Still and silent outside this morning...

The silence being broken only by the occasional bird and machina, piloted or driven. The Moon, last night as on the two or three previous ones, was a livid red-orange, this presumably due to the smoke in the atmosphere which (unlike two days ago) I don't smell. I suppose this has to do with the winds? The mages predict another reach to the mid-90s but it is supposed to decline from that fairly expeditiously, thank goodness. It is the Vigil of the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady (Introibo, CE, Wiki) with a commemoration of the confessor Saint Eusebius (Introibo, CE, Wiki). The Mass is Vultum tuum deprecabuntur.

The annual festival Chopin and His Europe (here) begins today with a performance at 1100 of the 1860 opera Verbum nobile by Stanisław Moniuszko. I don't know if all the concerts are livestreamed or not; I seem to recall from last year that they are. Time for Prime. 

Marc-Antoine Charpentier's last Mass, from 1702, two years before his death, is Assumpta est Maria H 11. From Dr Cressac's Marc-Antoine Charpentier (trans Glasow 1995, p 315). 

Two versions of this Mass exist, one for four-part string orchestra... and the other [H 11a] in separate parts scored for small trio ensemble (two violin dessus parts and basso continuo). Nevertheless, outside of the reduced accompaniment in the work as a whole, only the 'symphonies' preceding the Kyrie, the Sanctus, and the Agnus Dei differ from those of the first [H 11] version.

I believe both of those are the H 11. 

The next of Charpentier's works devoted to Our Lady's Assumption are settings of three antiphons from the day's Office, H 50, 51, and 52. This is H 51, In odorem unguentorum, the 3rd antiphon at Lauds and Vespers, from the Canticum canticorum. 

Ant. In odórem unguentórum tuórum cúrrimus: adolescéntulæ dilexérunt te nimis.

And H 52, alas not embeddable, here, performed by Les Voix Baroques on their album Canticum Canticorum. The text is that of the 5th antiphon at Lauds and Vespers.

Ant. Pulchra es et decóra, fília Jerúsalem, terríbilis ut castrórum ácies ordináta.

I'll guess that the text of H 50 is that of the 1st antiphon at Lauds and Vespers, Assumpta est Maria in caelum.

Ant. Assúmpta est María in cælum: gaudent Angeli, laudántes benedícunt Dóminum.

But I cannot find a recording at YT, tsk. 

Ante Sextam. The concert performance of Verbum nobile was a wonderful treat on a Saturday morning; the Chopin Institute is in fact livestreaming tomorrow's concert-- works by Karol Kurpiński, Karol Lipiński, Jakub Gołąbek, and Chopin-- and I'll go ahead and assume that all of 'em are being streamed.

It is also the feast of Saint Fachta (6th century), of Saint Marcellus (4th century), and of Saint Arnulfus (11th century).

V. Et álibi aliórum plurimórum sanctórum Mártyrum et Confessórum, atque sanctárum Vírginum. R. Deo grátias.

LDVM