Luogo e data di registrazione		St. Emmeram, Regensburg (Germania) - luglio 1971
	Registrazione: live / studio		studio
	Producer / Engineer		Andreas Holschneider / Gerd Ploebsch / Klaus Hiemann
	Prima Edizione LP		Archiv - 1722 007 - (3 lp's) - durata 39' 48" | 42' 32" | 48' 02" - (p) 1972 - Analogico
	Edizione "Collectio" CD		Archiv - 437 078-2 - (1 cd) - durata 53' 23" - (c) 1986 - ADD
	Note		Selezione dall'edizione originale in Long Playing.

SCHÜTZ: THE "PSALMS OF DAVID" Heinrich Schütz is a composer of words - of the words of the Bible, above all, in Martin Luther’s German translation. He has never been surpassed in his understanding of how to render his native language so that its intonations, articulation and meaning become music, and simultaneously to make his music a language wherein the musical and verbal expresssions of his Protestant faith are inseparable. It is therefore hardly surprising that the majority of the texts which he “translated into music”, as he put it, come from the Book of Psalms. One of the marks of Schütz’s greatness is the skill with which he marries tradition with the very newest artistic forms of his own time; and here, too, he is doing more than write the latest chapter in the age-old history, dating back to the Middle Ages, of setting the psalms to music. Rather, it is also the case that in the psalms - which are, after all, texts written to be sung - he finds a language already to some extent provided with a musical structure, and which is especially suited to the composer’s needs. The typical formal structure is one significant factor in this: the verses are metrically irregular, their rhythm that of natural speech, but poetic order is imposed by the parallelismus membrorum, the pairing of lines which express a similar content in different forms of words. There is any number of ways in which this parallelism can be rendered in the music, by correspondence and cross-reference, as well as by matching the periodic articulation to that of the verses. Another factor is the characteristic imagery of the psalms, especially the numerous references to singing and the playing of instruments in praise of God, which give the composer the opportunity to indulge in ornate illustration and interpretation of the words, as well as to introduce the very instruments themselves. Finally the liturgical practice of generally concluding every psalm with the standard formula of the Lesser Doxology (“Glory be to the Father .. .” - “Ehre sei dem Vater ...”) can be exploited to provide the formal conclusion necessary to round off a composition which has followed the informal succession of the verses of the psalm. This can be done by setting the words to new music which recognizably forms a conclusion, or it may be found equally successful to bring back earlier music, in the manner of a reprise, but this time using it to set the words of the doxology. The Psalms of David (Psalmen Davids), published in 1619, was Schütz’s first sacred composition. He described the work as “German psalms in the Italian style”, and was at pains to emphasize that he had been “diligently supervised by [his] beloved and world-renowned preceptor Master Johan Gabrieli”. Certainly some important features of the work derive from techniques pioneered by Giovanni Gabrieli, with whom Schütz studied during his first stay in Venice (1609-13). Foremost among them is the mastery of colour and sonority, the skill and imagination brought to the deployment of the widest range of compositional techniques. This goes hand in hand with the opulent treatment of words, which are vividly illustrated - even painted - and interpreted in a manner which nonetheless never allows them to become detached from the musical context but always leaves them integrated in it. Other characteristic elements of Schütz’s Italian style include the alternation between different units among his forces, producing an effect similar to registral changes, the building of immense crescendos by gradually increasing the number of parts and voices, and the multifarious contrasts, resulting most notably from the juxtaposition of tuttis and solo ensembles, or of vertical harmony and linear polyphony. There is further the optional participation of instruments as an additional sound source. Finally, the distribution of the musical means employed among groups placed in physical separation from each other has the result that, to a certain extent, the building itself becomes part of the composition as its spaces and planes fill with the music. Schütz’s use of a continuo, generally in an obbligato role, is new, although it is still Italian in inspiration. In passages where the voices are few Schütz employs it to support them, but it becomes the foundation of the chordal harmony when the full choral forces are engaged. This may be regarded as a concrete consequence of a major change in the ideal of sacred vocal music, at a time when the instrumental element was steadily encroaching on it. One of the most significant innovations, however, is the fact that, in transferring all these techniques from the preserve of clerical Latin to Luther’s German, Schütz suits the musical declamation to the specific character of the vernacular texts in such a way as to render the sound and the meaning of the words immediately comprehensible to everyone. In the preface to the Psalms of David he gives this style a name which he also brought from Italy: they are composed “in stylo recitativo (till now almost unknown in Germany)” - a remark which undoubtedly has a promotional intent, but also emphasizes that the musical setting is designed to assist understanding (and should be performed accordingly). The Psalms of David consists of 26 polychoral settings of psalms and two other biblical texts, the majority of them very sumptuous and imposing in style. Their performance requires between one and three choirs of so-called favoriti, which, as Schütz states in his preface, “the Kapellmeister should recruit from the best and most pleasing” of his singers. With few exceptions the part-writing for these choruses is for soloists or very small groups, which may however be supported by instruments. Fourteen of the settings also call for one or two large choirs in addition to the favoriti; these “are included for volume and splendour”, and in most cases they can be made up of voices, instruments or a mixture of both ad libitum. The present recording brings together the last ten of these settings, which between them exemplify the most notable features of the entire collection. “Nun lob, mein Seel, den Herren”, designated “canzon”, is a chorale version of a metrical paraphrase of Psalm 103 (“Praise the Lord, O my soul”). For two of the pieces Schütz uses the term “moteto”, thus invoking a style of part-writing with an established tradition, in which the imitative polyphony produces vocal lines which are more independent than in homophonic, chordal textures. Three of the settings are designated “concerto”: another term of Italian origin which was still new to the German-speaking world. Schütz uses it to draw attention to the “concertante” principle, exemplified in these pieces by the balanced alternation between sections for tutti and those for solo voices with continuo accompaniment. Finally it should be mentioned that the selection on this recording includes all nine of the pieces in the collection for which Schütz specifies the exact instrumentation. They include the magnificent setting of Psalm 150, which calls for many of the instruments named in the text, and a version of Psalm 136 which makes highly effective use of a trumpet and timpani, as well as a chorus of trombones. The only purely vocal setting is the “concerto” “Lobe den Herren”. By far the greater part of Schütz’s surviving œuvre consists of sacred vocal music. There are a small number of secular vocal works, but no purely instrumental works have survived at all. In consequence a totally distorted picture has been formed of his actual production. From 1616 until his death Schütz was Kapellmeister at the court of the Elector of Saxony in Dresden. His duties in this capacity included the provision not only of sacred music but also of operas, ballets and other music for the theatre, and a large number of purely instrumental pieces. Compositions of this nature, however, were always associated with specific occasions, and the court owed it to itself to have only new music performed on state occasions and for family festivities: as a result, the music was performed only once as a rule, was not printed, and has, with few exceptions, been lost. As a pious Lutheran who had received an excellent humanistic education, Schütz entertained from the first quite different intentions with regard to his sacred music. That is already clear from the systematic way in which he grouped these works according to their genres and the forces for which they were written, and published them in collections, for which, furthermore, he wrote highly instructive prefaces. It is also significant that Schütz systematically gave all his published collections opus numbers - and was one of the very first composers to do so. While printing guaranteed dissemination and survival for his works, opus numbers signified the inviolable, definitive character the works had in their composer’s own estimation. Although the sacred music, too, was often written for specihc occasions, he intended it to have a more than ephemeral existence and to be used again and again during the church year. It was also his intention, as the many works not intended directly for liturgical use testify, that, independently of any particular occasion, his music should be recognized as being, of its very nature as art, a means of praising God and serving mankind. It would, of course, be one-sided to look for Schütz’s greatness only in his word-setting. Rather, his special achievement lies in the very fact that his music presents a meaningful and wholly integrated entity, even without particular regard to the text, by the deployment of specifically musical formal means. His hrst sacred opus, the Psalms of David, is already an eloquent witness to that: it is not necessary to look further than the concluding item, the end which crowns the work. The last section of this “concerto” is what the list of contents describes as the “Ripieno of Psalm 112 'O praise the Lord, all ye heathen'” and employs full choral forces; it is rounded off by the reprise-like repetition of the Alleluia in a jubilant hymn of praise which is simultaneously a refulgent finale. Perhaps, after all, in this union of verbal sense and purely musical formal considerations, the lost instrumental œuvre of Kapellmeister Schütz is sublimated and subsumed in the surviving sacred works of Schütz the musicus poeticus ecclesiasticus. Wolfram Steinbeck (Translation: Mary Whittall)