Saint Anne, mother of Mary, does not appear by name in the Bible; her name and life are recounted in the second-century Protoevangelium of James. Yet as the Church's perception of the Virgin Mary's divinity grew during the European Middle Ages, the woman who bore her also increased in prominence. Anne became patron saint of all housewives, with an official feast day of July 26 (together with her husband Joachim). Only one polyphonic Mass specifically honoring Saint Anne, however, has survived - by Pierre de la Rue. An illuminated manuscript proudly bearing the Hapsburg-Burgundian coat of arms and an inscription to Archduke Charles (the future Holy Roman Emperor Charles V), contains Masses by Charles' star composer, perhaps intended for his new court chapel in Brussels; this and two other choirbooks made for the Burgundian court, preserve La Rue's Missa De Sancta Anna.

The St. Anne Mass is frequently cited as exemplifying La Rue's most "accessible" musical style. Its consistently bright F-mode and its clear and satisfying cadential behavior, fall as pleasantly on a twentieth-century ear as one of the sixteenth. Its pervasive use of duet textures (a strong characteristic of La Rue's more famous contemporary Josquin Desprez), and the frequent passages built around streams of parallel consonances (a favored recourse of Jacob Obrecht), lend an airy texture to the counterpoint. Yet the melodies maintain a rhythmic vigor characteristic of La Rue, especially in the lengthy Kyrie and Agnus Dei movements. The harmony often dips affectively into surprising flatward areas such as the harmonic softness at the text et incarnatus and the sudden shift at vivos et mortuos, "the living and the dead." One extraordinary feature of this Mass is the subsitution of his chordal motet O salutaris hostia into the Sanctus. Such subsitution, very common in some Milanese Masses, provides a powerful moment of reflection at the most holy moment of the Mass, the Elevation of the Host.

The copy of this Mass in the Archduke's manuscript gives the title "Mass of Saint Anne," and includes a Latin incipit in the Tenor voice: "Felix Anna." Unfortunately, no other evidence of a Tenor cantus firmus survives, nor have historians located the piece of music upon which the Mass must be based. At least three distinct melodic phrases, however, recur throughout the Mass, appearing in all voices; the first of them even provides a "headmotive" to open each movement (usually in the Tenor and Cantus). These tantalyzing fragments of melody unify the sonic world of the Mass, and for an audience perceiving music associated with her, would have tied it irrevocably to Anne's feast.

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