Well, I am sitting here in the shop at the Morgan Horse farm overlooking the stallion pastures where I work as a part-time driving horse trainer and webmaster for the three businesses on the farm and I can look across at the Smoky Mountains...and I am listening to Chant samples from a new book I got and logging on in spite of all that....
So yes, My Name is Noel, and I'm a Chant Fanatic....
And the problem is? :-) My only addictions are oolong tea and dark chocolate. But I do look forward to reading the latest posts on the forum each day. I usually learn something each time.
I'm in the middle of Dvorak 8 and checking the forum... sad. Actually the trombones don't play again until the 4th movement. I'll check on them in a few minutes.
All joking aside, I'm constantly refreshing this waiting for some interesting new perspective, and not a day goes by where someone doesn't make me think or reconsider something!
Ok, so at schola tonight we were talking about the Salicus and the following sentence was uttered that made us all realize that we are crazy:
"An ictus never appears on a podatus, so if a podatus has under it what looks like an ictus, it is really a vertical episema, which means that the neume is a salicus."
That is totally correct, Jeffrey --- and I can add that in the Preface to one of the editions of the Liber Usualis, Solesmes admits that they would have much preferred to write a horizontal episema, but they could not "because of the difficulty in writing this" (remember that they were not allowed to alter the Vatican edition)
What is truly confusing is that 90% of the time, what Solesmes calls a "salicus" is NOT a salicus according to the Vatican edition. There is a tiny "space" that makes a true salicus, according to the Vatican edition. The only really clear explanation of this is in Joseph Gogniat's book, and when one reads it, the jaw drops --- it is quite something --- no wonder Gogniat was exasperated that nobody understood this fact! The Vatican edition has very few salicus, but the Solesmes editions have literally thousands. It would be akin to me calling any type of feline a "bobcat" --- while the Vatican edition has a very specific definition of a "bobcat"
By the way, I was amazed to relearn that Dom Mocquereau had a different performance style than Dom Pothier from the very beginning (Combe, The Restoration of Gregorian Chant, page 102), and also that Dom Mocquereau was allowed to write ("adapt") the Propers for St. John Bosco's feast --- Dom Moc had a great devotion to Don Bosco
OK, Jeff. Fair enough. That explains why so few of the neumes in NOH are marked with the 2nd slur to make it a salicus. But, as I'm singing through each of these propers, with the NOH, I'm already sensing which neumes really 'want' to be treated as a salicus. When I then go to the GR to check, I find that my feelings are correct. Am I sensing something false in the current use of the salicus, or is it something that maybe the VE didn't quite get right? And what exactly is the difference if I chant it one way rather than the other?
The emphasis in the salicus is on the second note. If one takes the neo-Solesmes, one will find thousands of salicus. if one takes the Vaticana way, one will find very few.
Yes. I'm just saying that, whatever the musicological reason to the neo-Solesmes, it makes perfect sense to my ear - to the extent that the Vaticana feels just that tiny bit unsatisfying.
Steve - Most of us are praying for just such an "expert" to show up! We can hand them the baton and modestly take our place as the one and only bass and we solfage up and down the square.
Yes. I did very much enjoy the sessions with Scott Turkington at Colloquium 2006. I did teach me a lot about chant. It's my own addition of organ accompaniment that I love even more.
Jeff, is there an online source that explains the notation of the salicus versus the non-salicus in the Vatican edition? I know it's there somewhere in the beginning of my Graduale Simplex, but my Latin isn't that good. CanticaNova offers a translation of this, but I wonder if there's something posted, perhaps linked from this site, that I haven't discovered yet.
I've decided not to lose sleep over the salicus. Instead, I shall think about the role of the liquescent neume in the developing economy of the Merovingian empire. And I'll also stop checking this Forum all the time.
It's a TREMENDOUS offer...having spent $99 plus shipping to purchase my copy, I am thrilled that anyone may now have it.
EVEN IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO SING IN ENGLISH....it is a great training tool....have your schola sing it in English while learning, then move to the Latin...their fuller understanding of the text will influence their singing.
Many, many thanks of Bruce Ford and Jeffrey with-a-bowtie Tucker.
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