Music for Holy Thursday: Amicus Meus

Equally beautiful , but more haunting is Victoria’s first tenebrae responsory for Holy Thursday. Notice how the verse ends with “se suspendit”—he hanged himself—a line reflected in the music with a half note and rest where you would expect a whole note to resolve.

Amicus meus osculi me tradidit signo:
Quem osculatus fuero, ipse est, tenete eum.
Hoc malum fecit signum,
qui per osculum adeimplevit homicidium.
Infelix praetermisit pretium sanguinis,
et in fine laquaeo se suspendit.

Bonum erat ei, si natus non fuisset homo ille.

My friend betrayed me with the sign of a kiss:
The one whom I will have kissed, he is the one, take him.
He made this evil sign,
he who through a kiss carried out murder.
The unhappy man passed over the price of blood,
and in the end with a noose he hanged himself.

It would have been better for that man if he had not been born.

Sung by Harry Christophers and the Sixteen