Gabriel Fauré - Messe Basse

- Composer: Gabriel Urbain Fauré (12 May 1845 -- 4 November 1924)
- Ensemble: The Cambridge Singers
- Performers: Ruth Holton (soprano), John Scott (organ)
- Conductor: John Rutter
- Year of recording: 1988

Messe basse, for solo voices, chorus & organ, written between 1881-1906.

00:00 - I. Kyrie eleison
02:18 - II. Sanctus
04:32 - III. Benedictus
07:05 - IV. Agnus Dei

While on vacation in Normandy in the summer of 1881, Fauré and his pupil André Messager wrote the Messe des pêcheurs de Villerville for the small church in the town where they were staying. The church's musicans were both fewer in number and less thoroughly trained than those found in the churches of Paris; accordingly, the composers wrote in a style well suited to amateur performers, but still musically appealing. This approach must have held some personal resonance for Fauré, whose musical career had begun in similarly informal, ad hoc circumstances.

Fauré wrote the Messe's Sanctus, Gloria, and Agnus Dei, while Messager wrote the Kyrie and the O salutaris; no Credo was included. In 1882, the pair collaborated on a version of the work with orchestra. In 1906, Fauré reworked and partially recomposed the Messe, leaving out those sections that had been composed by Messager. This version of the work, commonly known by the title Messe basse, is that most frequently performed today. The Messe basse calls for a somewhat different instrumentation than its predecessor, including soprano solo, women's choir, and organ.

In all versions of the Messe, the writing has much of the ethereal clarity and lyric lightness that imbue nearly all of Fauré's sacred music, an effect particularly enhanced by the use of massed female voices. Fauré made little attempt to pictorialize the various texts, instead employing a relatively similar texture throughout. He later used a similar technique in the famous Requiem (1887-1899), in which he evokes an overall mood rather than creating a theatrical flow à la similar works by Mozart and Verdi.

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