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The Song of Songs, also known as the Song of Solomon, was a favorite source of texts for composers throughout the seventeenth century. This ancient Hebrew love poetry provided enough passion and drama to create interesting music while still technically counting as a sacred text, making it ideal for dramatic monody and also church-appropriate! This program includes the spritely intertwining of cornetto and voice in Tarquinio Merula’s Nigra Sum, the haunting and virtuosic Anima mea liquefacta est from Hieronymus Kapsberger’s collection of Motetti Passeggiati, and Nathaniel Cox’s own cornetto diminutions on Palestrina’s motet Pulchra es, amica mea. With cornetto, organ, theorbo, and voice, this program showcases some of the most colorful and sensual sacred music of the seventeenth century.

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Personnel:

Agnes Coakley Cox, soprano

Nathaniel Cox, cornetto and theorbo

John McKean, organ

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Works drawn from:

Giovanni Paolo Cima: Concerti Ecclesiastici (1610)
Giovanni Girolamo Kapsberger: Libro Primo di Motetti passeggiati (1612)
Tarquinio Merula: Il Primo Libro de Motetti (1628)

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