This thread will soon become a caricature of itself (A. Wood is laughing now) but as I understand it, you are essentially correct. That is one reading of the chant, based on some evidence. Hiley in his new book says that the evidence runs in all directions (hardly a surprise, once you think about it), so the essential mistake here is looking for the One Correct Way.

The problem that I see in this approach is that it is too director dependent. As a listener, I find it just as disorienting as equalist chant taken too slowly and ponderously.

The entire repertoire of chant for any given year was, seemingly, sung by heart, both words and music. Until this experience of trying to sing the entire liturgy by memory is replicated in the 21st century, we cannot comment on how feasible or not heavily nuanced performance is in relation to historical practice.

The webpage http://musicasacra.com/forum/comments.php?DiscussionID=3478&page=1#Item_0 contains a semiological interpretation of the introit antiphon "Gaudeamus omnes" which could be sung to a beat. The webpage http://www.box.net/shared/tye5md0clm contains a rhythmically nuanced solo rendering of that interpretation. Both webpages are operational at the time of writing this comment.

The semiological approach is not necessarily any more director-dependent than any other. This is because the semiological approach can lead to various possibilities of singing chants, ranging from extremely nuanced durations to absolutely rigid counting of the beat. There is much about the nature of the rhythmic notations which is unproven when it comes to deciding upon durations. If any given chant is sung to a beat, a conductor is not anymore necessary than he would be for the unaccompanied communal singing of the hymn "Faith of our Fathers". In short, it is up to us whether to interpret this music as metrical or not. We should take into account, of course, the ancient Latin theoretical writings on music (which generally speak of 2:1 ratios and so forth) prior to the emergence of the rhythmic modes. We should also take into account modern singing styles around the Mediterranean of chants whose melodies may date to the same era, for example, Greek kontakions such as Τη Υπερμάχω Στρατηγώ (To the champion general, hymns of victory) which is sung to a beat.

Interpreting the chant to a beat has, obviously, pastoral advantages as such an interpretation is, with respect to acquisition and performance, much more accessible to congregations generally. The rhythmic details of a performance to a beat are easier to memorise than the rhythmic details of a nuanced, soloistic performance.

I do hope this discussion remains civil. .. My thoughts on the matter are that those in favor of a seimiological interpretation need to develop actual performance editions and practical approaches. We need to restore/establish chant in the average parish which will require more of a method I think. It seems that many scholas using this approach learn by rote and 'lean on' the director and I think this is not good. Singers should be taught as much as they can reasonably handle (keeping them together is going to require the development of practical approaches) I also have the impression ( I may be wrong) that a good many renditions according to this approach are exaggerated and I question whether some of those claiming to be using seimiolgy really understand that approach.

That being said I'm rather interested in the newer approach, but I don't think Its necessarily radically different from "Old Solesmes" as I recently pointed out in a different thread the introduction to the Liber Usualis says that in syllabic chant each note has exactly the same character, length ect. as the syllable to which it is attached. I'm also unaware of anyone marking ictuses for psalm tones, equalism doesn't mean exactly equal.

Since we seem to be doing a good job at sharing in a non-judgmental, non-defensive way, I have a question. What exactly would one define semiology as? I assumed it would require study of the "in campo aperto" neumes. But here, it seems to me to be the generic term for the approach used by anyone differing from "Old Solesmes" - or am I mistaken?

not that ther's anything wrong with it.

I have been absent from this forum for a couple weeks and had been wondering why I was having a sudden spike in hits to those old Gaudeamus recordings which I made as training materials for my medieval music ensemble EUOUAE. I should mention that each of the readings was intended to highlight one aspect of various semiological theories, and not to present a complete stylistic interpretation. Please take them with a grain of salt.

Some writers have stressed the importance of the sound of text (Cardine, Saulnier), others the rhythmic proportions of long and short notes a-- especially the St. Gaul notation (Vollaerts, Murray), and still others the structural pitches of the various modes (Mahrt, Kelly). My theory is that although the manuscript evidence appears to point in different directions, the various notational systems spring from a common oral tradition. When you look at the words (both sound, and meaning), the long and short notes (whether there be two values, three, or even nuances beyond that), and the melodic structure of the modes, there emerges a musical rhetoric which is common to much of what we call the authentic Gregorian repertory.

...the practice of chant unnecessarily excludes congregational participation through the melodic line being interpreted in overly complex rhythm which the congregation would find very difficult to sing. Which brings us back to the subject of the difference between the practice of giving most notes the same duration (and therefore a beat) and the methods which use long and short notes.

This is not true at all, I think. I actually don't think in terms of "long and short" by any means. This seems to me to get closer to the idea of mensuralism. Semiology, as I practice it relies essentially upon a speech rhythm. Does a congregation need to proclaim together the Creed in a strict rhythm of equal pulses? No way. They can do the same when they sing it or any other mostly syllabic chant. The only difference is that now they do it with pitches. It's pretty simple really.

The other information that Semiology reveals is quite helpful for more melismatic chant which is beyond the scope of a congregation anyway.

Adam Bartlett,

you wrote: "I actually don't think in terms of "long and short" by any means. This seems to me to get closer to the idea of mensuralism."

How long is long and how short is short? Applying natural speech rhythm to, for example, a latin text sung on a single pitch would, of course, not produce isochrony. Current linguistic research indicates that speech rhythm is not isochronic and therefore that vowels take long and short durations of varying proportions. This is not taken in linguistics to imply mensuralism.

You wrote, "Does a congregation need to proclaim together the Creed in a strict rhythm of equal pulses? No way. They can do the same when they sing it or any other mostly syllabic chant. The only difference is that now they do it with pitches."

I have never been in a congregation where a Creed was ever spoken in such a way that the people kept close together rhythmically at all points, so I don't perceive of the matter as being simple. When the celebrant's voice is amplified, this can ameliorate the rhythmic disunity but far from removes it. The singing of the Creed shows the universal tendency for groups to slow down syllabic movement when singing together to a musical scale. Even then, lack of a beat between phrases inevitably, in my experience, produces phenomena such as "D-d-deum d-d-de D-d-deo ... D-d-deum v-v-verum d-d-de D-d-deo v-vero" where multiple singers in the congregation begin the next phrase at a different moment from each other. I find this to occur even when a congregation is conducted well.

You wrote, "The other information that Semiology reveals is quite helpful for more melismatic chant which is beyond the scope of a congregation anyway."

In the Coptic church, melismatic chants are happily sung not only by the cantors, but then the Copts sing large communal chants to a beat. The earliest rhythmic notations of chant do not preclude the possibility of singing latin chant to a beat any more than they preclude the possibility of not singing latin chant to a beat. Consequently, latin melismas are just as manageable as Coptic melismas when interpreted to a beat. Again, how long is long and how short is short and are the monks who wrote about chant prior to the rhythmic modes to be believed when they give a 2:1 ratio for long and short? Very few chant practitioners today would teach chant "plaudam pedes" as the writer of the 9th century Scholia Enchiriadis apparently did.

"This numerical proportion [numerositatis ratio] is always seemly in skilled song and adorns it with very great dignity, no matter whether the singing be slow or fast, or whether it be rendered by one or by many. Furthermore it follows that, as in rhythmical singing [numerose canendo], no one sings either more slowly or more quickly than another, the voices of a multitude sound like that of one man [quasi ex uno ore vox multitudinis audiatur]."

If you are ever at a service with the theologian Stanley Hauerwas, you will hear him recite the Our Father against the grain--and in his very distinct voice to boot! But I digress...