Officium Hebdomadae Sanctae (The Holy Week Office): Tomás Luis de Victoria

This is quite amazing; a complete - I think so, anyway; it's 2.5+ hours of music - recording of this work by Victoria. 



Victoria wrote this piece in or around 1585.   The YouTuber includes the following credits:

Coro de monjes del Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos
Coro de voces blancas de Burgos
Concertador: Dom Felipe Fernández, O.S.B.
Director: Ismael Fernandez de la Cuesta.

Below is the (partial, it seems) track list from the above page; the first part is from Palm Sunday - and most of the rest comes from Matins of Maundy Thurday (In Coena Domini), Good Friday (Parasceve), and Holy Saturday (Sabbato Sancto).

In other words, the greatest part of this music was written for the Office of Tenebrae - Matins and Lauds of the great Three Days.   Included, too, are readings (including some from the Lamentations of Jeremiah), antiphons, responsories, hymns, and pieces from John's Passion and the Adoration of the Cross on Good Friday.

To follow along with the Matins sections, use Divinum Officium; enter the date at the top of the page, then click "Matutinum" at the bottom.  You can listen to St. Thomas' Tenebrae sung in plainsong here.

Officium Hebdomadae Sanctae- S.XVI. ( Integral)

I DOMINICA IN RAMIS PALMARUM

Pueri Hebraeorum

II FERIA V IN COENA DOMINI

In I Nocturno ( Lectiones I,II,III )
In II Nocturno ( Lectiones et Responsoria:
IV " Amicus meus",V " Judas mercator"
VI " Unus ex discipulis" )
Lector: Francisco Lara

In III Nocturno ( Lectiones et Responsoria:
VII " Eran quasi Agnus", VIII "Una Hora"
IX " Seniores populi "
Lector: Dom Pedro Alonso, O.S.B.
Benedictus Dominus
Lectores: Dom Baudilio López O.S.B. y
Francisco Lara ( Primer coro)- Dom Jose Luis Angulo, O.S.B.
y Dom Constancio del Alamo, O.S.B. ( segundo Coro)

III FERIA VI PARASCEVE ( principio )

In I Nocturno ( Lectiones I, II, III ).......
In II Nocturno ( Lectiones et Responsalia:
IV " Tamquam ad latronem", V " Tenebrae factae sunt", VI " Animam meam" )
Lector: Francisco Lara
In III Nocturno ( Lectiones y Responsoria:
VII " Tradiderunt me", VIII " Jesum tradidit",
IX " Caligaverunt" )
Lector: Dom Pedro Alonso, O.S.B.

III FERIA VI IN PARASCEVE ( final)

Passio secundum Joannem ....
Sinagoga: Francisco Lara
Cronista y Jesucristo:
Ismael Fernández de la Cuesta
Improperia: " Popule meus"......
Soprano: Hermana Maria Begoña Martínez
Contralto: Hermana, Maria Lourdes Gabilondo
Tenor: Francisco Lara
Bajo: Dom Constancio del Alamo, O.S.B.

IV SABBATO SANCTO

In I Nocturno ( Lectiones I, II, III )
In II Nocturno ( Lectiones et Responsoria:
IV " Recessit pastor nortes", V " O vos omnes",
VI " Ecce quomodo" )...........
In III Nocturno ( Lectiones et Responsoria:
VII " Astiterunt", VIII " Aestimatus sum",
IX " Sepulto Domino")...........
Miserere mei, Deus

Maundy Thursday: "Gregorian Chants from Assisi - Medieval Lauds"

Gregorianische Gesange aus Assisi, Gregorian Chants from Assisi - Laudes Antiquae Medieval Lauds, In Cena Domini de Missa Solemni Vespertina - Coro della Cappella Papale di San Francesco d 'Assisi, Padre Maestro Alfonso Del Ferraro. (1967)

In cena domini : de missa solemni vespertina = Plainsong melodies for the commemoration of the Lord's Supper on Maundy Thursday.

De missa
1.Nos autem gloriari oportet
2. Christus factus est pro nobis obediens.

De lotione pedum:
3.Mandatum novum do vobis
4. Postquam surrexit Dominus
5. Dominus Jesus, postquam cenavit
6. Domine, tu mihi lavas pedes?
7. Si ego Dominus et Magister vester
8. In hoc cognoscent omnes
9. Maneant in vobis fides, spes, caritas
10. Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est

De missa:
11. Dextera Domini fecit virtutem
12. Sanctus

De solemni translatione ac repositione sacramenti:
13.Pange lingua gloriosi Corporis mysterium

Cantus Poenitentiae:
14.Parce Domine, parce populo tuo

In festo Corpore Christi:
15.Verbun supernum prodiens
16.Lauda Sion Salvatorem.

Maundy Thursday: "Partaking of the sacrificial body"

Again from catholicity and covenant:

Do the disciples understand the nature of the bond? Jesus has blessed his food, to be the body he will offer in his sacrifice; do they know that they are committed to membership in such a body as that?  A body flogged, broken, crucified - see, he crumbles the loaf before their eyes.  Do they perceive the new meaning in the ancient custom, the breaking of the bread?  Are they willing to be parts of such a body, are they willing that his body, with its sacrificial destiny, should be theirs?  The disciples were not yet fully willing, but they came to be, and so we all must; for if we do not want to be given and surrendered to God, why touch religion at all?  By partaking of the sacrificial body, we are to be made capable of sacrifice, taken up, as we are, into the sacrificial being of Christ.

From Austin Farrer's address "This is my Body", given at the 1958 Eucharistic Congress, in Said and Sung.

(The painting is Georges Rouault Christ and the Apostles.)

Maundy Thursday: "We must return every day into his death"

In catholicity and covenant today:

Take the Passion of Christ in S. Matthew or S. Luke, and merely look with all your eyes on one scene at a time.  Begin at the upper room;  see Jesus give himself away with his own hands to his Father and to his friends, in bread and wine that are his body and blood.  Go on to the garden, see him give himself again, and confirm his gift in the agony of prayer; see him, by standing to the truth of his mission, call death on his own head in Caiaphas's court and in Pilate's.  See him, half  flogged to death, wear that crown and that robe which assert the kingdom of God's will on earth through mockery and annihilation.  See him receive the cross on which he is to die, and see him die on it.  Then see if the overflowing mercy which unites you to him will not make something more of your giving yourself to God, if only for a day.  We must live one day at a time, but we cannot do that if we do not return every day into the life of Jesus, and above all into his death.

From Austin Farrer's sermon "Dying to Live" in Said or Sung.

(The painting is Georges Rouault Head of Christ, 1937.)

Maundy Thursday: Pange Lingua, gloriosi

Written by St. Thomas Aquinas in the 13th Century, the hymn extols the Eucharist and Christ's sacrifice in giving it. Below are the words, in Latin and the glorious, glorious English translation by Edward Caswall, a 19th-Century Anglican clergyman and hymn writer (who later converted to Roman Catholicism).

Listen to a stunningly beautiful version of it here, an mp3 of the St. Thomas Fifth Avenue Solemn Maundy Thursday Eucharist, sung to the hymn tune Grafton. I love the plainsong version - but this is really so lovely and loving that it's difficult to listen to, in its context, without tears welling in the eyes. The hymn, with organ accompaniment, starts at around 1:43:30; at the moment I think it's the loveliest hymn ever written. There are long pauses between verses as the Sacrament is taken in procession to the Altar of Repose. (The whole service is very worth listening to; you'll hear the crotalus used at the consecration, and the sound of palm branches scrubbing the altar as it's stripped at the very end of the service, during the chanting of Psalm 22. Here's the service leaflet, in PDF; here's Coverdale Psalm 22, the version they're singing.)

Pange, lingua, gloriosi
Corporis mysterium,
Sanguinisque pretiosi,
quem in mundi pretium
fructus ventris generosi
Rex effudit Gentium.

Nobis datus, nobis natus
ex intacta Virgine,
et in mundo conversatus,
sparso verbi semine,
sui moras incolatus
miro clausit ordine.

In supremae nocte coenae
recumbens cum fratribus
observata lege plene
cibis in legalibus,
cibum turbae duodenae
se dat suis manibus.

Verbum caro, panem verum
verbo carnem efficit:
fitque sanguis Christi merum,
et si sensus deficit,
ad firmandum cor sincerum
sola fides sufficit.

Tantum ergo Sacramentum
veneremur cernui:
et antiquum documentum
novo cedat ritui:
praestet fides supplementum
sensuum defectui.

Genitori, Genitoque
laus et jubilatio,
salus, honor, virtus quoque
sit et benedictio:
Procedenti ab utroque
compar sit laudatio.

Amen. Alleluja.

NOW, my tongue, the mystery telling
Of the glorious Body sing,
And the Blood, all price excelling,
Which the Gentiles’ Lord and King,
Once on earth among us dwelling,
Shed for this world’s ransoming.

Given for us, and condescending
To be born for us below,
He with men in converse blending
Dwelt, the seed of truth to sow,
Till he closed with wondrous ending
His most patient life of woe.

That last night at supper lying
Mid the twelve, his chosen band,
Jesus, with the Law complying,
Keeps the feast its rites demand;
Then, more precious food supplying,
Gives himself with his own hand

Word-made-flesh, true bread he maketh
By his word his Flesh to be,
Wine his Blood; when man partaketh,
Though his senses fail to see,
Faith alone, when sight forsaketh,
Shows true hearts the mystery.

Therefore we, before him bending,
This great Sacrament revere;
Types and shadows have their ending,
For the newer rite is here;
Faith, our outward sense befriending,
Makes our inward vision clear.

Glory let us give and blessing
To the Father and the Son,
Honor, thanks, and praise addressing,
While eternal ages run;
Ever too his love confessing
Who from both with both is One.

Amen. Alleluia.

The Maundy Thursday Offertory: Ubi Caritas

The Offertory for the Maundy Thursday Evening Mass (Missa Vespertina in Cena Domini) is Ubi Caritas - "Where Love is, there is God." This is one of the few chants not based directly on Scripture, and for most of its history, it was used as one of the antiphons for the footwashing rite at the Maundy Thursday Eucharist. (It was assigned by the Roman Catholic Missal as the Offertory only in 1970.)



Here's the chant score, with the Latin text and one English translation below. (There are differences in the Latin text, according to manuscript used; one version has Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est ("Where Love and Charity are, there is God"), and another version - the one given below - has Ubi caritas est vera, Deus ibi est. ("Where Charity is true, there is God").)

Ubi caritas est vera, Deus ibi est.

Congregavit nos in unum Christi amor.

Exultemus, et in ipso jucundemur.

Timeamus, et amemus Deum vivum.

Et ex corde diligamus nos sincero.

Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.

Simul ergo cum in unum congregamur:

Ne nos mente dividamur, caveamus.

Cessent iurgia maligna, cessent lites.

Et in medio nostri sit Christus Deus.

Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.

Simul quoque cum beatis videamus,

Glorianter vultum tuum, Christe Deus:

Gaudium quod est immensum, atque probum,

Saecula per infinita saeculorum. Amen.

Where charity and love are, God is there.

Christ's love has gathered us into one.

Let us rejoice and be pleased in Him.

Let us fear, and let us love the living God.

And may we love each other with a sincere heart.

Where charity and love are, God is there.

As we are gathered into one body,

Beware, lest we be divided in mind.

Let evil impulses stop, let controversy cease,

And may Christ our God be in our midst.

Where charity and love are, God is there.

And may we with the saints also,

See Thy face in glory, O Christ our God:

The joy that is immense and good,

Unto the ages through infinite ages. Amen.

Here's Marucie Durufle's choral version, hewing closely to the Gregorian chant melody, sung by the King's College Choir:



This is Morten Lauridsen's lovely version, via the "Poznan Chamber Choir, Dir.: Bartosz Michalowski at 11th International Chamber Choir Competition Marktoberdorf 2009":




Here, 'Composer/pianist Ola Gjeilo joins the CWU Chamber Choir (Gary Weidenaar, director) in presenting Gjeilo's "Ubi Caritas"':



And here is the Taize version of this song:



Here's a post on the Introit for today, Nos autem gloriari (also used on Holy Cross Day), and another on all the chants for today.