Dan Schwartz

Mass: De Feria, Palestrina

1.) Throughout the work, Palestrina employs various types of imitation, perhaps in an
effort to keep a work on such a simple, repetitive text interesting. In the opening
kyrie section, Palestrina begins with paired imitation. The altus enters with the cantus
coming in a fifth higher, two bars later. This pair is echoed on the same pitch,
although an octave lower, in the bassus and tenor. Upon restatement of the kyrie, in
measure 9, the paired imitation comes back, acting as a reentry. This time however,
the paired entries are overlapped, with the diminished motive in the cantus echoed by
the tenor a fifth below. The altus has already entered before the tenor (measure 11),
and is echoed by the bassus a fifth below (these two voices maintain the rhythmic
integrity of the original motive). This second point of imitation acts more like a
cascading, stretto effect, than paired imitative duets, but the rhythmic alteration, and
notes chosen (‘a’ and ‘e’ in the altus and bassus vs. the original ‘f’ and ‘c’ in the
cantus and tenor) really link the voices into pairs.

The christe section proves just as interesting. Again the entries seem grouped into
paired imitative duets (m. 20), but the bassus and altus misbehave. The temporal
length of the entry of the altus is noticeably extended, not to mention the fact that it is
coupled with the bassus, who has a reentry doubling the altus at a third lower.

By just looking at these three entries, no two points of imitation are the same, and
temporal length of entry, motivic change, coupling, overlapping/cascading effect, and
other features ensure that Palestrina kept the piece interesting, since he was restricted
to repeating the same text over and over.

2.) There is one strong internal cadence. While there are a few 4-3 suspensions that turn
into cadential gestures in the opening kryrie section, every cadence seems avoided
and weekend by running quarter notes in at least one voice (ex. m. 10, with an
interrupted cadence in both the cantus and bassus). The one, strong internal cadence
seems to happen in the christe section, measures 24-25. Again, we have a 4-3
suspension to an authentic cadence, but this time all three voices hold their pitch, and
the altus enters on the cadence, eliding their entrance of the imitation with completing
the cadential chord by adding the 5th. This seems to be the strongest internal cadence,
and any other gesture of suspension to cadential material is fairly weak except for the
conclusions of each big section.
3.) There is a suspension in measure 6:

4-3
5

There is a suspension in measure 18:

4-3
8
5

There is a suspension before the one strong internal cadence in measure 24:

4-3
5

4.) Measure 8: minim passing tone

9: Lower neighbor minim and a 6/5 in the altus and tenor
28: consonant 4th
38: accented passing tone, minim passing tone at end of bar
51: this is a 2-1 suspension. Do we call this a 9-8 sus?
61: minim passing tone