João Lourenço Rebelo

João Lourenço Rebelo, or João Soares Rebelo (1610 – 16 November 1661) was the only Portuguese composer to adopt the Venetian polychoral style. Despite his closeness to King John IV of Portugal (1603–1656), and despite what is traditionally said, Rebelo never held any office in the royal household.

Life Rebelo was born in Caminha in 1610, the son of João Soares Pereira and Maria Lourenço Rebelo. In 1624, he became a choir boy at the Ducal Palace of Vila Viçosa, the ancestral seat of the Dukes of Braganza, while his older brother, Father Marcos Soares Pereira (?-1655) was admitted as chaplain-singer.

In keeping with the aristocratic patterns of behavior of the 17th century, and as a sign of pre-eminence, Teodósio II, the 7th Duke of Braganza (1568-1630) had created an academy for court musicians, the Colégio dos Santos Reis Magos (College of the Three Wise Kings), where Rebelo studied under Robert Turner (c.1578-1629), an Irish musician who himself had been a student of the Flemish composer Géry de Ghersem, and mestre de capela of the ducal chapel from 1616, and possibly also under Friar Manuel Cardoso,

In 1646 Rebelo was made a nobleman, Fidalgo de juro e herdade, of the Royal House and knighted with the Order of Christ, a position with significant financial benefits, the Comenda of São Bartolomeu de Rabal, providing an annual income of two hundred thousand réis. In 1652 Rebelo married Maria de Macedo, daughter of Domingos de Macedo, governor of Monção.

In the case of the letter to the Portuguese agent in Rome, dating from March 1654, the King wrote: “I have prepared some books for the press [containing] a complete series of vesper psalms, and other pieces for different choirs and voices by Juan Lourenço Rabelo (…)”.

In 1657 the workshop of Maurizio and Amadeo de Belmonte, in Rome, printed the collection of 33 pieces dated between 1636 and 1653, in the form of seventeen booklets respectively for voice and instrument, under the title Joannis Laurentii Rabello Psalmi, tum Vesperarum tum Completarum. Item Magnificat, Lamentationes et Miserere (Psalms, both of Vespers and of Compline. [And] also the Magnificat, the Lamentationes and the Miserere by João Lourenço Rebelo). Only one single copy of this edition had been preserved, thanks to the Italian priest Fortunato Santini (1776-1861), and is now preserved in the library of the Episcopal Seminary of Münster. A modern transcription was released in 1982 by Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation monumenta edition Portugaliae Musica. In addition, four volumes of the original impression survived in the Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal, from the Jesuit College of Santo Antão.

João Lourenço Rebelo died at Apelação (Loures) on 16 November 1661.

Music, style and influence Currently, only forty-four compositions are known from Rebelo, all published by Portugaliae Musica. Unfortunately, most of his works vanished in the Lisbon earthquake of November 1, 1755, with the destruction of the Music Royal Library. Any considerations made about Rebelo's music, style and influence are confined to this set of compositions.

Rebelo is a good illustration of the intriguing juxtaposition of tradition and innovation in Western music during most of the 17th century.

In his compositions, Rebelo strives for strong contrasts in sound and in the very texture of the musical architecture, mixing choirs of singers, solo singers, and voices and instruments. We can find Cantus firmus sung on long notes as the basis of splendid concertato counterpoint for six vox instrumentalis, like in Educes me (Psalm 31, verse 5), the endless repetition of musical figuration in Super Aspidem (Psalm 19, verse 13 – with 13 parts) or the typical sonorities of Monteverdi's madrigals in the charming Qui habitat (Psalm 91, verse 1-6).

At the same time Rebelo knows how to evoke the Roman School polyphony, like is in seven-part motet Panis angelicus, full of harmonic false relations or in his Lamentationes, in which the composer achieves effects through the use of piercing chromatic harmonies.

There is no evidence of Rebelo's music being played in the Royal Chapel, which is not surprising since Rebelo has not held any official position. The king himself says, in the dedication of his musical treatise, that he saw Rebelo's music books not heard his music. We may consider the hypothesis of private musical sessions, only with the king attending but, again, the absence of documentary evidence in this matter, refers us to the field of assumptions.

Probably, most of Rebelo's compositions were made in a theoretical and aesthetic sense, looking for a particular style or concept of music more than the display of contrapuntal virtuosity or secure a place in History. As Paul Van Nevel says regarding Rebelo's music: “For him, music was an absolute art with its own ideas that were not necessarily connected to any text (…). One must conclude that Rebelo wrote in the way that momentarily suited him: he either composed music to serve a text or music in which the text is only a background for the expression of purely musical ideas”.

Modern editions Psalmi tum Vesperarum, tum Completorii: Item Magnificat Lamentationes e Miserere, Vol. I / João Lourenço Rebelo / 1982 / Psalmi tum Vesperarum, tum Completorii: Item Magnificat Lamentationes e Miserere, Vol. II / João Lourenço Rebelo / 1982 / Psalmi tum Vesperarum, tum Completorii: Item Magnificat Lamentationes e Miserere, Vol. III / João Lourenço Rebelo / 1982 / Psalmi tum Vesperarum, tum Completorii: Item Magnificat Lamentationes e Miserere, Vol. IV / João Lourenço Rebelo / 1982 /

Recordings 1996 Sacred Music from Seventeenth Century Portugal Melgás & Rebelo. The Sixteen, dir. Harry Christophers, Collins Classics 1465, reissued as Coro 16020 2000 Rebelo Vesper Psalms and Lamentations. Huelgas Ensemble, dir. Paul Van Nevel, Sony Vivarte 53115 2002 João Lourenço Rebelo Psalmi, Magnificat & Lamentationes. Currend, Erik van Nevel, Eufoda 1344