Marc-Antoine Charpentier's 'Messe de Minuit'

Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s early life is shrouded in mystery. Even his date of birth is unknown (estimated today as some time during the late 1640s in Paris), and although it is known that he went to Rome to study with the early master of the oratorio, Carissimi, the period of his stay there remains uncertain. Upon his return to France he is known to have fulfilled a number of church and aristocratic appointments as maître de musique. He now found himself in the paradoxical situation of being a Frenchman espousing the Italian liturgical style of Carissimi against the largely secular French style promoted by Lully, who was himself an expatriate Italian.

By the 1690s Charpentier’s style had gradually begun to merge both national characteristics. In the Messe de minuit pour Noël, probably written at some time in the early 1690s for use in the Christmas midnight Mass of the main Jesuit church in Paris, we find him combining traditional French carols with a contrapuntal manner that is typically Italian. A different carol melody forms the basis of the material for each section of the text. These sections (within the movements) alternate between solo and choral forces, while Charpentier’s use of the instrumental accompaniment is especially subtle, with the woodwind in particular imparting a pastoral flavour that is in keeping with the nature both of the folk tunes and of the festival itself.

Matthew Rye

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