ANTON BRUCKNER Born 4 September 1824 in Ansfelden, Upper Austria; died 11 October 1896 in Vienna Two Motets for Chorus In 1856, just before he started taking counterpoint lessons from Simon Sechter (to whom Schubert had applied for instruction just before his premature death in 1828), Bruckner composed a setting of the Ave Maria, the supplication to the Virgin derived from the annunciation, for solo voices, four-part chorus and organ. He then refrained almost completely from creative work during the five-year course of tuition with Sechter, which he carried on by mail and occasional visits to Vienna from his post as organist in Linz. Bruckner marked the end of his study in 1861 with another version of the Ave Maria text, this one for unaccompanied seven-part chorus. (His third Ave Maria, for contralto and organ, dates from 1882.) The 1861 Ave Maria is generally regarded as the first masterwork among his motets, and its premiere at Linz on May 15, 1861, in which he debuted in the joint roles of conductor and composer, marked the beginning of his artistic maturity. Ave Maria gratia plena Dominus tecum. Hail, Mary, full of grace; the Lord is with thee. Benedicta tu in mulieribus Blessed art thou amongst women, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Jesus. and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Sancta Maria, mater Dei, Holy Mary, Mother of God, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, pray for us sinners, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen. now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Bruckner composed Locus iste for the dedication of the votive chapel in the new Linz Cathedral in 1869, and premiered it at the Cathedral on September 25th as a pendant to a performance of the E minor Mass. He revived Locus iste eleven years later, when he included it as the gradual in his D minor Mass on June 6, 1880, the first work of his to be heard in Vienna after the calamitous premiere of the Third Symphony in 1877. Locus iste a Deo factus est This dwelling is God’s handiwork; inaestimabile sacramentum a mystery beyond all price irreprehensibilis est. that cannot be spoken against. .