• List Price: $15.99  
• Your Price: $15.99
• In Stock: 3

You must login to place orders.




Not purchasing for a business? See our consumer site.

The Pauline order was founded in Hungary at the end of the thirteenth century, and for a long time clung to the central Hungarian liturgical and musical customs as a sign of the order's own identity. When after 1600 they moved to the new Roman (Tridentine) liturgy, they wanted to preserve at least the musical aspect of the order's character, and so they reapplied the Roman chant texts to their own melodies from the Hungarian tradition, simplifying them a little where they saw fit. Compared to the old Gregorian chant this was a barbarian act, but this repertoire is a part of our music history, and if we listen to it as an expression of late Renaissance or early classical music, then undeniably, melodious and at times heart-rending chants were created in this manner. This dual, historical and aesthetic curiosity explains why it is worth presenting at least a small selection of this repertoire on a CD. The source was an anthem book of the Paulines in Sátoraljaújhely written in 1623 containing chants for the mass. It provides three movements for each feast: the introit, which begins the mass, the alleluia, and the communion chant. The two outer movements show less change compared to the Middle Ages, because even their texts mostly match those of the earlier tradition. The genuinely characteristic forms are to be found in the alleluias: these are usually new compositions based on old models, yet in the place of the old Gregorian ornamentations there are shorter aria-like melodic passages. The appendix to the Pauline gradual also contains ordinaries for the mass. In the first and the last cycle here (which contains the chants for the feast of Saint Paul the Hermit, the patron saint of the order) Schola Hungarica have recorded some of these pieces, which well demonstrate the new style.

Track Listing

Press Quotes

A wonderful spiritual, musical and acoustic experience

     —József Komlós Jr, Alfoldi Regio Magazine