[Letter from Denis Stevens]Author(s): Denis StevensSource: Journal of the American Musicological Society, Vol. 20, No. 3 (Autumn, 1967), pp.516-517Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the American Musicological SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/830340 .

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5 6 JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MUSICOLOGICAL SOCIETY

on the primo piano, out of reach of the flood waters of November 4, 1966. Thus the library's collection of rare music is safe and intact.

Denis Stevens, Columbia University, sends the following communication:

IN HIS ARTICLE on "The Reson Mass" (this JOURNAL XVIII [1965] p. 9), Mr. Hamm states that "a search for paired Mass sec- tions in the Old Hall Manuscript... is al- most fruitless." He mentions a Gloria and Credo by Queldryk, and rightly rejects them as a stylistically integrated pair. On p. Ix he postulates a paired Sanctus and Agnus Dei (anon. and Typp) but does not recognize "other examples of this sort of pairing by Typp." Since Mr. Hamm's method of pairing sections has attracted some attention recently (Revue Belge de Musicologie XIX [1965], p. 15), I would like to take this opportunity of submitting my own observations on this subject, which date back to 1956, rather in the same spirit as the author of Sub Arturo plebs, who ends his motet text: "Illis licet infimus Johannes Alanus sese recommen- dat.... '

Since the Fifth Edition of Grove's Dic- tionary of Music and Musicians (i954) contained only one or two biographical entries for that splendid constellation of English medieval composers whose works help to make the Old Hall MS the fas- cinating compilation it is, Dr. Blom graci- ously acceded to my plea for the inclu- sion of omitted names in the Supplement to the Fifth Edition, which was published as Volume Io in 196o.

After photographing the entire manu- script in color, with the kind permission of the Librarian of St. Edmund's College, Old Hall, and after studying it afresh from stylistic, historical, and palaeograph- ical angles, I wrote or revised some 21 articles for the Supplement, at the same time using the musical results of my re- searches in two programmes entitled Form and Style in Late Plantagenet Mu- sic, which were broadcast on the BBC Third Programme on January 12 and 18, 1957, and reviewed in the Corporation's

Journal, The Listener, on January 17 and 24.

Both in the programmes and in the ar- ticles, I stressed the importance of recog- nizing Mass pairs with the aid of certain standards or characteristics, and these were clearly stated in the Grove Supple- ment as follows: Burell (p. 53), Byttering (p. 57-two separate references), Chir- bury (pp. 72-73), Sturgeon (p. 428), Typp (p. 447). My methods of establishing Mass pairs included features such as similarity of clefs, mode, texture, style, mensura- tion, and-not insignificantly-recurrence of a composer's name.

In addition to the six possible pairs and the two dubious ones listed by Mr. Hughes, the following were suggested in my articles on the above-named compos- ers: BURELL: Gloria (I, 17) and Credo (II, 58)-the volume and page numbers refer to the Plainsong and Mediaeval Music So- ciety's edition of the Old Hall MS. Both movements are in conductus style, for three voices, and they are definitely at- tributed to Burell. Mode is consistent be- tween the two, and clefs are exactly simi- lar except for one minor displacement. BYTTERING: Gloria (I, 39) and Credo (II, 149). Similarities of clef, texture, style, and scoring are supported by an incipient scheme of mode-centres or modulation: the Gloria begins in F (to borrow, for purposes of illustration only, more modern terminology) and ends in G; completing the circle, the Credo be- gins in C and ends in F. BYTTERING: Gloria (I, 47) and Credo (II, 203). In the PMMS edition they ap- pear as a three-voice Gloria and a four- voice Credo, but since the Gloria is ca- nonic their textures are identical-two alto voices supported by two instruments. Finals are on D, and the clef-positions are very nearly the same. An interesting touch is the composer's presumably cal- culated use of a quasi-canonic texture in the Credo, in order to match the real canon of the Gloria. CHIRBURY: Sanctus (III, 22) and Ag- nus Dei (III, 1I6). In addition to the sim- ilarities of clef, style, and metre, the in-

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COMMUNICATIONS 51 7

tonations of both movements are (most unusually) set in three-part harmony, in- stead of as measured or unmeasured chant. STURGEON: Gloria (I, i i) and Credo (II, 51). There are sufficient concordances in style, mode, and clefs here to make these movements strong candidates for pairing. The Gloria is the only one by this composer in conductus style, and the Credo is his only extant setting of this text. TYPP: Sanctus (III, 30) and Agnus Dei (III, z22). Clefs are identical, and the cantus firmus is in the middle voice of both movements. Although the modes are dissimilar because of the different chants utilized, there are striking melodic remi- niscences in the uppermost voice-part:

hart, "Die H~indel-Handschriften der Santini-Bibliothek in Miinster," Hiindel- Jahrbuch VI [1960o], p. I19); Julianellum was the medieval Latin name of the borgo Vignanello, derived either from a legend- ary founder Giuliano, head of a group of

fugitives who escaped from the Goths, or, more probably, from a "fondo Giuliano" that preceded the foundation of the cas- tello (cf. Facolta di Architettura, Univer- sit' di Roma, Quaderni dell'Istituto di Ricerca Urbanologica e Tecnica della Pianificazione, no. 3 [1966]: Plinio Mar- coni, 11 Territorio della Media Valle del Tevere, p. i 6). In Vignanello I searched in vain for Cerruti's altarpiece of St. Anthony. The convent of San Sebastiano for which it was destined has been sup-

Sanctus

[ex] - - - - cel - [sis]

.1 ~ - fr , '

[Be-ne]-di - - ctus

Agnus Dei

qui tol . ...

lis

Ursula Kirkendale, Durham, N. C., sends the following communication:

I SHOULD LIKE to add here some informa- tion on Handel's activity in Vignanello, which I could obtain only during travels last summer when my article "The Rus-

poli Documents on Handel" (this JOURNAL XX [19671, pp. 222-273) was already in

press. My thesis that Handel's Mottetto Coe-

lestis dum spirat aura/In festo S. Antonij de Padua . .. 1707 was composed for

Vignanello could not be confirmed more

simply than by a passage in the second recitative where "Julianelle" is addressed and declared happy for having St. An- thony as patron. The name does not refer to a person (as assumed by Rudolf Ewer-

pressed; the church, now a parish church, has been crudely renovated. Yet a modern statue of Anthony is still the only saint represented in the church besides a corres- ponding Virgin Mary, both framed by neon tubes. The castello Ruspoli, dating from the later Middle Ages and impres- sively reconstructed in I537 by Antonio da Sangallo, has been in the possession of the Marescotti-Ruspoli ever since the middle of the 16th century when Sforza Marescotti acquired it through his mar- riage with Beatrice Farnese's daughter Ortensia Baglioni. Much of the interior dates from Handel's time, as proved by the corresponding entries in the Giustifi- cazioni. Handel's secular cantatas from documents i and 2 were probably heard in the gallery of ancestors on the first

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