The Complete Motets 2

Lasso's first motet book after he took up residence in Munich was the Sacrae cantiones of 1562, twenty-five new motets for five voices, published in Nuremberg by Berg and Neuber. It was his most famous and influential motet collection, reprinted complete only five months later in Venice by Antonio Gardano and fourteen more times thereafter, in addition to many separate printings of individual pieces.

Forty-seven instrumental adaptations of the Nuremberg motets are known to have been printed, and the motets were frequently cited by contemporary theorists, notably Joachim Burmeister, whose discussions of oratory in music in his Musica poetica (Rostock, 1606) draw on Lasso's Nuremberg motet book far more than on any other composer or source.

All but one of the texts are scriptural or liturgical. The most famous motet in the collection is probably "In me transierunt irae tuae," which Burmeister uses to compare the construction of a motet to that of a speech by a persuasive orator.