Synopsis:

Nowhere in Western Christendom was Easter commemorated as elaborately as in Rome, and the finest choirs were those of the Sistine Chapel and St Peter's Basilica, attracting the best composers and singers from all over Europe. We present a programme of Late Renaissance & Early Baroque sacred music which was likely to have been sung at Papal services on Easter Sunday during the Counter-Reformation period.

Composers covered include the three successive Masters of Music at St Peter's: Giovanni Animuccia, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, and Felice Anerio.

Not so many have heard of Animuccia, who was maestro di cappella (music master, composer, choirmaster) of the Cappella Giulia, the pope's choir at St Peter's Basilica in Rome, possibly one of the most highly-coveted appointments in the musical world, from 1555 till his death in 1571. Animuccia was simultaneously Master of Music at St Peter's Basilica and the New Church (Chiesa Nuova) run by the Oratorian order, whose founder, the great Counter-Reformation figure St Phillip Neri was his spiritual father. Animuccia was, by contemporary accounts, a gentle and kind man. St Philip describes Animuccia, a daily mass-goer, as having died in the odour of sanctity (Animuccia had the great consolation of receiving the last rites from St Philip), and this devotion is reflected in his music.

Now, if you're choirmaster at the head cathedral of Western Europe, you're at the top of the game, and your eternal fame should be assured. Unfortunately for Animuccia, his successor was Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, who needs no introduction and whose blazing fame eclipsed his.

Felice Anerio, Palestrina's successor at the Cappella Giulia, was a composer who blended the older polyphonic stile antico (old style) aesthetic with the newer baroque declamatory style. However, like Animuccia, standing next to Palestrina has resulted in him being mostly forgotten.

Appropriately for Eastertide, we resurrect these two composers to show that the genius of Palestrina was part of a continuous tradition and did not spring fully-formed ex nihilo.

Among the pieces sung will be Animuccia's glorious six-voice Missa Victimæ Paschali laudes (based on the Easter Sequence), polyphonic settings of the propers of the Easter Vigil mass, chant from the Roman editions of 1614, appropriate motets, and two Italian laude (praise songs) that would have been sung at services led by St Philip Neri.

Come hear what Easter in Rome would have sounded like 400 years ago!

Admission is free, with a retiring collection for the upkeep of the host venue. Full texts and translations of the pieces sung will be provided.

Please register on Eventbrite so we have a better idea of audience numbers, to facilitate ushering and programme printing arrangements.