El cant de la Sibil·la (The Song of the Sibyl) is performed during midnight mass on Christmas Eve in every church on the island of Mallorca. It is one of the most deeply-rooted, living practices of the music of oral tradition in Catalan-speaking regions: an a cappella song about the Final Judgement and the Second Coming of Christ, sung by the Erythraean Sibyl incarnated as a boy or a girl.
Although the performance of this song as a liturgical drama during the Christmas Eve mass was a practice spread by Christianity, it was prohibited by the Council of Trent in the middle of the 16th century in an attempt to unify and order the Liturgy. This prohibition was not adhered to in Alghero nor in Mallorca, where the song has survived to the present day and the ritual is a key event in Mallorca’s festive calendar.
The parish church of Santa Madrona will hold a special mass during which the Song of the Sibyl will be sung by Inès Mas, a sibyl from Campos, a village in the Migjorn region of Mallorca.
The Song of the Sibyl of Mallorca was declared an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2010.
**Wednesday, December 21 at 6:30 p.m., the musicologist Francesc Vicens Vidal will present the social and musical fact of the tradition of the song of the Sibyl in Mallorca. Parish Church of Santa Madrona. Free access with prior reservation at reservesmuseu@auditori.cat. Limited capacity.
A liturgical service (mass) in association with the Religious Affairs Office and the Catholic Church