Homages to Binchois and Duruflé
Benedictus – a Homage to Binchois (1976) mj108
It was a standard procedure during the Renaissance period for composers to write a Homage based on another composer’s work. Either a vocal line was transferred to another part and then the whole piece was re-worked, or a short passage (either at the opening or closing of a section) was used to generate a new composition. The melodist Gilles Binchois (c.1400-1460) was a Netherlandish composer of the Burgundian school (along with Dufay and Dunstable), whose musical ideas were used as sources for far more composers to rework than those of his contemporaries. In 1976 Malcolm Hill wrote a Homage to Binchois, for the choir of St Mary-the-Virgin, Primrose Hill in London. He took material from two cadences by Binchois and composed new music before it while maintaining Binchois’ standard structure and to some extent his harmonic style. The text comes from St. Luke 1 vv68-76, 79.
Ave Maria – a Homage to Duruflé (1989) mj170
This is an example of the other form of Homage – a tenor line hidden in Duruflé’s choral texture is given to the sopranos in the main repeating section and then the piece was re-worked to bring out its melodic character.