Mudarra’s setting of Psalm 126, the fourth psalm at Vespers on feasts of the Virgin Mary. The music is a brief 19 compases and sets only verse 1, repeating the same music for the two half verses. As the number of syllables varies for each susbsequent verse, it should be assumed that only the text give here is intended for singing.
The classification of the piece as mode 7 is rather anomalous. Venegas de Henestrosa reworked this work. See 1557/2, no. 74 [Anglés1944, 110: Fabordón I], transposing it a tone lower so that it concludes on G. Most of the harmony, hoever, is on the fourth degree of the mode, with a minor triad. Effectively, this makes the harmonic outline iv-V-I. Roa points out that Mudarra’s composition conforms to the second manner of Psalm fabordón setting described by Santa María, based on the “Seculorum” using the reciting tone as a melody, setting a bass to it that begins and ends on octaves and uses thirds in between (Roa2015, 411-412). This argument is not wholly satisfactory, but it does explain the musical behaviour.