Though Orlande de Lassus displays overflowing vitality in his secular music, matters are quite different in his sacred music: the twelve motets assembled on this album (most of them composed in the last years of his life) bespeak a profound melancholy and show not only his ability to make use of a wide range of stylistic devices, but also great subtlety in the art of rhetoric. An expressive palette handled in masterly fashion by Daniel Reuss at the head of Cappella Amsterdam!
ROLAND DE LASSUS [1530-1594] · Omnia tempus habent Cantica sacra sex et octo vocibus (4'27) · Audi tellus Sacræ cantiones, liber quartus (7'48) · Ad Dominum cum tribularer Cantiones sacræ sex vocum (3'42) · Media vita in morte sumus (Gregorian Antiphon) (1'50) · Media vita in morte sumus Patrocinium musices, prima pars (4'29) · Circumdederunt me dolores mortis (Cantiones sacræ sex vocibus compositæ, Munich, 1601 (2'49) · Libera me Domine Selectissimæ cantiones (2'26) · Recordare Jesu pie Cantiones sacræ sex vocum] (2'58) · Deficiat in dolore vita mea DefiCantiones sacræ sex vocum (2'40) · Vidi calumnias Cantiones sacræ sex vocum] (4'21) · O mors quam amara Primus Liber concentuum sacrorum (4'56) · Cum essem parvulus Mottetta sex vocum typis nondum uspiam excusa (4'01) · Vide homo Lagrime di S. Pietro [...] con un mottetto nel fine (2'44)
