The Golden Jewels of Zacateca and Potosi

The new world cities of Zacateca in Mexico and Potosi were developed in the sixteenth centuries in the Spanish quest for gold. What was found in far greater quantities in both high-altitude settlements was silver. By the seventeenth-century a fusion of locally composed polyphonic music had entered and altered the church music brought by the Spanish in the early sixteenth century, most notably in the rhythmic addition of villancicos, and its indigenous dance rhythms and poetic forms. Featuring vibrant baroque music from Mexico, South American and Spain, we showcase the splendour of polyphonic writing that emerged in such musical centres as Mexico City, Zacateca, Cuzco and Potosi where new and old-world musical traditions and languages merged in the seventeenth-century.