Gregorian Chant:

The First Notated Music 590 – 1000 CE

Gregorian Chant, Introit: Puer natus est Nobis, c.600?

Gregorian Chant

 The religious music of the Roman Catholic Church was derived from existing Jewish and Eastern musical forms.

 Pope Gregory the Great (Pope from 590-604 CE) is said to be responsible for unifying chant into a uniform body of Christian music;  The standardization of the chant and a shift from improvising to composing music necessitated the development of musical notation. Thus, this is the first significant body of recorded music available to music historians.

Sources: Grove, pp 20 – 33; Miller and Cockrell Icon of Blessed Virgin Mary Byzantine

Gregorian Chant II

Pope Gregory ordered the collection and standardization of chants from all over Europe:     Byzantium (now Istanbul) = hymns (songs of praise); Ambrosian Chant (Milan, after St. Ambrose) = antiphonal singing (two choirs alternate); Gallican chant (from France; chant with Northern European and Celtic characteristics) ; Mozarabic chant (from Spain; chant with North African and Spanish characteristics).

Characteristics of Gregorian Chant I

     Monophonic (a single melody with no harmony) Modal (not in a major/minor key, but using one of eight ancient range of pitches) A cappella (Instrumental music cannot communicate prayer as efficiently as vocal music) Non-metric (uses free/flexible rhythms that follow the natural rhythms of the words) Melodically conjunct (the melody mostly rises and falls by adjacent notes) Gregorian Chant, Mass for Christmas Day: Kyrie, c.600

Characteristics of Greg. Chant II

    Limited range (usually within an octave range, suitable for higher male voices) Sung in Latin Written in neumatic notation (see below) Gregorian chant remains among the most spiritually moving music in western culture. However, its pure, floating melody was purely functional: a means of communicating prayer, whether it be for the eight Offices (prayers throughout the day), or for the Mass.

Sources: History of Western Music, Miller & Cockrell, Grout “History of Western Music”

The Catholic Mass

The Roman Catholic Mass is a ‘recreation’ of the last supper.

• The Mass has two main parts, the

Proper

and the

Ordinary

. •The

Proper

of the mass varies through the year and includes texts unique to feasts and holy days.

•The

Ordinary

of the mass is invariable and contains the following five parts:  Kyrie (“Christ have mercy”)  Gloria (“Glory to God in the Highest”)  Credo (“We believe in one God”)  Sanctus (“Holy, Holy, Holy”)  Agnus Dei (“Lamb of God”) Ibid.

Nave of Chartres Cathedral

Function & Types of Chant

The main function of chant is to enhance the meaning of the church liturgy.

Music was set to the text in the following ways:  Syllabic (each syllable gets one note) Greg. Chant, Sequence for Easter, Victimae, c.600?

 Neumatic (each syllable gets a couple of notes)  Melismatic (some syllables get many notes) Gregorian Chant, Introit: Puer natus est Nobis, c.600?

Gregorian Chant, Mass for Christmas Day: Kyrie, c.600?

 Psalmodic (many syllables are sung to one note) Greg, Chant, Psalm 109: Dixit dominus, c.600?