Jordi Savall Tomas Luis de Victoria: Passion - Officium Hebdomadae Sanctae Hybrid Multi-Channel & Stereo 3SACD

Tomás Luis de Victoria's OFFICIUM HEBDOMADÆ SANCTÆ is one of the most compelling examples of creative genius in a composer, a toweringly poignant and masterpiece on the Passion of Christ, a pure but infinitely subtle creation, Ad majorem Dei gloriam.

More than 70 years ago, the sequences of Gregorian chant and polyphonic music such as that of Tomás Luis de Victoria made a profound impression on Savall's musical experience at that time from 1949 to 1953, when he was a chorister under the direction of Joan Just in the boys' choir of the Piarist school at Igualada, Catalonia. To have been submerged in the beauty of that music during his childhood unquestionably made a lasting impact and shaped certain aspects of his education as a chorister, and particularly his musical sensibility. The memory of those spellbinding chants also had a decisive influence on his choice to study the cello a few years later, just before he turned 15, when he was spellbound one evening at a rehearsal of Mozart's Requiem. It was after that evening of extraordinary intensity, and thanks to Joan Just, who conducted the choir of the Schola Cantorum in Igualada, that he fully realized the power of music and decided to become a musician.

To embark - well into the 21st century - on the performance of a great religious masterpiece composed more than 400 years ago for the celebration of the liturgical offices of its own very specific age poses a number of crucial questions and as many exceptional challenges. How are we to conceive a present-day interpretation of a composition so intimately associated with Christian worship in the Counter-Reformation, remaining faithful to the composer's intention and the musical practice of his day, whilst at the same time ensuring that it conveys all the work's beauty and spirituality without neglecting its liturgical purpose? What is the essential quality of a work of art which makes it possible for a piece of music composed in 1585 to continue to move and touch us deeply today? To what extent can the artistic dimension of that work of art exist independently of the liturgical context which inspired it? Can we today feel the full spiritual force and beauty of these Gregorian chants and ancient polyphonies completely independently of the liturgical purpose for which they were created? How can we, as musicians and singers of the 21st century, truly grasp the profound spiritual message and the artistic sense that Tomás Luis de Victoria conveys in this colossal masterpiece?

Ultimately, the answers to all these questions are to be found in the music; in other words, in the last analysis, it is the essence of the music itself which provides the key to unlocking its mystery. We know that music admits no duplicity, least of all the music of Victoria, and that is why the utmost purity of commitment and sensibility are required of the performers: each voice, each instrument must own the profound meaning of each melody and modulation, sharing with the other voices the absolute need to find meaning and, above all, "grace." As La Fontaine said, "Cette grâce plus belle que la beauté" ("That grace which is more beautiful than beauty itself") because it directly touches our soul. So before all else, we must study the original document, since any transcription is in itself an interpretation. First of all, we had to study the original edition of the collection printed at Rome in 1585 under the title OFFICIUM HEBDOMADÆ SANCTÆ, and subsequently the corresponding Gregorian antiennes, especially in the case of the Passions, where Victoria composed only some of the verses (21 verses for the St. Matthew and 14 for the St. John), corresponding to the passages in which several characters intervene.

In contrast to other pieces from the Officium, such as Tantum ergo, Vexilla regis, written in the "moro hispano," or Spanish style, in the two Passions Victoria uses the Gregorian chant customary in the Roman tradition. Savall and company, therefore, based their reconstruction of the Evangelist's and Jesus's Gregorian parts, corresponding to the two Passions according to St. Matthew and St. John included in the Officium, on Giovanne Domenico Guidetti (JOHANNE GVIDETTO BONONIENS in the printed edition) CANTUS ECCLESIASTICUS (brilliantly performed and sung by "cantor" and celebrant Andrés Montilla-Acurero).

Tomás Luis de Victoria's OFFICIUM HEBDOMADÆ SANCTÆ is one of the most compelling examples of creative genius in a composer, a toweringly poignant and masterpiece on the Passion of Christ, a pure but infinitely subtle creation, Ad majorem Dei gloriam.