Du fons de ma pensee (Gentian)

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  • (Posted 2012-01-13)  CPDL #25005:     
Editor: Dick Wursten (submitted 2011-11-26).   Score information: A4, 9 pages, 102 kB   Copyright: CPDL
Edition notes: Transcribed from the three remaining partbooks with added Bassus. Orthographical oddities (like "se" for "s'est" etc..) in the original text have been edited to facilitate performance by modern day musicians. The original spelling however is retained. Slight differences between the surviving partbooks have been streamlined. One error in the original text has been corrected: In the original partbooks (Tenor and Altus) the last line of the trio (secunda pars) reads: "Aussi au point du jour", which has to be "Assise au point du jour" (correct in Superius). The text used in this 1544 composition still largely follows the unofficial versions that circulated in print and manuscript before 1541.

General Information

Title: Du fons de ma pensee
Composer: Gentian
Lyricist: Clément Marot, based on Psalm 130

Number of voices: 4vv   Voicing: SATB
Genre: SacredPartsong

Language: French
Instruments: A cappella

First published: 1544 in Le difficile des chansons, Livre 2, no. 26
Description: Polyphonic version of Psalm 130, with French text by Marot, no link with the Geneva melody. Only three partbooks of this publication by Jacques Moderne are extant: Superius and Tenor (Germany, Bayerischer Staatsbibliothek); Altus (France, Library of Chantilly) The music is of high quality. So I asked Willem Ceuleers (http://www.ceuleers.eu) to add (reconstruct) a Bassus. While adding a Bassus he soon found out that the second part is perfect as it is: a trio. About the composer, Gentian, nothing is known. His name appears on some 20 compositions (chansons), published in Paris between 1538 and 1558. This one is the exception (a Psalm text, Lyon)

External websites:

Original text and translations

French.png French text

Du fons de ma pensée
Au fons de mes ennuys
À toi s’est adressée
Ma clameur jours et nuyctz
Entends ma voix plaintive
Seigneur, il est saison
Ton oreille attentive
Soit en mon oraison.

Si tu veux par rudesse
Nos pechez mesurer
Seigneur, Seigneur qui est ce
Qui pourra endurer
Or n’es-tu point sévère
Mais propice à mercy.
C’est pourquoy on revere
Toy et ta loy aussy.

En Dieu, je me console,
Mon ame s’y attend,
En sa ferme parolle
Tout mon espoir s’estend.
Mon âme à Dieu regarde
Matin et sans séjour,
Matin avant la garde
Assise au point du jour.

Qu’Israel en Dieu fonde
Hardiment son appuy
Car en Dieu grâce habonde
Et secours est en luy,
C’est celuy qui sans doubte
Israel jectera
Hors d’iniquité toute
Et le rachètera.