The Practice of Medieval Music : Studies in Chant and Performance

How music functioned in the middle ages, what it meant to its hearers, and how it was performed: these are the subjects of this fascinating volume. The studies collected here introduce the reader to the practical detail and complex intricacies of the performance of medieval music in the liturgy, bringing into clear focus a number of matters that were long obscure. (A second volume by Professor Kelly will focus specifically on the sources of Beneventan chant, Ashgate 2011).
Two detailed studies of aspects of musical practices of the Eternal City bring new historical perspectives to the understanding of the growth of the Roman liturgy, while the second and third groups of articles bring the reader close to the actual sound of medieval musicians. Writings on the art of the prosula, a hitherto understudied musico-poetic phenomenon, give practical information about Gregorian chant that can be acquired in no other way. Likewise, the study of variants in the music of the Exultet for Holy Saturday provides a window onto a creative and improvisational practice that is often difficult to discern from surviving written sources.
A final study, of the composers of chant in the middle ages, gives us a view of how musicians and others thought of themselves in a time that often valued anonymity.

CONTENIDO:

Introduction
Acknowledgements

Roman matters
I. Old-Roman chant and the responsories of Noah: new evidence from Sutri
- Early Music History 26, 2007
II. Candle, text, ceremony: the Exultet at Rome
- Études grégoriennes 32, 2004

Embellishing the liturgy
III. Introducing the Gloria in excelsis
- Journal of the American Musicological Society 37, 1984
IV. New music from old: the structuring of Responsory prosas
- Journal of the American Musicological Society 30, 1977
V. Melodic elaboration in Responsory melismas
- Journal of the American Musicological Society 27, 1974
VI. Melisma and prosula: the performance of Responsory tropes
- Liturgische Tropen: Referate zweier Colloquien des Corpus Troporum in München (1983) und Canterbury (1984), ed. G. Silagi (Münchener Beiträge zur Mediävistik und Renaissance-Forschung 36). Munich: Arbeo-Gesellschaft, 1985
VII. Neuma triplex
- Acta musicologica 60, 1988
VIII. Modal neumes at Sens
- Western Plainchant in the First Millenium, eds S. Gallagher, J. Haar, J. Nádas and T. Striplin. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003

Singing from scrolls
IX. Structure and ornament in chant: the case of the Beneventan Exultet
- Essays on Medieval Music in Honor of David G. Hughes, ed. G.M. Boone (Isham Library Papers 4). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Department of Music, 1995
X. The liturgical rotulus at Benevento
- Laborare fratres in unum. Festschrift László Dobsay zum 60. Geburtstag, eds J. Szendrei and D. Hiley (Spolia Berolinensia.Berliner Beiträge zur Mediävistik 7, eds F. Wagner and W. Maaz). Berlin: Weidmann, 1995
XI. A Milanese processional roll at the Beinecke Library
- The Yale University Library Gazette 73, 1998

Later medieval music
XII. Medieval composers of liturgical chant
- Musica e Storia 14, 2006
XIII. Early polyphony at Montecassino
- In cantu et in sermone: for Nino Pirrotta on his 80th Birthday, eds F. Della Seta and F. Piperno (Italian Medieval and Renaissance Studies 2). Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1989
Index of incipits
Index of manuscripts
Index of names and places