Description
Jacob Obrecht’s Parce Domine is a luminous four-voice motet on the penitential plea, “Spare, O Lord.” Characteristic of the late Franco-Flemish style, it sets a slow-moving, chant-derived cantus firmus in the bass beneath expressive, intertwining upper lines. Among Obrecht’s most widely circulated works, it appears in numerous early sixteenth-century sources and printed anthologies that secured his posthumous reputation. The motet exemplifies Obrecht’s mastery of large-scale design and melodic invention, transforming a brief liturgical refrain into an expansive and deeply moving meditation on divine mercy.
© Owain Park 2025
Parce Domine, populo tuo
quia pius es et misericors.
Exaudi nos in aeternum, Domine.
Spare, O Lord, spare thy people,
for Thou art gracious and merciful.
Hear us for ever, O Lord.
c. 6th century
