Felipe de Magalhaes

Program: #23-33   Air Date: Aug 14, 2023

NOTE: All of the music on this program comes from recording Felipe de Magalhães: Masses featuring Cupertinos and led by Luís Toscano. It is in the Hyperion label and is CDA68403.

Filipe de Magalhães (c1563–1652) was most probably a companion of Duarte Lobo (c1565–1646) and Manuel Cardoso (1566–1650) at Évora Cathedral, and was arguably the most acclaimed Portuguese composer among his contemporaries. In the extraordinary context of musical activity in Portugal during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, he has been pointed out as the favourite pupil of the renowned master Manuel Mendes (c1547–1605), who bequeathed his musical estate to him in exchange for an intended posthumous edition that sadly never came to fruition. By the end of the 1580s, Magalhães was already a music tutor and singer in the service of Évora Cathedral, from which he would leave for Lisbon in 1596. There, according to the pioneering historian and bibliographer Diogo Barbosa Machado (1682–1772), he was appointed ‘master of the Caza da Misericordia of Lisbon’ and, ‘with great credit to his talent’, master of the Royal Chapel—where he succeeded Francisco Garro (d1623)—from 1623 to 1641, leaving an indelible mark as one of the most esteemed Portuguese musicians.

As a pedagogue, Filipe de Magalhães is credited with having guided such distinguished composers as Estêvão de Brito (c1575–1641) and Estêvão Lopes Morago (c1575–after 1630). In 1614 he published Cantus ecclesiasticus, a book consisting mainly of plainsong dedicated to the liturgical Office of the Dead, whose success can be gauged by its continual re-publication over almost two centuries (until at least 1804), and which earned him the title of ‘distinguished master’ in the Art of plainsong, a treatise by Pedro Thalesio (c1563–c1629) published in Coimbra in 1618. Magalhães, nonetheless, had to wait until 1636 to get his two volumes of polyphonic music—the Missarum liber and Cantica Beatissimae Virginis—published in Lisbon at the workshop of Lourenço Craesbeeck. Aside from the chronological coincidence (it was a remarkable year for Craesbeeck which also saw the publication of two of the three Mass books by Manuel Cardoso), Magalhães’s two volumes are also interesting because they are dedicated, respectively, to Philip III of Portugal (Philip IV of Spain) and Dom João, at the time Duke of Braganza but who, four years later, would be proclaimed John IV, King of Portugal, thus concluding the troubled six-decade period (1580–1640) that would come to be known as the Iberian Union.

The centuries-old intense cultural relations between Portugal and Spain, which naturally deepened during this period, may help to explain the genesis of the Missa Veni Domine and Missa Vere Dominus est, both of which feature on this recording. The two Masses are included in the Missarum liber and are based in turn on the eponymous motets by the Spanish composer Francisco Guerrero (1528–1599) and the Franco-Flemish composer Pierre de Manchicourt (c1510–1564). Born in Seville, Guerrero enjoyed great popularity in Portugal—besides Magalhães, Duarte Lobo also used motets by the Hispanic master, in the latter case as models for four of the fifteen Masses he published—probably boosted by the dedication of his first book of Masses, published in Paris in 1566, to the ill-fated adolescent Portuguese monarch King Sebastian. In Manchicourt’s case, the connection to Spain comes from the fact that he was, from 1560 until his death, master of the Flemish chapel in Madrid, in the service of Philip II (Philip I of Portugal from 1580 onwards). In fact, except for the Missa De Beata Virgine and Missa pro defunctis, each based on their respective chants, and the Missa Veni Domine, all of Magalhães’s Masses are modelled on works by musicians linked to the Spanish court: Manchicourt (as mentioned above), Christian Hollander (c1510/15–1568/9), Jacobus Clemens non Papa (c1510/15–1555/6) and Stefano Limido (d1647).

Looking at the compositional aspects of Francisco Guerrero’s motet Veni Domine, it is clear that one of its most peculiar features is the presence, in the superius II part, of an ostinato (a musical pattern repeated several times). Comprising two distinctive melodic motifs, it forms the unifying element of this motet, either through its appearance in the remaining voices or through ingenious combination with other motifs. In the Missa Veni Domine, Magalhães, despite his liberal use of motifs from Guerrero’s motet, draws most frequently from the two motifs, alone or combined, of the ostinato with which he opens the main sections of the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus and Agnus Dei. This ostinato receives unusual emphasis in the concluding Agnus Dei II, appearing explicitly—it even quotes the text of Guerrero’s motet (‘Veni Domine et noli tardare’)—in an additional fifth voice, in this case the superius II.

In the Missa Vere Dominus est, on the other hand, Magalhães clearly begins each section with the assertive motif from Manchicourt’s motet—in line with the usual procedure for Masses based on imitation or parody—and then subjects it to multiple elaborate manipulations that call upon a range of contrapuntal techniques. In structural terms, the motet Vere Dominus est is divided into two parts, as is customary in Manchicourt’s works, with the final ‘Alleluia’ section of each part corresponding to approximately twenty-eight semibreves. The laudatory motif of these sections is emulated with admirable mastery by Magalhães in his Mass at the end of the Gloria, Credo and both Agnus Deis. As in the Missa Veni Domine, the second Agnus Dei is here reinforced with a fifth voice—in this instance, a tenor II—and the work thus culminates with the same textural richness found in Manchicourt’s five-voice motet. It should be emphasized that, in accordance with one of the main aims of the Cupertinos ensemble, both Masses interpreted here were transcribed by the group members themselves from the original printed copy, which is preserved in the General Library of the University of Coimbra.

The central point of the present recording is reached with the hymn Magnificat primi toni. It is part of the book Cantica Beatissimae Virginis, which brings together the typical two collections of the Magnificat in the eight psalm tones—one setting the odd-numbered verses, the other the even-numbered verses—for a total of sixteen versions. While the verses are often performed in alternatim—in other words, with odd-numbered verses sung in polyphony and even-numbered verses sung in plainchant (the latter sometimes being replaced by organ or instrumental music) or vice versa—for this recording, we have chosen to sing the whole text polyphonically, thus using the first-tone version of all twelve verses. Indeed, before the alternatim performance style described above became widespread, the practice of singing every verse in polyphony seems to have been preferred in various institutions, including the Papal Chapel in the Vatican. The collection of five Magnificat settings by Cristóbal de Morales (c1500–1553), published in Venice in 1542, in which all twelve verses are subjected to a continuous polyphonic treatment (rather than being divided between eight versions each for the odd- and even-numbered verses), is usually cited as the primary testament to this practice. In this version of the Magnificat primi toni by Magalhães, the first psalm tone is always present. It is clearly perceptible in every verse, whether as structural material for imitation across the voices, or as an extended cantus firmus, or even during the last verse of the doxology, as a canon at the unison which engenders an enchanting game of reverberation between the two superius voices.

The works on this album are bookended by Magalhães’s two surviving six-voice motets: Exsurge, quare obdormis Domine? and Commissa mea pavesco. The first, for the liturgy of Sexagesima Sunday, is one of the rare manuscripts explicitly attributed to Magalhães and is set out in a volume containing motets for the main celebrations of the liturgical year, most of which are by Magalhães’s putative disciple Estêvão de Brito. Preserved in the Chapter Archives of Málaga Cathedral, this volume was possibly collated there on the instruction of Brito himself during his almost three decades as local chapelmaster, a post he held from 1613 until his death. The second, with which Magalhães concludes his Missa pro defunctis and which occupies the last folios of the Missarum liber, is in all probability his best-known and most internationally interpreted work. In both motets, the profoundly pious character conveyed by the texts, which oscillates dramatically between penance and pleading, is exquisitely reflected in concise yet poignant musical moments that in themselves fully and unreservedly justify the enormous prestige that Filipe de Magalhães earned among his peers.

Luís Toscano & José Abreu © 2023

Composer Info

Filipe de Magalhães (c1563-1652)

CD Info

Hyperion label CDA68403