The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in August 1572 did not bring only death and desolation: on 5 September of this dark year, Pope Gregory XIII had the massacre celebrated as a liberation of the kingdom of France, and requested a Te Deum to be sung to thank God for saving the Most Christian French King from the heretics. The ensemble Huelgas has decided to explore the French Protestant music of that period (including that of composer Jacques Goudimel who was one of the victims of the ongoing murderous rage who had begun in Paris, but went on throughout France for another month or so, in Lyon in Goudimel’s case), but also that of Catholics who applauded the anti-Huguenot frenzy of the Pope. This album, a superb overview of sixteenth-century music, is divided in three parts: psalms set to music by several Huguenot musicians (with the texts by Clément Marot and Theodore de Beze taken from the famous Genevan Psalter published by Calvin), the papal rejoicings including a piece by Palestrina, and finally the profane and the sacred works in the Huguenot world. The Huelgas ensemble offers a deep insight on music, vocal and instrumental, on both sides of the Reformation in these troubled times. © SM/Qobuz