Gaspar Fernandes (1566/70-1629) was a Portuguese composer who left his native Alentejo for a life as an organist and composer in the New World. For many years, he worked in the Cathedral of Santiago de los Caballeros de Guatemala (La Antigua Guatemala, diocesan see at the time), and then in the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, in Puebla de los Ángeles, New Spain (pictured below, as completed by Blessed Juan de Palafox not long after Fernandes' death).
In Xicochi conentzintle, in the tradition of the Spanish villancicos, Fernandes recalls in Nahuatl (already with ecclesiastical words of Greek and Hebrew origin) the presence of the guardian Angels - who watch over children, and a Child in particular.
Caumiz hui hui joco in angelos me, (while the Angels play music)
Alleluia, alleluia.
