Modality as Orthodoxy and Exegesis: Strategies of Tonal Organisation in Victoria’s Motets

The essay examines Victoria’s motets in terms of their modal organisation. The most prominent feature of Victoria’s modal usage is his absolute orthodoxy to the eight-mode system as generally defined by the theorists of the time. Precisely this orthodoxy, however is for Victoria the perfect background for shaping compositions remarkable in several aspects. In fact, it allows Victoria some strategic deviations resulting on the one hand in the depiction of some textual images of a ‘visual’, quasi-Marenzian, strength, and on the other hand in musical contours that constitute true musical exegesis of the liturgical text.