Viderunt omnes !
The programme Viderunt omnes ! presents compositions from the Middle Ages and early Renaissance, all of which have a connection with Paris and its cathedral Notre-Dame.
It begins with a liturgical song written in XIIIe in honour of Saint Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris, and evokes the procession of the relics of the saint who preceded the end of the crisis of the evil of the ardent, « burning fire » which reduced the Parisians to despair around 1130. The procession, which had passed through the Latin Quarter, was returned to the early cathedral dedicated to Notre-Dame.
Ceremony of the descent of the reliquary shawl of Saint Geneviève at the Abbey of Sainte-Geneviève in Paris.
Procession of the shawl of Sainte-Geneviève Abbey in Paris.
A few decades later, in parallel with the construction of the present Gothic cathedral in a Paris admired for its rich intellectual and artistic life, polyphonic masterpieces from « The School of Notre Dame » spread throughout Europe. Initiated by improvisers and/or composers of genius – anonymous or who have reached posterity – it has profoundly marked the history of Western music with its conduits, motets and rhythmic organa whose flamboyant jewels will be presented as the monumental Viderunt omnes Perotin the Great.
The following composers worked at the cathedral respectively as chaplain, morning clerk or master of choir children. You will hear the only piece that came to us from Aubert Billard, a motet that praises the Virgin, remarkable representative of the Ars subtilior, this musical style refined to the complexity such that only the best singers of the time could read the rhythms. A few years later,Agnus Dei d-Étienne Grossin spreads his soothing counterpoint to demand peace. The concert ends with two jewels by Antoine Brumel, master of the Franco-Flamand polyphony of the all-new Renaissance: a Ave. Maria With three voices and a magnificent four-voiced motet whose words from Jeremiah's Lamentations evoke Jerusalem in ruins.
The programme Viderunt omnes ! is given by 5 singers. In the following photo, from left to right: Vincent Pislar, Erwan Picquet, Renaud Tripathi, Emmanuel Bouquey and Christian Ploix.
