La Flor en Paradis — The New Musical Art in Europe, 1250-1350

Synonymous with beauty, ornament, the allegory of God, and the evocation of Virginal purity, the flower is omnipresent in the Medieval imagination. The flower was also a symbol of nobility, power, and sensuality in the chapels and grounds of Medieval kingdoms. In the second half of the 13th century, these themes were essential to the blossoming and development of polyphony in the West.

Of all musical forms, the French motet (a derivative of “mot,” or word) established itself as the favored genre of the intellectual classes, particularly in Parisian academic and bourgeois circles. The motet—the fruit of the process of adding new voices to a pre-existing Gregorian melody—opened up new avenues for experimentation, becoming a vibrant vehicle for the exploration of novel compositional techniques and contrapuntal formulas. By juxtaposing different themes and subjects, the motet opened up an artistic universe in which to combine the sacred and the profane, as well as the literal and the allegorical. Serious plainchant entered into dialogue with amorous poetry, often with two or three different narratives superimposed in Latin and vernacular languages, creating combinations between reality and metaphor. In any case, the keen expressive power and compositional complexity of motets were known and appreciated by practical and theoretical musicians of the time, starting with the famous scholar Johannes de Grocheo (fl. 1300), who opined that "this type of music should not be played before vulgar audiences, as they cannot appreciate its refinement and take pleasure in it. Rather, it should be played before ecclesiastics and all those who seek subtlety in art.”

This concert presents a small selection of works composed between the years 1250 and 1350, performed mainly with the unique combination of voice and organetto, according to the Medieval practice of "intabulation": the small organ plays the lower voices while the singer performs the upper part, in this case sometimes also accompanied by the bowed fiddle. In addition to motets, Tasto Solo will perform other pieces characteristic of the Ars Antiqua (ca. 1170–1310) and the early Ars Nova (ca. 1310–1370), such as florid organum (Gregorian chant organized in long note values and embellished with rapid, virtuosic ornaments, or "flowers" in Medieval terminology), Latin sequences, instrumental dances led by percussion, and excerpts from the Mass ordinary, with most of these works being linked to the Marian devotion that flourished in the last centuries of the Middle Ages. Two main sources were used to create the program: the famous and precious "Codex Montpellier," a manuscript which, despite its small size, is of incalculable value as it contains the largest and most luxurious collection of richly decorated and illuminated 13th-century French motets; and the famous "Las Huelgas" manuscript, which compiles the music used by the nuns and expert singers of the Santa María la Real de Las Huelgas monastery in Burgos, Spain during the last decades of the 13th and early 14th centuries.