Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Stabat Mater

As I mentioned on my regular blog, the sequence "Stabat Mater" has been set to music by numerous compsers. As promised, here are some samples in various styles culled from many more available on YouTube. Enjoy.

Here's a different version of the first stanza as set by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi.

Palestrina's late Renaissance version, which goes all the way through without repeating the text.


An excerpt from Rossini's setting, with Luciano Pavarotti singing.


At one point I collected a number of recordings by different composers. Talking to a colleague of mine at work who had studied Latin, I jokingly referred to my "collection of Stabant Matres" putting the title in the plural (which is as if I were to refer to a collection of various editions of the play "She Stoops to Conquer" as my collection of "They Stoop to Conquer").
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7 comments:

  1. AnonymousSeptember 17, 2009 at 1:37 AM

    ABC Classic FM 100 symphony countdown http://www.abc.net.au/classic/classic100/
    countdowns nearly wrapped up only less than 30 symphonies before number appears

    ReplyDelete
  2. PilgrimSeptember 17, 2009 at 10:51 AM

    I love the Pergolesi one! Propz Pilgrim

    ReplyDelete
  3. naturgesetzSeptember 18, 2009 at 2:48 PM

    Thanks for the comments.

    @ Anonymous — Thanks for the link. I've listened to some of it, and it's interesting to see how it goes. I'll continue this evening (Saturday morning your time) for as long as I can. Also posting a link in my broadcast/streaming list.

    @ Pilgrim — I find it very powerful, too. The Rossini is beautiful, opulent music, but not so rooted in the text as Pergolesi, IMO.

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  4. MirrorboySeptember 18, 2009 at 11:46 PM

    Stabat Mater. Move the 'ma' to the front, remove the third 't', and you get what sounds like Masturbator. ^_^

    ReplyDelete
  5. naturgesetzSeptember 21, 2009 at 2:25 PM

    @ Mirrorboy — >_<

    Actually it doesn't work, because the "a's" in "sta" and "ma" are long, but the one in "bat" is short. So you have to keep that third "t" so you won't give a long pronunciation to the short vowel. So if you anglicize the pronunciation, it comes out sounding like "maystaybatter," which sounds as if it has to do with baseball or cricket. :P

    LOL

    P.S. I thought I posted this a couple of days ago. Dunno why it didn't make it to the blog.

    ReplyDelete
  6. MirrorboySeptember 21, 2009 at 6:50 PM

    I always say it like maystaybattion, therefore i am RIGHT. No further discussion. lol

    ReplyDelete
  7. naturgesetzSeptember 21, 2009 at 7:26 PM

    LLOL (Literally LOL)

    ReplyDelete

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