Missa Pange lingua

The Missa Pange lingua is a musical setting of the Ordinary of the Mass by Franco-Flemish composer Josquin des Prez, probably dating from around 1515, near the end of his life. Most likely his last mass, it is an extended fantasia on the Pange Lingua hymn, and is one of Josquin's most famous mass settings.

The Missa Pange lingua is considered to be Josquin's last mass. It was not available to Ottaviano Petrucci for his 1514 collection of Josquin's masses, the third and last of the set; additionally, the mass contains references to other late works such as the Missa de Beata Virgine and the Missa Sine nomine. It was not formally published until 1539 by Hans Ott in Nuremberg, although manuscript sources dating from Josquin's lifetime contain the work. Famous copyist Pierre Alamire included it at the beginning of one of his two compilations of masses by Josquin.

The hymn on which the mass is based is the famous Pange Lingua Gloriosi, by Thomas Aquinas, which is used for the Vespers of Corpus Christi, and which is also sung during the veneration of the Blessed Sacrament. The mass is the last of only four that Josquin based on plainsong (the others are the Missa Gaudeamus, a relatively early work, the Missa Ave maris stella, and the Missa de Beata Virgine; all of them involve, in some way, praise of the Virgin Mary). The hymn, in the Phrygian mode, is in six musical phrases, of 10, 10, 8, 8, 8, and 9 notes respectively, corresponding to the six lines of the hymn. The work is tightly organized, with almost all of the melodic material drawn from the source hymn, and from a few subsidiary motives which appear near the beginning of the mass. As such, the Missa Pange lingua is considered to be one of the finest examples of a paraphrase mass.

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