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With Hyperion's Mortuus est Phillipus Rex: Music for the life and death of the Spanish King, featuring the Choir of Westminster Cathedral led by the redoubtable James O'Donnell, it is not the singer, nor the song, but the subject that is the focus of the argument: Castilian King Philip II of Spain. While it has been a matter of dispute among some scholars, conventional wisdom tells us that King Philip was the architect of Spain's "Golden Age" and a devoted patron to what became a flourishing culture in the latter half of the sixteenth century. When he breathed his last breath at age 71 on September 13, 1598, he could see the High Altar of his Basilica from his deathbed and would also have presumably been able to hear its choir. The matter of Philip and music is what is essayed here, and he had rather pious musical tastes; with relatively minor exceptions, O'Donnell and his excellent crew provide an emotional and varied portrait of the King through music he either paid for, was dedicated to him, or both. Apart from Alonso Lobo, none of these composers are particularly well known.

The main event is the "Missa Phillipus Rex Hispaniae" of obscure Spanish renaissance composer Bartolomé de Escobedo, a follower of Josquin's practice who was likely known to Cristóbal Morales and has a somewhat similar style. The mass comes from a Vatican Library manuscript in horrible shape owing to ink corrosion and only yielded its secrets as the result of a painstaking transcription involving forensic techniques, high resolution color photography, and a small amount of conjecture as to what notes might belong in a particularly unreadable expanse of tangled ink bleed-through. It was worth the effort, as this is a glorious work with some thrilling, spine-tingling moments; the Westminster Cathedral Choir has some strong tenor voices, and when these rise up through the center of the texture between the boys and the basses it is a tremendously impressive sound. The two settings of the response "Versa est in luctum," by Sebastián de Vivanco and Alonso Lobo, respectively, are both searingly beautiful pieces, and of course the Lobo setting is the most famous of this particular text and should be familiar to most listeners that have some grounding in the Spanish renaissance. The works of Ambrosio Cotes and Don Fernando de las Infantas both belong here as they deal directly with Philip and can be related to events in his life, though as compositions they are a bit more run-of-the-mill renaissance than the others. The Lobo setting of "Libera me, Domine," is not so much a "setting" as a simple responsory, with plainchant and brief passages of polyphony. It takes a lot of work to recover such a composition, as the chant and the polyphony come from two different sources that need reconciling, even though the result is relatively plain and purely devotional and not the most compelling listening. However, this is the kind of music Philip himself like valued most highly; chant-based, functional, and designed for worship rather than entertainment.

While no location of recording is specifically listed here, it's safe to assume that "Mortuus est Phillipus Rex" would have been recorded at "home," the cavernous recesses of Winchester Cathedral. One would like some more heft in the low end of the recording; the men are not easy to hear in some passages and the boys tend to dominate the whole of the proceeding. However, these are very well-trained boys who sing very nicely, and everyone seems to connect on the Lobo "Versa est in luctum"; it is magical and moving. This disc was originally released in 1998 -- in connection with the anniversary of Philip II's death -- on the main Hyperion label; this is the Helios re-release from a decade later. Uncle Dave Lewis, All Music Guide

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