Descendit angelus

Hilaire Penet’s setting of Descendit angelus Domini is a sacred motet for STTB voices in Latin. The text, taken from the Gospel of Luke, recounts the annunciation to Zechariah concerning the birth of John the Baptist. The angel assures Zechariah that his prayer has been heard and that he and his wife Elizabeth will have a son, who will be named John. Penet's music sets this biblical narrative with a style characteristic of Renaissance sacred polyphony. The four-part texture of STTB provides rich harmonic possibilities for expressing the divine message and the human response of faith and obedience within the devotional context of the motet tradition.