Ave Maria à 4

It is an easy misconception to think that music tends to grow increasingly complex and elaborate over time. It is part of our modern mindset, instilled by ideas from Hegel and Darwin and generations of “progressive evolution” scholars. But a few striking examples completely undermine the progressivist theory. By far the most striking, and one with lasting impact on music history, comes from 16th-century Italy. At the center stands Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (ca. 1525-94), once regarded as the savior of sacred music and the single most identifiable voice of Renaissance music in Italy. First, a short digression is needed.
Sacred music had grown increasingly complex over the previous 150 years, culminating in extremely florid motets in which each voice could have a unique melody, text, and language (French, Italian, and Latin), all at the same time. Words were totally lost, existing like mere appendages upon which the music soared into extravagance. The legend grew that the Council of Trent (1545-63), the Catholic Church’s main counter-reformation effort, was ready to ban polyphonic music entirely until Palestrina composed a beautiful choral mass that showed a way forward. That work, the Pope Marcellus Mass, remains a cornerstone of 16th-century sacred music. But that it was written to appease the Council is total fiction. For his own reasons, Palestrina had already settled on a leaner, more text-based style before the Tridentine Council even convened.
Of course, as news of the Council’s feelings about music emerged, Palestrina was perfectly poised to take advantage. In 1551 he took his first post in Rome at St. Peter’s. All of his remaining life was spent in Rome and involved several of the most significant church positions. As the first “native Italian” composer of masses, Palestrina’s reputation flourished during his lifetime, particularly among advocates of his conservative, text-friendly aesthetic. The five-voice Ave Maria motet (1575) offers a perfect example of that style. All five voices proceed through the text at roughly the same pace. Palestrina uses cadences to mark the end of one textual section and the start of the next. A small set of recurrent motives helps unify the parts and provide aural signposts for the listener, who is not bombarded with widely conflicting styles at any one time. One way to state this all is to note that Palestrina’s works are among the earliest that can be conducted; that is, there is sufficient concerted effort by the various parts to make a conductor possible, though not essential.

(c) Jason Stell