Donald Grout 'History of Western Music'
Chapter 2: Chant and Secular Song in the Middle Ages
I. Roman Chant and Liturgy
A. Office (Canonical Hours)
1. Codified in chap. 9-19 of the Rule of St. Benedict (ca.520)
2. Celebrations generally in monasteries throughout the day
3. Matins (before daybreak), Lauds (sunrise), Prime, Terce, Sext, Nones
(respectively at 6 am, 9 am, 12 pm and 3 pm), Vespers (sunset),
Compline (after Vespers).
4. Consists of prayers, psalms, canticles (New Testament passages),
antiphons, responses, hymns and readings.
5. Music for the Office is contained in a book called an Antiphoner or
Antiphonale.
6. Most musically significant hours are the Matins, Lauds, Vespers.
7. Vespers includes the canticle Magnificat anima mea Dominum. Also was
the only Office that admitted polyphonic singing in early times.
8. Compline inlcudes the singing of the Marian antiphons, one for each
specific time of the church year.
B. Mass
1. Principle service of the Catholic Church.
2. Culminating act of the service is the commemoration of the Last Supper.
3. Basic types of services:
a. High Mass (missa solemnis): includes singing by Celebrant,
Deacon, Subdeacon, along with chanting or polyphonic singing by
the choir.
b. Low Mass (missa privata): simplified form of the mass in which
a single priest takes on the Deacon and Subdeacon roles. Everything
is spoken.
c. Sung Mass (missa cantata): modern compromise between High and
Low mass.
4. Basic divisions of the mass:
a. Liturgy of the Word
b. Liturgy of the Eucharist
5. Early form of the Mass as found in the Ordo Romanus (7th c. instructional
for performance of the liturgy by the Bishop of Rome)
a. Intriot, Kyrie, Gloria, Collect.
6. Canon of the mass is fixed by 6th c.
7. Sacramentaries (books of instruction for the celebrant) dating from
600 and later indicate the level of uniformity in the mass.
8. Missal: a book containing the mass texts.
9. Tridentine Liturgy
(Liturgy of the Word)
a. Introit: originally an entire psalm with antiphon chanted during
the entrance of the priest. Later, it was shortened to only a
single psalm verse w/antiphon.
b. Kyrie: each invocation is repeated three times by the choir.
c. Gloria: (except during the penitential seasons of Advent and Lent):
begun by the priest with the words 'Gloria in excelsis Deo' and
continued by the choir.
d. Collects: prayers
e. Epistle: scriptural reading
f. Gradual & Alleluia: On Easter, Alleluia is followed by a Sequence.
In penitential seasons Alleluia is replaced by a more solemn Tract.
g. Credo: begun by the priest 'Credo in unum Deum' and continued
by choir.
(Liturgy of the Eucharist)
h. Offertory
i. Preface
j. Sanctus & Benedictus: sung by the choir
k. Canon: prayer of consecration
l. Pater Noster
m. Agnus Dei
n. Communion: sung by the choir
o. Post-Communion Prayers: chanted by the priest
p. Ite missa est: sung responsively by priest and choir.
10. Proper of the Mass: parts of the mass which are variable according
to the season of the year or particular feast.
a. Proper: Introit, Collects, Epistle, Gradual, Alleluia/Tract,
Sequence, Gospel, Offertory, Preface, Communion, Post-Communion.
11. Ordinary of the Mass: parts of the mass that are invariable.
a. Ordinary: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei, Ite missa est.
b. Choir (or congregation) typically sings these parts.
c. Since the 14th c. Ordinary texts were most often set to polyphonic
music.
12. Music for the Mass: Proper & Ordinary is contained in a Gradual
a. Liber usualis: modern text contains a selection of most frequently
used chants from the Antiphonale and Graduale. Texts of Mass
and Offices respectively are published in the Missal and Breviary.
C. Chant Notation
1. Clefs indicate relative pitches
2. Notes are called neumes
3. Earliest chant notation is preserved in mansucripts from the 9th c.
and later.
4. One theory holds that notation was systematic recording of an oral
tradition. Important proponents of this theory include Leo Treitler
'Homer and Gregory: The Transmission of Epic Poetry and Plainchant'
(Musical Quarterly, 1974).
D. Classes, Forms and Types of Chant
1. Text classifications
a. Biblical vs. non-Biblical texts
b. Prose vs. Poetic texts
1. Biblical prose texts: lessons of the Office, Epistle, Gospel.
2. Biblical poetic texts: psalms and canticles.
3. Nonbiblical prose texts: Te Deum, many antiphons, 3 of the
4 Marian antiphons
4. Nonbiblical poetical texts: hymns, sequences.
2. Performance classifications
a. Antiphonal: alternating choirs
b. Responsorial: alternating soloist and choir
c. Direct: without alternation
3. Text setting classifications
a. Syllabic
b. Melismatic
c. Neumatic
4. Tonic accent: the principle that chant reflects post-classical Latin
accents of the text.
5. Forms
a. Forms exemplified in psalm tones: 2 balanced phrases corresponding
to the two balanced parts of a typical psalm verse.
b. Strophic form: exemplified in hymns, in which the same melody is
sung to several stanzas of text.
c. free forms
E. Reciting and Psalm Tones
1. Reciting Tones
a. Typically used with more syllabic settings
b. Recitation of prayers, readings border between speech and song
c. Reciting note is called the tenor
d. Upper neighbor/lower neighbor used to bring out accent
e. Initium: the 2-3 note introductory formula preceding the recitation
tone
Source:web.archive.org
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