Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-q99xh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T13:30:16.205Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Problem of Pitch in sixteenth-Century English Vocal Music

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

David Wulstan
Get access

Extract

In sixteenth-century choral music there are two problems of performance that prove most vexing to sensitive choirmasters and to those musicologists who are hot tone deaf: they are the twin problems of pitch and vocal scoring. There are, of course, those ostriches who cannot see such difficulties, having a touching belief in the absolute quality of the written pitch. Such a fundamentalist faith is not exceeded by the claims of the Jehovah's Witnesses or by the dear old lady who protested against a new translation of the New Testament with the words: ‘The Authorized Version was good enough for St. Paul, and it's good enough for me’. Assuming the present gathering to be rather more scientific, I shall illustrate these problems by concentrating on English music of the period, not because of parochialism, but because of the limitation of time and my belief that our prophets deserve honour even in their own country.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association , Volume 93 , 1966 , pp. 97 - 112
Copyright
Copyright © 1967 The Royal Musical Association and the Authors

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 See Mendel, ‘Pitch in the 16th and early 17th centuries’, Musical Quarterly, XXXIV, 28, and Andrews, ‘Transposition of Byrd's Vocal Polyphony, Music and Letters XLIII, 25-, both pioneers in this field.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 See footnote9.Google Scholar

3 Clefs are named according to the following convention: Soprano, Mezzosoprano, Alto and Tenor = C1, C2, C3 and C4; Violin and Treble = G1 and G2; Bass and Baritone F4 and F3; Contrabass F5 and its homologue D4; Gamut = D5 (named after its homologue, found in continental sources, gamut on the third line. The term homologue signifies that a clef differs in form but is otherwise identical; the term analogue will be used to denote a different clef on the same line.Google Scholar

4 ‘Vocal Colour in English Polyphony’, Proceedings of the Plainsong and Mediaeval Music Society, I, and Ardran and Wulstan, ‘The Alto or Countertenor Voice’, Music and Letters, XLVIII, 17.Google Scholar

5 MSS C1, C10, C11, C19 and A1; B.M. Add. MS 30478. (Ascribed to Gibbons.)Google Scholar

6 Particularly Byrd's contribution to Cantiones quae ab argumento sacrae vocantur. Leighton's Teares or Lamentacions was published in 1614.Google Scholar

7 See p. 17.Google Scholar

8 In the case of Lupo's O vos omnes and Miserere mei two versions of each are given in the same collection (B.M. Add. MSS 29372–7).Google Scholar

9 ‘The great organ which was built at Worcester 1614 consisted of 2 open diapasons of pure and massy metal. Double F faut of the quire pitch and according to Guido Aretines scale (or as some term it double C faut according to the keys and musiks) an open pipe of ten foot long the diameter 7 inches and a half (at St. Paul's Lond. the diameter was 8 inches)’ (Bod. Lib. Add. MS C 304a, f. 141) cf. also the well-known note in the Tenbury copy of Musica Deo Sacra, and also the specification for the Duddington organ for All Hallows, Barking of 1519 (see Clutton and Niland, The British Organ, London, 1963, p. 48).Google Scholar

10 ‘The Origin of the Modes’ in Studies in Eastern Chant, Vol. III, to be published.Google Scholar

11 Piggot, Prehistoric India, London, 1950, p. 253.Google Scholar

12 Wulstan, ‘The Tuning of the Babylonian Harp’ in Iraq, to be published.Google Scholar

13 In ‘Musica Nova’, Monuments of Renaissance Music, I, Chicago, 1964, p. vi.Google Scholar

The following music illustrations were sung daring the course of the lecture, by The Clerkes of Oxenford directed by David Wulstan: James Bowman, Frederic Goodwin, David Bray, Martin Roberts, Guy Protheroe (alto); Joseph Polglase, Derek Harrison (tenor); Roger Bray, Graham Rose, William Robinson (bass), with Juliet Brown, Jill Gibson, May Hofman, Virginia Jones and Rosemary Stanser (soprano).Google Scholar

  1. a

    a Taverner: Dum trmsisset à 4 (B.M. Add. MSS 17802-5), opening.

  2. b

    b (a), à 5 (Ch. Ch. MSS 979-83), opening.

  3. c

    c Sheppard: Sptritus Sanctui à 5 (Ch. Ch. MSS 979-83), opening, at written pitch.

  4. d

    d (c), complete, transposed up a minor third.

  5. e

    e ditto, à 6 (Ch. Ch. MSS 979-83), complete, transposed up a minor third.

In a short recital after the lecture, the following pieces by Sheppard were sung: ‘Christ our Paschal Lamb’, ‘I give you a new commandment’, Audiui vocem de coelo, and Dum transisset sabbatum.