The Benedictine monastery of Saint Gall (Sankt Gallen), situated near Lake Constance, acted in the early medieval period as a creative centre for the development of music and poetry concerned with the liturgy. To be found there were the oldest named composer-poets from the West, especially monks such as Ratpert (d.890), Notker (d.912) and Tuotilo (d.913). They enlarged and broadened the scope of existing liturgical chants with additions whose melodic and poetic inventiveness still provoke admiration today. Such tropes and sequences were brought together in the 10th century in Sankt Gallen’s codices 484 and 381, with a precise notation in numes which is unique to the Abbey.

Across a number of important and far-reaching recordings, musicologist Wulf Arlt and Dominique Vellard, along with his Ensemble Gilles Binchois have recovered and revived broad areas of medieval music. This collection of works from Sankt Gallen, which we are now reissuing, occupies a distinguished and noteworthy position because it presents the first music of Western culture which can be ascribed to individual creators. The recording itself was made in one of the most beautiful Romanesque churches in Switzerland in Romainmôtier.

One of a new series started in collaboration with the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Basel, Switzerland, this CD was recorded in the Église de Romainmôtier, Vaud, Switzerland in April 1996 (previously available as HMC905239).

Contents:
Gallus
1. Alleluia. Iustus ut palma
2. Sequentia Dilecte deo [Notker]

Nativitas
3. Introitus Puer natus est and tropes:
Hodie cantandus est [Tuotilo]
Hodie natus est
4. Alleluia. Dies sanctificatus
5. Sequentia Natus ante sæcula [Notker]
6. Communio Viderunt omnes and tropes:
- Hodie pectore mundo [attr. Tuotilo]
- Cernere quod

Johannes Evangelista
7. Introitus In medio ecclesiæ and tropes:
Dilectus iste [attr. Notker]
Quoniam dominus [Tuotilo]
Os tuum inquiens
Milibus argenti

Innocentes
8. Sequentia Laus tibi Christe [Notker]

Epiphania
9. Introitus Ecce advenit and tropes:
Hodie clarissimam
Forma speciosissimus [attr. Notker]
Olim quem

Versus ad Processionem
10. Versus Ardua spes mundi [Ratpert]

Pascha
11. Offertorium Terra tremuit and tropes:
Gaudete et cantate [Tuotilo]
Monumenta aperta sunt
Notus est dominus
In pace factus est

Dominica IV post octavam Paschæ
12. Sequentia Læta mente [Notker]

Ascensio
13. Introitus Viri Galilæi and tropes:
Ex numero frequentium [attr. Notker]
Quasi quid
14. Alleluia. Dominus in Sina
15. Offertorium Viri Galilæi

Pentecostes
16. Alleluia. Spiritus domini
17. Sequentia Sancti spiritus [Notker]