11. Paul Kolb: Rhythmic Chant and Chant-Based Polyphony in the Annaberg Choirbooks
Channel: SMNF cz
Date: 2020-12-23

Cantus Fractus 2020 conference
http://www.smnf.cz/en/news/Virtual-conference-Rhythm-in-Music-and-the-Arts-in-the-Late-Middle-Ages/

Rhythmic Chant and Chant-Based Polyphony in the Annaberg Choirbooks 

Paul Kolb, KU Leuven


By the late Middle Ages, monophonic and polyphonic notations had gone their separate ways: notes were shaped and grouped differently, they were described using different terminology, and they represent (in chant and polyphony) two different ways of making music. Or so the story goes. But while the most famous manuscripts of chant and polyphony exhibit this distinction clearly, local traditions were inevitably messier affairs. In instances of so-called “cantus fractus”, aspects of mensural notation were adapted to give more explicit rhythms to plainchant. Equally striking is the use of visual aspects reminiscent of chant notation in notated polyphony. Both directions of influence are at work in the Annaberg Choirbooks (Dresden, Sächsische Landesbibliothek, MSS Mus. 1/D/505 and 1/D/506), two manuscripts of liturgical polyphony from early sixteenth-century Saxony. The chant incipits were given rhythmic significations as well as simple divisi at cadences. Within sections of polyphony the chant cantus firmus is sometimes highlighted visually with larger note values or coloration. And sometimes, the rhythmic chant incipit continues uninterrupted into a section of polyphony, requiring both types of notation to be sung simultaneously. The latter cases make the rhythmic relationship between chant and polyphony explicit. The incipits present evidence for a chant performance practice neither unmeasured nor monophonic. The back-to-back placement of two visually distinct types of notation highlights their implicit musical difference while paradoxically breaking down the stylistic distinctions between chant and polyphony.