Donald Macleod surveys one of the most famed Spanish composers of the Renaissance, Tomás Luis de Victoria. Tomás Luis de Victoria has become the most famed Spanish composer of the Renaissance and ranks alongside Palestrina and Lassus as one of the greatest composers of the 16th century. He was a singer, organist, scholar, teacher, and a priest but it was in composition that he made his most significant impact. His motets, Offices for the Dead and music for Holy Week are admired for their great beauty and intensity and his musical talent thrust him into the orbit of Spain’s royal family and the most senior clerics in Rome. His devotion to God sat at the heart of his creative life; and he wrote, “there is not a single thing as useful as music, which, reaching our hearts soft but deeply, provides a clear benefit not only for our soul but also for our body.” Music Featured: O magnum mysterium Ave Maria Missa pro defunctis (Taedet animan meam) Missa pro defunctis (excerpt) Missa pro...