continue (1668) Motets à deux III et IV parties, pour voix et instruments, avec la basse continue (1681) The most important of these is Meslanges à II, III, IV & V parties avec le Bassecontinue contenant plusieurs chansons, motets, magnificats, Préludes et allemandes pour orgue et pour les viols. Et la litanie de la Vierge, [re]published in partbooks posthumously by Ballard under the title: Motets pour la Chapelle du Roy, mis en musique par Monsieur Dumont Abbé de Silly, et Maistre de la Musique de ladite Chapelle... Imprimez par exprès commandement de Sa Majesté. In addition, the Bibliothèque Nationale holds numerous works in manuscript among which is Dialogus de anima for five voices, a masterpiece that is his only true oratorio. Legacy The anthology Cantica sacra published in 1652 contained motets for 1, 2, 3 or 4 soloists with continuo, the first of their kind in France. What was new was not the use of continuo (for which there was some precedent) but the combining, in sacred music, of solo voices with obbligato instruments, particularly in the petits motets for one or two voices. Here there are many innovations, such as the introduction of typical Italian devices such as vocalise and echo. The grand motets also look forward to those later written for Versailles. The oratorio genre and the recitativo style are both prefigured in the dialogue motets. As to the continuo, if he did not introduce it to France, he was the first to print a separate partbook and thus did much to propagate its use. His grands motets pour la Chapelle Royale (1686) reunite all the formal experiments of his previous work. It is notable that Dumont's motets were sung in parish churches into the 1730s, that is, 60 years after his death. Grands Motets Dumont's grands motets for the Chapelle Royale are the first representatives of the genre. Unlike the later works of Lully, Delalande, Desmarest, Charpentier, Mondonville and Rameau they are not made of successive movements unified by key and thematic material - rather, the versets (without final barline, regardless of what appears in some modern editions) are linked and ordered with a constant eye towards contrast, which can also be seen in the deployment of the performing forces: soloists, groups of soloists, sub-choir, ripieno and orchestra all join, retire, engage in dialogue, and reunite, the solo voices rejoining the choir. The five-part writing is typical