La Quintina

Nicholas Ludford, Missa Sabato

Mass for the kings of England

 

The Missa Sabato is part of a cycle of seven Masses for the Virgin offered by Nicholas Ludford to Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon . The music preserved today at the British Library in the royal collections in the form of four separate notebooks (Roy. App. 45-8) reveals intimate music with 3 voices. The observation of the original sources suggests that this music was devoted to an office in the private chapel of the monarchs. In this case, the positive organ could be replaced by its portable counterpart, the organetto, and the choir by solo voices. La Quintina offers an interpretation in this configuration in order to preserve the soft polyphony of Nicholas Ludford.