Valerio Bona’s ‘Missa Morir non può ’l mio core’ (1611): a further stage in the journey of Nanino’s popular madrigal

This article retraces the history of the circulation and assimilation of the madrigal Morir non può ’l mio core by Giovanni Maria Nanino, highlighting several previously unexplored examples of sacred compositions it inspired. Among these is the Missa Morir non può ’l mio core, a sixteen-voice, four-choir work by the Brescian composer Valerio Bona (fl. 1590–1619), which is given particular focus. Like most of Bona’s works, this Mass has come down to us incomplete; however, analysis clearly reveals the main formal strategies and techniques of musical borrowing used by the com-poser. Rather than drawing conceptual parallels between the text of the madrigal and the Mass Ordinary, Bona’s attention is directed towards creating structural coherence within each section of the Mass and across the entire cycle. This case study also provides an opportunity to examine the criticisms made of Bona by Michael Praetorius in the third volume of his Syntagma Musicum (1619). Despite its incomplete form, this Mass—and many other incomplete works still awaiting study—offers valuable insights into the networks of influence, intellectual exchange, and compositional practices that shaped early seventeenth-century music.