515, King François I met with the Pope Leo X; the Royal chapel made a good impression on the music-loving Medici Pope, even in comparison to his own Sistine Chapel Choir. In 1520, a similar meeting between François and Henry VIII of England at the Field of the Cloth of Gold resulted in a similar musical competition between choirs. Motets of a high artistic caliber featured prominently in the Royal chapel's repertory: François often requested his choir sing motets over the priest's intonation of Mass, and the royal printing house of Attaignant in the 1530s released seveal large motet prints apparently representing the heart of their repertory. Mouton's eight-voiced canonic Ave Maria Gemma Virginum is good evidence of their musical prowess.

The text of Ave Maria Gemma Virginum expands on the common angelic salutation to the Virgin annunciate in Luke 1:30, calling Mary the "gem of virgins" and exhorting her aid in the hour of death. Mouton's motet also expands common parameters. Fully four of the eight voices in this brief motet are canonic, deriving their notes strictly from another notated voice an octave below. The utter richness of texture thus compares favorably to Mouton's other eight-in-four canon, Nesciens Mater. Though the melodies in Ave Maria Gemma Virginum proceed with Mouton's characteristic fluid grace, the motet presents a somewhat harsher contrapuntal fabric, with starker contrasts between the four low voices and the answering quartet and more pungent dissonances among the voices. Yet the full canonic texture could not help but astound listeners with the technical achievement both of the King's select choir and of his star composer.

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