The Music of the Viceroyalty of Peru

Speaking broadly, the Spanish Viceroyalty of Peru includes the modern-day nations of Peru, Bolivia, Chile, and, at one point, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, Argentina, and Paraguay.  Essentially, for some time, the Spanish possessions in South America fell under this jurisdiction.  For our purposes here, I will include all those areas once in the Viceroyalty, including New Granada and Rio de la Plata.  As in New Spain to the north, Spanish culture was alive and well.  In what follows, you will find a few examples of the music of the Spanish New World colony.

The Viceroyalty of Peru at various stages: Green indicating its 17th century height, brown its 18th century boundaries.

To give a sense of the old political entity, this video presents a slide show of splendid baroque architecture of the old Viceroyalty.  Musically, this presents Dos Cachuacas written for Bishop Baltasar Jaime Martínez Compañón (Bishop of Trujillo, Peru from 1779-1790, and Archbishop of Santa Fe de Bogotá from 1790 to his death in 1797) and included in the "Códice Trujillo del Perú."

This piece, dating to 1631AD, is of Peruvian origin -- it seems it was published by a Fransciscan, Juan Pérez de Bocanegra, and employing the native Quechua language.  It is called, Hanacpachap cussicuinin, and is a processional hymn to Our Lady:

Next, Estacio Lacerna (+1625AD), born in Seville, and died in Peru.  This is an organ work Tiento de sexto tono, with photos of the Convent of Santa Clara de Sucre (Bolivia).

Tomás de Torrejón y Velasco (+1728AD) was a choirmaster of the catherdral at Lima, Peru.  This setting of the Mass for Six Voices is a good example of his work (this video only includes the first half of the musical setting of the Mass).  This images in this video are of the cathedral of Lima:

Juan de Araujo (+1712AD) was Iberian born, served as Choirmaster at Lima and at Cuzco, but ended up the Choirmaster in La Plata, now Sucre, Bolivia.  This is a setting of the Magnificat:

Andrés Flores (+1754AD) would succeed Araujo in Bolivia, and would write this setting of Tota Pulchra Es:

Finally, also writing in La Plata (Sucre), Bolivia, was Roque Ceruti (+1760AD), with this lively setting of Dixit Dominus:

Live well!