Virga Jesse
Motet by Anton Bruckner
Immaculate Conception (Wintershouse)
KeyE minor
CatalogueWAB 52
FormGradual
TextVirga Jesse floruit
LanguageLatin
Dedication100th anniversary of the Linz diocese
Performed8 December 1885 (1885-12-08): Vienna
Published1896 (1896): Vienna
VocalSATB choir

Virga Jesse (The branch from Jesse), WAB 52, is a motet by the Austrian composer Anton Bruckner. It sets the gradual Virga Jesse floruit for unaccompanied mixed choir.

History

The work was completed on 3 September 1885 and may have been intended for the celebration of the one-hundredth anniversary of the Linz diocese; however, like the Ecce sacerdos magnus that Bruckner composed A.M.D.G. for that event, it was not performed there.[1][2] It was performed on 8 December 1885 in the Wiener Hofmusikkapelle for the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.[1]

The original manuscript is archived at the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, and transcriptions of it at the Hofmusikkapelle and the Abbey of Kremsmünster.[3] The motet was edited together with three other graduals (Locus iste WAB 23, Christus factus est WAB 11, and Os justi WAB 30), by Theodor Rättig, Vienna in 1886.[1] The motet is put in Band XXI/34 of the Gesamtausgabe.[4]

Setting

This 91-bar gradual in E minor is for mixed choir a cappella. In the first part on the verse Virga jesse floruit (bars 1-20) Bruckner used twice the Dresdner Amen on the word floruit (bars 7-9 and 17-19).[1] The last part (bars 63-91) consists, as in the earlier Inveni David WAB 19, of an Alleluja, for which Bruckner drew his inspiration from the Hallelujah of Händel's Messiah, on which he often improvised on organ.[5] The motet ends in pianissimo by the tenor voice on a pedal point.[6]

Max Auer regards it as the most accomplished and magnificent a cappella motet of the composer.[6] The Bruckner biographer Howie also calls this work "one of Bruckner's finest motets".[2]

Selected discography

The first recording of Bruckner's Vexilla regis occurred in 1931:

A selection among the about 80 recordings:

References

  1. ^ a b c d van Zwol, Cornelis (2012). Anton Bruckner – Leven en Werken. Thot. p. 708. ISBN 978-90-686-8590-9.
  2. ^ a b Howie, A. Crawford (2004). "Bruckner and the Motet". In Williamson, John (ed.). The Cambridge companion to Bruckner. Cambridge Companions to Music. Cambridge University Press. p. 61. ISBN 978-0-521-00878-5.
  3. ^ U. Harten, p. 467
  4. ^ Gesamtausgabe – Kleine Kirchenmusikwerke
  5. ^ van Zwol, Cornelis (2012). Anton Bruckner – Leven en Werken. Thot. p. 705. ISBN 978-90-686-8590-9.
  6. ^ a b M. Auer, pp. 73-77

Sources

External links

Anton Bruckner
Authority control databases
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