05/25/2026
Eastman professor emeritus Patrick Macey recently reconstructed a motet by Jean Mouton for performances by the Chicago-based early music ensemble Schola Antiqua, led by professor Michael Alan Anderson in a program of music from the circle of Pope Leo X (early 16th c.) The piece is a setting of the "laudes regiae" (royal acclamations), beginning “Christ conquers, Christ reigns, Christ commands." This ceremonial form was first associated with the honoring of kings and emperors - perhaps even Charlemagne himself - before being adapted for popes, bishops, coronations, processions, and major feasts. By the Middle Ages, it had become one of the most powerful musical expressions of sacred authority. Mouton’s "Christus vincit" was likely written for Leo X’s election as pope in 1513, but for centuries it could not be performed: only two of the original voice parts survive (one just surfacing recently). Macey’s reconstruction allows the piece to sound again! A wonderful example of musicological scholarship moving from archive to audible reality. Shown below: a snapshot of the new edition prepared for the performances.