auch die oktavversetzten Klange, also auch weitgespannte Intervalle als veritable "concordantiae" verstanden und bezeichnet haben will, und weil sie die Problematik damit auf die Ebene der Definition abschiebt. Ja auch die eher historische Frage, ob die "recentiores" mehr Gebrauch der gleichen "concordantiae" ubten, wie sie den "veteres" schon zur Verrugung standen, oder ob sich seither das Arsenal der ,~concordantiae" an sich vergr6Sert habe, stellt Tinctoris nicht, und die noch grundsatzlichere Fragt)i; warum denn eigentlich ein bestirnmtes Intervall oder ein bestimmter Klang an sich wohllautend sei, ,warum ein anderer nicht, wird beiseite geschoben und nur ganz beiliiufig mit dem Hinweis auf die Natur und deren Kraft beantwortet, "cooperante natura" 31 oder "naturali virtute" 32. So bleibt letztlich die Bilanz dessen, was Tinctoris aus einer m6glichen Synthese zahlreicher "euphonischer" Einzelwertungen auf einen grbBeren Zusammenhang hin, auf das konkrete musika- lische' Kunstwerk und dessen art in der Musikgeschichte, hatte aussagen k6nnen, leider geringer als erhofft. Der Eindruck, daB Tinctoris von dem Phiinomen eines neuen, eines "geh6rten" Klangs zwar geradezu gebannt worden ist, laBt sich nicht abweisen; er stellt dieses Phiinomen fest, erklart es auch technisch in verschiedenen Ansatzen, aber zu einer wirklichen AusfUhrung und Durchdringung gelangt er im Grunde nicht. So dankbar denn der Musikforscher nach genau fUnfhundert J ahren fUr das ist, was Tinctoris zur Sache der "euphony" beibringt - und er bringt unter den damaligen Theoretikern bestimmt am meisten bei -, so gibt er fiir heutige Vorstel1ungen noch immer zu wenig, als daB sich das fragliche Phanomen unter seiner Anleitung wirklich voll erkennen und erklaren lieBe. 3. Zur geschichtlichen Situation Vielleicht sollte man aber kurz uber die bloSen Schriften von Tinctoris hinausdenken und sich ihre und ihres Verfassers historische Stellung zu vergegenwartigen suchen. Ein geborener musikgeschicht- licher Niederllinder, mit ausgezeichneter Universitatsbildung mid von unverkennbar humanistischer Pragung, wirkt er im siidlichen Neapel, einer musikgeschichtlich fur diese Zeit ungeniigend erschlossenen Stadt, die aber - wenigstens das ist deutlich - so niederliindisch erfullte Quellen wie den Mellon-Chansonnier 33, vielleicht auch das beriihmte "L'homme-arme"-Messen-Manuskript 34, und gleichzeitig soitalienisch wirkende Handschriften wie Monte Cassino 871 35 oder, wie Allan W.Atlas meint, auch Perugia 431 36 hervorgebracht hat. Es ist lehrreich zu sehen, daB eine musikalische "Nord- Sud-Polaritat", wie man sie danach erwarten konnte, weder Tinctoris' Darlegungen insgesamt noch seine Auslassungen zur "euphonia" durchdringt: ohneItalienisches einfach zu verschweigen, argumentiert er doch mit erstaunlicher Exklusivitat an einem praktisch allein niederlandischen Repertoire 37; nach seiner Sicht jedenfalls stammt Wohllaut aus dem Norden und bestimmt nicht aus dem Suden Europas. Eine zweite Dberlegung mag angefiigt werden. Vieles bei Tinctoris steht in unangefochtener mittelalterlicher Tradition, so manche Definition, oder auch die immer wieder vorgebrachte Betonung der Wichtigkeit quadrivialer, besonders arithmetischer Kenntnisse rur den Musiker 38• Aber wieviel Neues, in die Zukunft Weisendes zeigt derselbe Tinctoris gleichzeitig? Man denke hier an die Verbindung, die etwa zwischen Ton und Wort hergestellt wird 39 , dann die Ansatze musikgeschichtli- 31 CS 77a. 32 CS 78a. 33 V gl. Manfred Bukofzer, "An unknown Chansonnier of the 15th Century (The Mellon Chansonnier)", Musical Quarterly 28 (1942), S.14-49. Die Herkunft aus Neapel vertritt in neuerer Zeit namentlich Leeman Perkins, der auch eine Ausgabe der Handschrift vorbereitet. 34 Wenn das Messen-Manuskript nicht in Neapel, von einem Schreiber aus dem Norden, geschrieben sein sollte, sostarnmt es direkt aus dem Norden Europas. DaB es aber in jedem Fall fUr ein Repertoire zeugen kann, wie es im letzten Drittel des 15. Jahrhunderts in Neapel geschatzt wurde, zeigt die Widmung der Handschrift an Beatrix, Konigin von Ungam, die eine Tochter Ferdinands 1., Konigs von NeapeL und bekanntlich auch Widmungstragerin von Schriften des Tinctoris war. - Vgl. auch Raffaele Arnese, I Codici notati della Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli (Firenze, 1967), S.109-111, sowie Judith Cohen, The siX anonymous L'homme-arme-masses in Naples, Biblioteca Naziona{e, MS VI E 40(0. 0., American Institute of Musicology, 1968), passim. 35 Vgl. Isabel Pope und Masakata Kanazawa, "The musical manuscript Montecassino N871 ", Anuario Musical 19 (1964), S.123-153. 36Vgl. Allan W.Atlas, "On the provenance of the manuscript Perugia, Biblioteca Comunale Augusta, 431 (G 20)", Musica Disciplina 31 (1977), S.45-105. 37 Das wird namentlich an den Verrassernamen jener Kompositionen deutlich, die Tinctoris als "exempIa" heranzieht oder wenigstens zitiert; hierbei finden sich Dufay, Caron, Ockeghem, Regis u. a. 38 Z.B. CS 18a oder 154b. 39 Z.B. CS 144af. 624 cher Beobachtung, die sich nun sogar ixn Traktat niederschlagen 40 , oder schlieBlich dermehrfache Hinweis auf die "pronuntiatio", den Vortrag der Musik 41 • In diese selbe Reihe gehort dochwohl auch die beschriebene Erfahrung der Musik als eines sinnlich wahrnehmbaren, klanglichen Geschehens, als einer "ars sonora" 42 und, damit zusammenhangend, die Wiirdigung der einzelnen Komposition als eines nun per se berechtigten, klingenden Werks 43, schlieBlich auch das lllustrieren mit individuellen und oft genug namentlich bezeichneten "exempla" dritter Meister 44 Nach aBen diesen Beobachtun- gen kann man bei der Erfahrung, die Tinctoris mit dem neuen Wohlklang gemacht hat, wenigstens den Hinweis auf die neue Welt der musikalischen Renaissance nicht mehr unterdriicken, so problematisch und umstritten dieser musikgeschichtliche Begriff auch immer sein moge 45. ' Discussion Lowinsky: Do you have any theory on why Tinctoris, who knows what he means by harmonia and supposedly knows what he means by melodia, makes this strange equation that you quote: melodia est hannonia? Staehelin: Nein. !ch glaube eben, daB die Tenninologie, wie sie im Diffinitorium von Tinctoris steht, eine geradezu gewMtige Konze:i1tration ist. Ich muE gestehen, daB ich die musiktheoretischen Texte des 15.Jahrhunderts, namlich die WlpubHzierten, nicht so gut kenne. DaB diese gleiche Sprache auch in weiteren musiktheoretischen Schriften auftritt, das ware moglich, ich weiB es einfach nicht. Lowinsky: May I ask whether the following hypothesis, concerning why Tinctoris makes this strange definition, would meet with your approval. Is it possible that the reason for this strange equation lies in what you poi.nted out when Tinctoris speaks of euphonia. He says-I think you said it even more strongly than I am putting it now--originally everything is tied to the single consonance? If that is true, then the single consonances have, of course, both harmonically and melodically a certain proportional character. If Tinctoris bases himself on the phenomenon of proportion, then is it possible that this might be the reason for the equation melodia est harmonia? Staehelin: Vielleicht. Melos~Melodia ist ganz bestimmt nicht das, was wir heute davon verstehen. Kurt von Fischer: The notion that symphonia est harmonia is part of the tradition of classical antiquity, and this applies both fOr simultaneous and for successive tones, just as Lowinsky has said with proportions. I think this is the solution. Arid there is no doubt that Tinctoris knew the classical tradition very well. WaIter Wiora: Nicht nur die Antike wird mer gestiirkt. Auch in den mittelalterlichen historischen Werken bei Symphonien, oder ganz in der gleichen Zeit bei Thomas Stolzer, wird Melodie in dem gleichen Sinn benutzt wie Symphonie. Also, Melodie ist durch die ganze Zeit in diesem Sinn benutzt worden, nicht nur in dem faktualen Sinn. Some Factors in the Control of Consonance and Sonority: Successive Composition and the Solus Tenor Margaret Bent Discussions of consonance and dissonance in medieval music sometimes imply that the composer must have worked in some kind of score, and that he was in a position to manipulate his part-writing on the same basis and with the same visual control as we are. I believe that this was not the case, and that it is a necessary preliminary to considerations of euphony in the finished product to explore the technical and practical problems which faced the composer in combining more than two contrapuntal voices. The rules of two-part counterpoint have been extensively treated both by medieval theorists and modern scholars: my concern in this short paper is more with how, in practical terms, such rules could be applied in composition, and by what means they were applied to composition in more than two parts. Score notation does indeed exist, but I know of no cases from the 14th or 15th centuries that can be considered as composing scores. (Their absence does not constitute an argument, for we likewise lack performing parts: I simply wish to establish that none of the surviving scores are of this kind.) Only in the case of keyboard notations is there any evidence that a single musician was expected to read a score. In all keyboard music of this period, special adaptations to mensural notation are made, 40 Z.B. CS 77a oder 154af. 41 Z.B. CS 18b, 19a oder nb. 42 Z.B. CS lb. 43Vgl. neuerdings auch Kurt von Fischer, "Zu einigen Wertkriterien in der Musik des·14. und 15. Jahrhunderts", Die Musikforschung 30 (1977), S.289-292, besonders S.29lf. 44Vgl. auch oben, Anm.37. 45 Vgl. neuerdings Die Renaissance im Selbstverstandnis der heutigen Wissenschaft; darin: Ludwig Finscher, "Musikwissen- schaft", Wolfenbutteler Renaissance-Mitteilungen 1 (1977), S.52-55. 625 eliminating the need to operate imperfection and alteration on more than one horizontal plane. The values of notes may be "counted out" as in the Buxheim organ book, or made dependent by alignment on a single rhythmically explicit line as in the Robertsbridge MS. Even the need to read two staves simultaneously, in Faenza, does not surpass these rhythmic limitations.· The English repertory for which "score" notation Was used is largely homophonic and much of it could be visually grasped in the same way. However,/when rhythmic complexities do occur and when alignment of parts is careful, as in Old Hall, the alignment very clearly follows the demands of the single row of verbal text rather than those of musical simultaneity. Mensural notation, in short, is inherently unsuited to use in score. Had it been habitually so used, by performers or composers, it would surely have given way much sooner to a system in which the value of a note was independent of its linear context, as it did in response to the special requirements of keyboard music, and as it did in the 16th century when scores-at least study scores, whether or not for composition and performance-do exist. Some composition may have taken place in some form of written score, but I doubt whether this was either necessary or normal. The handling of a two-part texture without the visual assistance of a score requires no ambitious assumptions about musicianship. The extension of such a two-part texture to three or four parts by means of successive addition does however require a little more explanation. Two distinct situations exist: (1) where the technique is clearly successive in that the third voice to be added, the contratenor, is detectable as such; and is grammatically inessential even where it goes below the tenor (Example 1), and (2) where there is no self-contained discant-tenor duet: where the addition of two upper voices depends on a framework of twu lower parts, tenor and contratenor (Example 2: ignore the fifth staff at this stage). In both examples 1 and 2 the contratenor crosses below the tenor. In 1 it enriches the harmony but does not support it. In 2 it shares the essential harmonic foundation with the tenor. These two situations presuppose different compositional techniques. Dunstable 15 I~JJ~¥¥¥Jtttttt£f~· ~:.- 20 • - • - "'-l:if , -p • ~ ..... ~ - 8 Ct T Example 2: Veni sancte spiritus 10 • - - ~ • ~ .......... • ~. (Small; .' staff) =:: Dufay b Example 1: Adieu ccs bons vins b b T 3 627 ~ - ~ !t W "I • 0 == ~ I # .Il- ..L# = ~ .... - .~ " : 626 The first category presents few problems. We can surely accept that a 15th-century composer·could handle a three-part song in his head. The discant-tenor duet can be invented, and then notated in separate parts. The contratenor can be thought out in knowledge of this duet and in turn written down. For longer compositions, weaker memories or weaker musicians we can put it in terms of the composer-singer-most 15th-century composers being employed as singers. He invents and writes down his melody, handing it or teaching it to a colleague who sings it while he improvises and empirically refines a tenor, which he then writes down. Another colleague then sings the tenor with the discant while he improvises, refines and writes down a contratenor. This is the normal order in which parts appear in the sources for compositions of this kind. The instability of contratenor parts in 15th- century chansons-and indeed 14th-century motets-might suggest that it was this last stage which was most commonly left to the test of a "sounding" rather than a written score, or to the mercies of an alien hand. However achieved, in the head or in sound, with or without written assistance at each stage, a piece so composed was both successive in conception and subject to simultaneous aural control of all parts. That is the technique in its simplest form. It can easily be extended to COVer longer compositions (mass movements using song technique) or compositions in four or five parts where each extra part ----------------------------------"~-" ---1 -- 35 ... ~ ~ ~ 3"" .... .... • "" , ~ "-V , - , Example 3: Fult homo (Kyrie) , 50 • 45 anon. · In sugge~ting one of several possible methods composers may have used in handling such situations WIthOut wntten scores, I offer two kinds of evidence, theoretical and musical. There are relatively few r~fe~:nces to counterpoint in more than two parts before the late 15th century. One which is sIgnifIcant for the present argument is given by the author of the Quatuor Principalia, dated 1351: "Qui autem ~riplum aliquo~ operari voluerit, respiciendum semper est ad tenorem. Si discantus itaque discordat cum ~~no~e, non dlscordat cum tnplo,. et e contrario, ita quod semper habeatur concordantia aliqua ad graviorem vocem ... " Qm a~tem qu~truplu~ vel qumtuplum facere voluerit, inspicere debet cantus prius factos, ut si cum uno discordat c~m alils non dlscorrlablt, sed ut concordantia semper ad graviorem vocem habeatur ... " (IV.2, chapter xliii British LIbrary, Add.8866, f.61v; cf. Coussemaker, Scriptorum ... IV, 295.) , Dunstable -- 10 - • • Example 4: Albanus roseo rutilat • 5 ~ " r -~" · ~ can be shown to have been added in successive fashion-the test being that the music makes sense without it. Many isorhythmic motets of the 14th and 15th centuries are also wholly or partially successive. Most compositions which depend on the combination of tenor and contratenor are motet-types with at least two upper parts: no pair out of the four can be taken as the backbone of the piece as can the discant-tenor duet in a composition using chanson technique. My second category comprises compositions where some such degree of simultaneous conception for three or more parts seems to be a necessary assumption. The simplest examples act as a bridge between the first and second categories. In writing a two-part canon which is going to have a third, free, accompanying voice, licences such as vertical fourths may be permitt~d between the two canonic voices if it is known that these can be rectified when the free tenor is added. Example 3 (from the English mass Fuit homo missus, c" 1425) shows the two upper parts forming a self-contained, grammatically complete duet of the discant-tenor type. The tenor cantus firmus moves in even notes, much like the tenor of a cantus-firmus basse danse, and it can be thought of as some kind of simultaneous conception. The composer simply steers his duet through a predetermined scheme of harmonies compatible with his tenor, which might therefore be allowed to supply the occasional essential note. Example 4 takes us a little further. It is from a three-part isorhythmic motet without contratenor by Dunstable (Albanus roseo ruti/at) and was surely managed in a similar way. The upper duet has a very strong musical impulse of its own, and was apparently conceived simultaneously with the slow-moving tenor, which is sometimes grammatically superfluous to the duet (bar 11) and sometimes furnishes an essential harmony note (bar n Before coming finally to the most difficult and interesting class of composition, comprising mostly four-part isorhythmic motets with a fairly high level of apparently simultaneous conception, I should point out that there are four-part isorhythmic motets that do not require such explanation. An example is Dufay's Vasilissa ergo gaude in which the contratenor is not essential, even though it is often below the tenor, or sounds when the tenor rests. At times the duet between the two top parts is self-contained, and at times it requires the completion of the tenor. The composition can be explained successively, at least as far as the contratenor is concerned; the upper duet may have been written simultaneously to the tenor. At all events, the contratenor was added last to that three-part texture. Not so in Example 2, where tenor and contratenor together provide the harmonic support. 628 629 / M. de Perusio? Dufay I 28 , 10 ~ I I I I 1 W~W---~~.:-. ~~~. ~ T. Ct. Example 5: Rite majorem 27 b 8 , l- A Example 6: Gloria , 1 ~I S.t. ,. J S.t. ~. 8 parts are e~lained. They usually res~1t from ficta problems or from the conflict between a 6-3 and a 5-~ ch~rd. the solus tenor was not a fIgured bass, but the rough general rule seems to have been to use or Imp y 5-3 chords most of the time, reserving 6-3 for cadential approaches. The upper part of the lo,:er.dm~t could. be th~ one existing voice, but not the lowest, with which the 14th-century Quatuor PnnClpalw permItte~ dIssonance; 15th-century com~osers usually avoid even one such dissonance, ~ut not always, as this Dufay. example shows. Increasmg fastidiousness about total consonance would ave brought about the d~IIllse of a technique which lacked total control, as did the reinstatement of t~e teno: and contratenor m place of the solus tenor at this stage in the composition process at just the tnne which ~~ks the end of the solus tenor's traceable career. The procedure suggested he~e does not of course ehm~nate the ~ossibility that composers were able to take' into account both parts of th iower duet while eomposmg the upper parts to fit it. In some cases, solus tenor parts were written a~ ong~m or m a slm~lified rhythm which matched that of the upper parts. This could of course be explam~~ along the hnes of a "Notbehelf," but I am tempted to suggest that it would also be useful in a composltIonal draft the "difficult" and I .. , more e egant notalion bemg reserved for the definiti e notated form of the tenor. v One way, not of ~ourse the only one, of accounting for differences between the solus tenor and the ten?~-con:rateno~, IS that the process of composing the top parts led the composer to make some reVISIOns m the fmal form of his tenor-contratenor duet. Where the tenor is a cantus prius factus the c~anges between the s~lus tenor and the final form of the tenor are often confined to rhythmic d~splacem~nts. An ObVIOUS example of this is the motet 0 Maria virgo davitica where the dis.crepancle~ betwe~n the solus tenor and the tenor-contratenor can be accounted f~r by sim le adjustments lD d~rations. Example 6 can probably be explained, though less simply, in similar fashi~n There .are occasIOn~lly octave displacements between tenor and solus tenor which may obscur~ operation and detectIOn of the basso seguente principle: see Example 7. The contratenor usually has ~ore freedom. of movement than the tenor, not being a pre-existent melody, and it may venture in its fmal~orm to pItches lower than thos~ embodied in the solus tenor, as in Example 8. These adjustments m.a Y h lllvolve changes of harmony whIch are compatible with the top parts though no longer compatible WIt the solus tenor, such as those in Example 6. Ct. T. *H.Besseler, Bourdon und Fauxbourdon (Leipzig, 1950), p.94. For the only study devoted entirely to the subject see Shelley Davis, "The Solos Tenor in the 14th and 15th Centuries," Acta A:[usicologica XXXIX (1967), pp.44-64, and Addendum in XL (1968),pp.176-8. I plan to prepare a fuller presentation of the ideas put forward in the present, necessarily brief, paper. This reference to the lowest voice, or rather the lower of the bottom two, is not isolated. A later reference from Anon XI (c. 1450) reads: "Et est sciendum quod contratenor, in quantum est gravior tenore, dicitur tenor." (Coussemaker, Scriptorum. Ill, 466.) Clearly, we do not nee,dto apply tills when the contratenor is added last, and is inessential, even where it is lower and even ,Jvhere it changes the harmony. But where it is both lower and essential, it is reassuring to find theoretical support for this important function of the bass note. The musical evidence is largely self-evident, from the essential nature of many such contratenor parts. But important further testimony is found in the provision of solus tenor parts for some twenty compositions of the 14th and 15th centuries, all motets or mass movements in four or five parts, all isorhythmic except for two which undertake the comparable technical challenge, respectively, of a double canon, and of an essay in mensural permutations, and all of the non-successive type. Tills is a significant proportion of the repertory which meets those conditions. Indeed, if we discount the four relevant motets of Machaut, three-quarters of the 14th-century motets to willch tills discussion relates have a solus tenor. A solus tenor can be roughly defined as a kind of basso seguente conflation of the tenor and contratenor and has been regarded by, I think, all writers on the subject as a "Notbehelf flir kleine Besetzung,"* enabling a four- or five-part composition to be performed with one line fewer. I am not going to dispute that the solus tenor parts may have been used in tills way, or for rehearsal, or for alternative performance, but there are several objections to this as having been their primary purpose. These parts are associated with only a handful of manuscripts containing highly sophisticated repertory: principally Ivrea, Modena 568, Chantilly, Old Hall, Canoniei mise. 213, Bologna QI5. ff the caliber of repertory in these sources is any indication of the flourishing state of the establishments at which they were used, here, of all' places would these simplified arrangements have been least necessary. Nor is it likely that singers who had taken the trouble to seek out or compose music of the highest erudition and artifice would have taken pleasure in the barbarous disregard for such features-isorhythm, canon, notational nicety, plainsong integrity-which solus tenor parts often display. Moreover, these manuscripts are often particulrtrlyauthoritative and in some cases thought to have been compiled in the orbit of the composers prominently represented. Only in a minority of cases are solus tenor parts strict tenor-contratenor conflations throughout. For the rest, they deviate to a greater or lesser degree and are often not explicable as conflations at all. If they were normally made in the manner and for the purpose generally claimed, they show a level of incompetence hard to reconcile with the authoritative character of their sources. As far as I can ascertain they are always copied integrally with the composition and never as later additions. If we admit this abnormally high level of error or incompetence as an objection to the received definition of a solus tenor, what then is it? It remains generally true that the solus tenor goes at least as well with the upper parts as do the tenor and contratenor of which it is supposed to be a conflation. And yet, if it is regarded as a freely-composed "new" tenor to fit the upper parts, it is hard to explain why so much of it is indeed a conflation. Sometimes the solus tenor does not give the lower note of the tenor-contratenor duet, or even a note compatible with those parts; although some such cases provide a full triad where the lowest note would not, there are equally numerous instances where no such reason for the deviation can be adduced. Sometimes the solus tenor does give the lower note at a certain point but nevertheless fits the upper parts better than does the tenor-contratenor pair. In these cases, the offending element is often the upper voice of the tenor-contratenor duet, the note which was not embodied in the conflation (Example 5, Dufay, Rite majorem, bar 28). I believe this can be explained as follows. The composer made a conflation of his first draft of the contratenor-tenor duet-a solus tenor-which then served as tenor, or gravior vox, upon which he constructed the upper parts in the manner proposed for Examples 3 and 4. Since he was not at that stage taking close account of the upper part of the lower duet, anomalies between it and the upper 630 631 15 this three-part version, which might therefore be considered an alternative. It does however show no significant increase in consonance over the four-part version and offers no basis for a claim that it was composed for this reason. Any argument that solus tenor parts were composed for alternative performance is weakened by the fact that no solus tenor parts survive for compositions which, in the terms I have defined, would not have needed them. (The only exception to that statement is the unique case of a solus contratenor for Binchois' Dueil Angoisseus which is simply an alternative additive part to a grammatically complete discant-tenor duet.) If solus tenor parts were commonly written post facto, some of the factors which underlie pitch discrepancies between the surviving examples and their tenor-contratenor pairs would surely have encouraged the composition of new solus tenor parts for successively-composed pieces also. Harmonic change in such pieces was achieved instead by the use of alternative contratenor parts; the techniques seem quite distinct. The inevitable question "why were these parts preserved?" is no more readily answerable in terms of their compositional function than of their use as "Notbehelfe." Given the objections raised above, why should either be preserved in the manuscripts which do, after all, preserve them? Modena 568 and Old Hall both contain palimpsest revisions of a compositional nature, suggesting ongoing compositional activity at least in those sources. As a basis for further, probably unwritten, compositionalgrowth of these compositions, the solus tenor may have provided a useful or even an essential aid. Given their availability, there is no reason why they should not have been copied for use in rehearsal and, if necessary, for alternative performance or "Notbehelf." 15th-century solus tenor parts do in general show more signs of being intended for use in performance, but the same objections apply to performance being their "raison d'etre." I am also suggesting that compositions which meet the same requirements but for which no solus tenor survives, such as Example 2 again, may have been composed with the aid of a conflation such as that suggested on the fifth staff, below it. Compare the projected solus tenor version of Dunstable's Veni sancte spiritus with the four-part version to see two features which make the latter look more archaic: the ungainly line of the contratenorwith its leaps of sevenths (bar 14-15) and the necessity to make sudden rests to avoid dissonance (bar 21) where the corresponding place in the solus tenor is a moving bass line. While much of this is merely informed guessing about how composers might have set about composing, it does fit many of. the musicallacts. It accounts for the absence of composition scores, while offering an explanation of solus tenor survivals. It implies a new approach to the analysis of an important sector of 14th- and 15th-century music and, I believe, amplifies the notion of successive composition by attempting to define the nature and extent of its simultaneous controls. Discussion Perkins: You invoke in the course of your discussion the quality of the repertories involved and the quality of the musical establishments reflected in those repertories. One might add that the manuscripts preserving the repertories also often seem to reflect the same kind of quality, if we think of manuscripts such as Chantilly and Old Hall with their illuminations and decorations. I wonder if you could explain why these solus tenor parts that you suggest might have been simply sketches for compositions were included in such elegant sources from 'such high-level institutions. Margaret Bent: I offer the possibility that if the manuscripts continued to be used by the composers and if the written fonn of a composition was not regarded as the only form that the composition was ever going to take, but rather that further impromptu and improvised refinements were intended, then the composer or performers may have wished to return to the solus tenor as the basis for this later embellishment William Mahrt: I have found the solus tenor very useful in rehearsing the other parts without requiring the tenors to be present. Margaret Bent: Yes, even when this involves rehearsing two notes that are different from those that will be heard at the final performance. Alejandro Plarichart: I would like to offer a bit of paleographic evidence that I believe supports what Prof. Bent has just said. These manuscripts are indeed very elegant and carefully done, but scribes sometimes did make mistakes. One of the most interesting of these appears in Dufay's motet Rite majorem in ma:imscript Bologna Q 15 where the solus tenor supports an introductory duet and thus acts as a contratenor to the upper two voices. Invariably this part is connected with the note of the later contratenor. So clearly this voice had been composed to accompany the introductory material and then lead on into the contratenor in the four-voice sections. The scribe of Bologna Q 15. seems to have ignored these introductory trios. Mixter: I am wondering how you account for a certain problem in chronology. For example, I think that Shelley Davis mentions two versions of solus tenors for motets by de Vitry that appear in rather late manuscripts, from the end of the 14th and beginning of the 15th centuries. In contradistinction, there are some very early sources for the solus tenor, for anon. Dufay 15 Example 8: Rite majoren 11 12 8 Example 7: Humane lingua S.t. ~. 8 I am suggesting therefore, that the soIus tenor may have been primarily a stage in the composition process, one of several possible methods of handling three or more parts without the aid of a written score. The surviving soIus tenor parts may provide unique and valuable evidence of the genesis of a composition, comparable to sketches and drafts from later periods. (Where more than one soIus tenor survives for a single composition, these may reflect different compositional stages.) Sometimes the soIus tenor is indeed given alone, taking on the status of a new tenor. In such cases it is usually made isorhythmic, and reflects the 15th-century taste for the greater control of consonance which three-part writing provided. Some compositions on "free" tenors may in fact preserve solus tenor parts in which traces of plainsong are embedded. It is possible that the kind of process described may account for those 14th-century motets that have labelled but unidentified tenors. In one case where a four-part composition has been reduced to three parts, 0 Maria virgo davitica in Bologna Q15, the tenor has not been identified as a plainsong, and the solus tenor is isorhythmic. There is thus no obvious barbarity in 632 633 example, in the manuscript that Frank Harnson discovered, Oxford, New College, 362. Does this apparent problem of chronology disturb your thesis? .. Margaret Bent: I don't think that the latene~s of the de Vitry examples IS necessanly an obJectlOn. There are, incidentally, instances of two different contratenors surviving for the same piece. Sometimes one is marked "vacat" in Ivrea, indicating that it was perhaps too far afield even to be used for rehearsaL It. is possible that these may r~flect different stages in the compositional process. New College, 362, is, as you say, the earhest example, and the Dufay pIeces the latest Thus the solus tenors do span more or less the complete history from New College through Dufay, and it is remarkable that they cql,ncide with the life span of that particular four-part repertory. /' The Musical Style of Polyphonic Hymns in the Fifteenth Century Masakata Kanazawa The early 15th century saw the rise of a new musical style, which was more international in nature than the music of earlier periods. This ne;w style was gradually fostered in the 1420s and reached its maturity sometime in the early 1430s. Significantly, its influence, particularly certain principles of composition, remained strong throughout the century. This is supported by statements of Johannes Tinctoris,l showing that the new style of the early 15th century was still "euphonious" to the ears of the theorist half a century later. To me, it seems probable, therefore, that by examining the major princ~ples of composition maintained throughout these years, we can come a step closer.to answering our major question: what is euphony in 15th-century music? Since the time is limited, I would like to confine my discussion primarily to one genre of composition which seems to illustrate my points best, namely that of the polyphonic hymns. 2 The tradition of polyphonic hymns started early as we have a 13th-century setting of the Vesper hymn, "Sanctorum meritis," in a source originating in Beauvais. There are also a few scattered examples from English sources, as well as a set of ten hymns in the Apt Ms., which reflects the liturgical repertory of the Avignon antipapacy, around 1400. 3 The style of these pieces belongs' to the one described by Tinctoris as not worth hearing. Then around 1430 there appear suddenly a considerable number of hymn settings in a new style. Generally they are written for three voices, either in fauxbourdon or in free counterpoint, and in tempus perfectum. They place the ornamented chant melody in the Superius, support it with a less active Tenor, and then add a third voice, Contratenor. This style is primarily represented by Guillaume Dufay's 22 hynllls, and contemporaries such as John Dunstable, Binchois, Johannes de Lyrnburgia and Johannes de Quadris have also left us pieces written essentially in the same style. 4 There are about 30 manuscript sources of polyphonic hymns dating between 1440 and 1500. They contain in total more than 400 hymn settings. An examination of these works shows that the influence of the hymn style described above persisted until the end of the century, although a newer tendency of imitative counterpoint with relatively equal importance of voices began to take over in the last decades of the century. The hymn style in question had its heyday around the middle of the century when it infiltrated various local repertories, represented by the works of such provincial composers as Antonius Janue,5 a typical follower of Dufay. Hymns contained in the Trent codices, dating from 1440 to 1480, testify to a gradual change of musical style after 1460, introducing binary mensuration and 1 See the dedicatory notes to his Proportionale musicae (ca. 1476) and Liber de arte contrapunti (1477), reprinted in c.E.R. de Coussemaker, ed., Scriptorum de musica medii aevi (1864-1876), VoUV, pp. 153-55 and 176-77. 2 For a detailed discussion of the hymn repertories and their style in the 15th century, see the unpublished dissertation by Masakata Kanazawa, "Polyphonic Music for Vespers in the Fifteenth Century" (Harvard University, 1966), VoU, pp.6-28, 42-68, 109-24, 220-39, 278-329, etc. Also see RGerber, Zur Geschichte des mehrstimmigen Hymnus (Basel, 1965); and Tom R Ward, "The Polyphonic Office Hymn and Liturgy of Fifteenth Century Italy," Musica Disciplina XXVI (1972), pp. 161-88. 3 For the English examples, see Frank Llewellyn Harrison, Music in Medieval Britain (London, 1958), pp. 150-52 and 345-46. A modern edition of the Apt hymns is in A. Gastoue, Le manuscrit de musique du tresor d'Apt, Publications de la Societe fram;aise de musicologie, Ser.I, Vol.X (Paris, 1936), pp.56-64. 4Modern editions of these hymns: G.Dufay, Opera omnia, ed. R.Besseler, Corpus mensurabilis musicae I (Rome, 1948-1966), Vol. V, pp. 39-72; G.Dufay, Siimtliche Hymnen, ed. RGerber, Das Chorwerk XLIX (Wolfenbiittel, 1937); John Dunstable, Complete Works, ed. M.F.Bukofzer, Musica britannica VIII (London, 1953), p. 95; Johannes de Quadris, Opera, ed. G.Cattin (Bologna, 1972), p.9. Binchois' hymns are included in J.Marix, Les musiciens de la eour de Bourgogne au XV siecle (1420-1467) (Paris, 1937), pp. 188, 191, 218 and 226. 5 His hymns are printed in Antonii Janue opera omnia, ed. M.Kanazawa, Corpus mensurabilis musicae LXX (1974), pp. 1-15. 634 increase in the number of voices. Yet the basic principles of couterpoint in these hymns remained essentially unchanged. The influence of the style is rather strongly observed among hymns from some sources dating around 1470 and 1480, such as San Pietro Ms. B 80,6 Montecassino Ms. 871,7 and Estense Mss. alpha M. I, 11-12, the pair of large choirbooks used at the ducal chapel of Ferrara which includes hymns by Brebis and Johannes Martini.s Martini's examples show a new feature: both Superius and Tenor are based on the chant melody, resulting in a canon-like style, but the three-voice texture and the function of each voice basically remains the same. Even more striking examples are found in Ms. 759 of the Veronese Chapter Library, from around '1490, which contains 21 hymns. 9 Many of these pieces treat the chant melody in a way like that of Dufay's hymns composed more than half a century earlier: they have a very similar three-voice texture and prefer tempus perfectum, the type of mensuration which was going out of fashion by that time. Last of all, Sistine Chapel Ms. 15, from the turn of the century, contains 28 hymn compositions, most of which are based on Dufay's hymns. In this repertory, each piece usually consists of two to four settings of hymn strophes, and as many as twenty of the 28 compositions include a setting by Dufay as one of the polyphonic strophes, alo'ng with settings by Josquin des Pres and Marbriano de Orto, the composers of the new generation. 10 \Vhat was the secret for the lasting popularity of the hymn style in question? The answer is simple, I think: the new style was pleasant and comfortable to listen to, and yet varied enough to stimulate the listener's interest. And this was achieved through a well-conceived plan of composition which gives the piece a perfect balance in its over-all structure, giving the music an effective development and a proper conclusion. Among many elements which effect such a plan, let me cite five which I consider the more important. (1) A piece of this type is composed in such a way that it is vmnally complete with Superius and Tenor only. These two principal voices give a strong framework for the composition. One can then add a Contratenor, an