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MUSIC HISTORY 1 NOTES

MEDIEVAL
300-1400

The Medieval period is also called the Middle Ages.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0E62fiv6mk (take a different look at medieval Europe)

Society

The Roman Catholic Church was the most dominant organisation in the society.

In Europe education was controlled by the church.

Printing was not invented till the 16th century and so all music had to be written by hand. Priests
were responsible for doing this and so most of the music sources from this period are sacred and
not secular.

Under the system of patronage musicians worked for the nobility and the church. They
composed and performed music to entertain their noble patron as well as for the patron’s worship
at home.

During this period the church created schola cantorum (singing schools), where boys were
trained in music and also educated. These boys and their older counterparts formed the church
choir and with the priest performed the liturgy i.e. all the music, readings and ritual in the
service.

Some Early Influences on Church Music

The first Christians were Jews living in the Roman Empire. Jews believed that music was the
appropriate language to communicate with God. The psalms were chanted and songs are found
in the bible. Also, some early Christian chants are similar to Jewish ones.

In the Roman Empire there were several religions. People could worship however they wanted
once they recognised Caesar to be god. Instruments were used in these forms of religious
worship and it is believed that Christians avoided the use of instruments in their services because
of the association with paganism.

Constantine converts to Christianity in 313AD. He makes Christianity a state religion and so

money is put into the movement. Latin replaces Greek as the language in the liturgy.
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The Mass

This is the principal service in the Roman Catholic Church. (199) Solemn High Traditional Latin
Mass Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament, Sacramento (May 5, 2012) HD - YouTube

The texts in this service are divided into the Ordinary and the Proper. The church year is
organised around seasons e.g. Advent, Nativity and Resurrection. The Proper texts change each
Sunday as they reflect a particular theme at that point in the church year. The Ordinary texts are
always the same and are performed for every Mass. These are the more important to musicians.

A setting of a Mass will usually be music to these 5 texts: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus and
Agnus Dei.

Plainsong

This is also called plainchant, Gregorian chant and monody. It is monophonic, rhythmically
free, vocal melody. Although it is assumed that it was unaccompanied in churches, secular
music of the period would have had instrumental accompaniment.
Listening:
 Kyrie

Chants can be syllabic where there is 1 note to 1 syllable.

Chants can be neumatic where there are a few notes to 1 syllable.

Chants can be melismatic where there are many notes to 1 syllable.

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The performance is antiphonal where choirs alternate.

Listening: Alleluia,Justus ut palma

The performance is responsorial where a leader and choir alternate.

Listening: Quem quaeritis in sepulchro

The performance is direct where there is no alternating e.g Kyrie

Most sacred chants will be through composed.
Secular chants are often poetic and so may be strophic and may also have a refrain.

Modes

Plainsong melodies were created from modes and not from major and minor scales as most of
our music is today.

There were 8 modes.

Each was different to the other because of its pattern of tones and semitones.

Each mode had a reciting tone (called a dominant). Texts like psalms made use of the
reciting tone.

Each mode had a final, that note on which the chant ended.

Chants generally were written using only the notes from the mode and so were seldom greater
than one octave in range.
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Harmony

As early as the 9th century the practice of singing the chants in parallel 5th and 4th had started.
This is called organum.

Parallel organum is when a voice mirrors the chant at a perfect 5th or 4th .
Listening: Tu patris sempiternus es filius
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4rYZmEnZO8

Free organum occurs when contrary and oblique motion are used in the added voice.
Listening: Alleluia Justus Ut Palma
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgWaz78yuGg

Melismatic organum occurs when the notes in the chant are sustained while many notes are
sung against each one of them.
Listening: Allelulia, Pascha nostrum
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngCRm7uLirA

Music is composed line by line. All of the upper voices are related to the lowest voice. The
perfect 4th, 5th and 8th are consonant. Phrases will usually end with these intervals.

Boethius c480-524

He is a musicus (philosopher). He describes 3 levels of music.

musica instrumentalis – all instrumental and vocal music

musica humana – music created through the union of body and soul

musica mundana – music of the spheres

Guido d’Arezzo c.997 – c1050

A Benedictine monk who was the most important writer of his time concerned with actual music
practice. He is a cantor (a performer). His Micrologus deals with notation, reading, classifying
and singing plainchant, improvising and composing organum.
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He is known today for the system of solmization; a teaching tool he based on the hymn Ut
queant laxis. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jo6trJ-sQ0k

Early Notation

As the church spreads through Europe variations to the chants spring up. Eventually it was
recognised that to keep it uniform it would be of value to write it down. In the 9th century
neumes were used above words to indicate the direction of the pitch. In the 10thcentury they
were placed at various heights. Guido in the 11th century describes a 4 line staff.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jo6trJ-sQ0k

Secular Monophony

The music of the troubadours and trouveres from France is termed secular monophony. These
poet-musicians were men and women of high birth and wealth who hired itinerant musicians to
perform their songs. These songs were usually about courtly love.

Adam de la Halle c1237-1287 is one of the best known trouveres.

Listening
 Robin m’aime by Adam de la Halle from Le Jeu de Robin and Marion
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCIx07t14jw (these are excerpts from the play by
Adam de la Halle. Robin m’aime is not included, but look at the instruments. The play is
about a knight, Robin, who encounters a shepherdess, Marion. She resists his advances.)

 A chantar mes al cor by Beatriz de Dia (a troubadour song written by a female)

Robins m’aime
By
Adam De La Halle (ca.1237 – ca.1287)
Robin loves me
Robin has me
Robin asked me
If he can have me
Robin bought me a skirt
Of scarlet, good and pretty
A bodice and belt
Hurray!
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A Chantar
By
Beatriz De Dia (d. ca. 1212)

To sing I must of what I’d rather not

So much does he of whom I am the lover embitter me;
Yet I love him more than anything in the world.
To no avail are my beauty or politeness,
My goodness, or my virtue and good sense.
For I have been cheated and betrayed,
As if I had been disagreeable to him

(An example of courtly love lyrics)

Can Vei La Lauzeta Mover
By
Bernart De Ventadorn (ca.1150 – ca. 1180)

When I see the lark beating

Its wings joyfully against the sun’s rays
Which then swoons and swoops down
Because of the joy in its heart
Oh! I feel such jealousy
For all those who have the joy of love
That I am astonished
That my heart does not immediately melt with desire!

Alas! I thought I knew so much

Of love and I know so little
For I cannot help loving a lady
From whom I shall never obtain any favour
She has taken away my heart and myself
And herself and the whole world
And when she left me, I had nothing left
But desire and a yearning heart

Notre Dame School

Leonin fl.1160 is recorded as the first great master of the Notre Dame School in France. His
generation creates melismatic organum by lengthening the notes of the plainsong to create what
they called a tenor. Above this they wrote a freely moving voice called a duplum.
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Listening: Alleluia Pascha nostrum by Leonin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngCRm7uLirA

Composers at Notre Dame also added rhythmic modes to sections of the chant.

Perotin and other Notre Dame composers in the 12th century use rhythmic modes and expand the
organum by adding 3rd and 4th voices called the triplum and quadruplum.
Listening : Mors by Perotin

Medieval Motets

Eventually some person or persons put words to sections of the organum with rhythmic modes.
These sections were done separately as pieces and are called motets.

The lowest voice is a plainsong but sacred or secular words were added to the upper voices. In
several motets different languages were used in the upper voices at the same time.
Listening: Pulcete-Je languis-Domino by Anon.

The title of the motet is derived from the 1st words of each line.

Performance Practice

It was common practice for musicians to lower or raise notes to avoid the interval of a tritone
(an augmented 4th or diminished 5th). This practice was called musica ficta. Today editors will
include accidentals in representations of medieval music but these were not used in medieval
times.
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Dance Music: An estampie (instrumental music for dancing) https://www.youtube.com/watch?

v=XYEh6213zjM (look at the dance)