The International Chant Academy announces HANDS ON with HILDEGARD, with Krista Cornish Scott and Marsja Mudde, via Zoom
Live lectures and optional Practitioner's Track via Zoom on the historical & liturgical background, musical notation, and performance practice for the songs of Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179).
Hildegard, renowned for her contributions to theology, music, literature, and art, was a German nun and mystic, canonized saint and Doctor of the Church. Hildegard was foremost a liturgist, however. She founded new monasteries for her sisters where she could have better opportunity to oversee their liturgies, that they might believe and live the Liturgy as truly cosmic and epic.
She and her nuns adapted forms of singing that they believed to be crucial to the reform of the Church in their day, and central to the ongoing turning of the heavens and to the nature of time itself. —————— LECTURE I with Q and A by Krista Cornish Scott
This session will be valuable to anyone who has felt hesitant to program Hildegard’s music, whether it be in a church or choral setting, or as a solo singer. • Explore biographical information which give context to Hildegard's religious life and early influences. • Learn about her non-musical output, which influenced her poetic and musical writing. • Delve into appropriate vocal production for Hildegard's music, and medieval Germanic pronunciation. • Discover multiple editions and resources now available for Hildegard's music.
Learn about performing Hildegard’s music in an historically informed way. Marsja will discuss and demonstrate: • The consequences of Hildegard’s interdisciplinary approach for understanding and performing her music. • How Hildegard “felt” the modes and utilized them in her compositions. • How understanding the original notation (neumes) and their origins (the hand movements that inspired the notation in the first place) can inform interpretation.
Lectures will be recorded. It is hoped that you will join live, however, and take advantage of the Q and A.
************ Optional PRACTITIONER’S TRACK with Marsja Mudde (choose Thursday 5/29, or Saturday 5/31): • Understanding and reading the original Hufnagel notation. • Directing via hand gestures (chironomy), reconstructed from the notation. • Identifying pivotal tones in relation to the mode(s). • Discovering the rhythmic-melodic flow of Hildegard’s music.
Thursday, May 29 OR Saturday, May 31 (2 hours, with short break) USA: 1:30p EDT | 12:30p CDT (UTC - 5) | 11:30a MDT | 10:30a PDT | Europe: 6:30p BST (UTC + 1)
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