| Ten years after the death of Juan Navarro in 1580, his music for Vespers was gathered and published in Rome through efforts of admirers. By means of this publication, entitled Joannis Navarri Hispalen. Psalmi, hymni ac Magnificat totius anni, and numerous manuscripts copied from this print as late as the eighteenth century, his music was disseminated in Spain, Portugal, and Mexico.;The information in this study can be divided into two categories: the music of Navarro and his revisions of that music. The first of these categories is limited to settings of pre-existent melodies, melodies that are given great prominence in Navarro's polyphony. One contribution of this study has been to identify and notate all of the uniquely Spanish melodies used by Navarro. Also included are transcriptions of all of Navarro's works based on pre-existent melodies except the works in his print of 1590, which have been edited and published in a modern edition by Samuel Rubio.;Each of Navarro's settings is guided largely by two factors: the nature of the pre-existent melody and the liturgical significance of its text. The longer chant melodies, such as antiphons, restrict the cadences in Navarro's polyphony less than do the shorter melodies, such as psalm tones and canticle tones. Navarro's settings of psalms, the shortest polyphonic settings, have more variety than those of this Spanish contemporaries.;During the 1570s, Navarro revised some of his early settings of psalms and hymns, partly in order to bring them into conformity with the Reformed Roman Breviary that had been published in 1568, but also to revise his early music according to his later, more mature style. The present study is a first effort to identify the specific changes in a Renaissance composer's style by examining Navarro's revisions of his own music. Generally, these revisions are more concise, more varied, and have a more active counterpoint than their early counterparts. A few revisions were made to clarify the mode of a setting or to control dissonance more completely. |
