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The plainsong Salve regina (‘Hail, queen, mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope’) is one of the four Antiphons of the Blessed Virgin Mary, dating probably from the eleventh century and intended for singing at the end of Compline. By the thirteenth century it had become so closely identified with this rite that it was sometimes sung as a separate evening service, known in France as ‘Salut’, elsewhere as the ‘Salve’. It has since been the basis of many settings of the Mass and of other polyphonic compositions.

Langlais’s Missa Salve regina was first sung at Notre Dame, Paris, at Christmas 1954. It calls for unusual forces—male-voice chorus (TTBB), unison voices, two organs and an octet of brass instruments (three trumpets and five trombones). Two trumpets and two trombones play with the Great Organ (Grand Orgue), the remaining brass with the Choir Organ (Orgue de Chœur). The music is melodious and colourful, making much use of parallel fifths and octaves which suggest a twentieth-century update of early organum and give the music a solemn, monastic quality. The opening of the plainsong is prominent throughout the Mass.

from notes by Wadham Sutton © 1988