Nourse, N :: Divinum Mysterium (Illuminations on a Christmas Plainsong)

Nourse Wind Publications presents 'Illuminations on a Christmas Plainsong: Divinum Mysterium' set for flute choir by Nancy Nourse.

Performance notes by the arranger: The complex origins of this great Christmas hymn began with the liturgical poem 'Corde natus ex parentis' from the 'Liber Cathemerinon'. Penned by the Spanish monk, Aurelius Clemens Prudentius (348-c.410), this collection of verse provided hymns for the different canonical hours of the day as well as for special days of the church year. It is through the 1854 'Hymnal Noted' that John Mason Neale's English translation of the 'Corde natus' text, 'Of the Father's Love Begotten', became widely known

It was only in the nineteenth century that the Sanctus trope tune, 'Divinum Mysterium,' thought to be a twelfth century chant from Wolfenbutel, Germany, became attached to the 'Corde natus' text. When J.M. Neal and Thomas Helmore found this plainsong melody in the 1582 Finnish publication, 'Piae Cantiones', they connected it to Neal's translation of the 'Corde natus' verses. While it is this pairing that we enduringly know today, there are conflicting opinions as to whether the melody should be sun with a consistently rhythmic pulse (of triple time) or should retain the traditional, free-flowing plainchant style.