motet notes - Stanford

Following the death of Purcell in 1695, English music went into a long period of decline that was not reversed until the late 19th century. Of the many musicians who helped to bring about the English musical renaissance it was Charles Stanford was one the most influential. This musical revival reached its full flowering with Elgar and continued with Vaughan Williams and a whole new generation of talented composers.

As a teacher of composition, Sir Charles Stanford was without equal. A list of his many pupils at the Royal College of Music reads like a Who’s Who of early twentieth-century British music: Vaughan Williams, Gustav Holst, Herbert Howells and Arthur Bliss to name only the most well-known. He was a prolific and highly regarded composer himself, with seven symphonies and five concertos to his name, as well as string quartets, operas, oratorios and numerous other compositions. Although there has been a revival of interest in some of the symphonies and chamber music, most of these works are now largely forgotten. In the field of church music, however, Stanford’s music has consistently been held in the highest regard.

"Beati quorum via" comes to us from a set of three motets that were published in 1905, but probably date from 1892. It is in six parts with divided sopranos and basses used antiphonally and homophonically.  The meditative text from Psalm 119 shows Stanford at his most lyrical.  

‍