Rare 1904 Recording / Augustinian Fathers / "Veni Sancte Spiritus" SEQUENCE for PENTECOST
  • RagueneauRagueneau
    Posts: 2,592
    In this rare 1904 audio recording, noted scientist and Sistine Chapel Choir director, Baron Rudolf Kanzler, conducts the Augustinian Fathers singing the "Veni Sancte Spiritus" (Sequence from Pentecost):

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlQPWEvCnqk

    As you can hear, it is extremely difficult for the singers in 1904 to get the "Pustet/Haberl" mensuralism of the Editio Medicæa out of their ears. They try as hard as possible to sing the notes evenly, but (as you will hear) the Augustinian Fathers simply cannot "unlearn" so many years of mensuralism. Incidentally, from a musicological standpoint, singing this Sequence in a mensural (rhythmic) way is not "wrong," and (indeed) may come closer to approximating how it might have sounded in the late Middle Ages.

    What Mocquereau and Pothier were able to do with their choirs in such a short time is so much MORE amazing, when one considers how firmly entrenched the Pustet/Haberl mensuralism was.

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    To access the rest of the recordings from the 1904 congress in Rome, click here
    Thanked by 1chonak
  • hilluminar
    Posts: 121
    Of course this was meant to be sung rythmically. So were numerous other sequences such as the one for Corpus Christi, which has a strict 4/4 rhythm. Shame on whomever
    attempted to make all chant, especially the very rhythmical Frankish chant, unnaturally smooth.
  • E_A_FulhorstE_A_Fulhorst
    Posts: 381
    Speaking as a (musical) layman, this opinion piece critical of mensuralism helped make sense of the larger issues at stake.
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