This programme evokes a Mexican Christmas at the height of the 18th century, when grand Matins services and Marian feasts were the true “oratorios” of the New World. Latin responsories and psalm settings stand alongside exuberant Spanish-language villancicos, creating a vivid dialogue between courtly polyphony and popular dance-like rhythms. Music by chapel masters in Mexico City and Puebla is heard together with works imported from Madrid, tracing a rich exchange between Iberia and New Spain: a glowing polychoral Mass in G with hunting horns, an opulently scored Dixit Dominus for Vespers, and movements from a Matins cycle for the Virgin of Guadalupe in which Baroque counterpoint shades into the new galant style. Trumpets, horns, oboes, strings, organ and guitars surround the choir with festive color, from martial fanfares and bell-like climaxes to tender nocturnal bird-songs greeting the dawn of Christmas. The result is a luminous, theatrical and deeply devotional portrait of Mexican Baroque spirituality at Christmastime.