Handl/Gallus/Victoria Ave Maria Mensuration question
  • SalieriSalieri
    Posts: 3,177
    Would anyone with access to the original part-/choir-books be willing to give me the original proportions/prolations for this piece? I'm struggling inwardly with whether the triple-meter section should be tripla or sesquialtera. Thanks!
  • Richard MixRichard Mix
    Posts: 2,768
    Check out the facsimiles linked below Aristotles edition on the CPDL page (as you may have noticed, the Publication link below that under General info mistakenly links to the volume with the 8vv setting).
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  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,151
    Sesquialtera, plain and simple.
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  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,151
    Okay, some might call that tripla. In Ari's score a (duple minim) = (three minims). In my score, a (duple semibreve) = (three semibreves). But the time signatures are C-slash (cut C) and 3/1 (in the source and in my score), the C-slash connoting two semibreves forming the duple structure. There is considerable ambiguity on the labeling of this relationship.
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  • SalieriSalieri
    Posts: 3,177
    Exactly. I was thinking that it looked like a tripla, a standard 3:1 ratio; but then, the tripla seemed far to fast (three semibreves in the space of one). I was hoping that there might have been an earlier source than Aristotle's (which clearly give 3:1), which might have simply had a 3--which ought to be interpreted as sesquialtera (3:2), but was sometimes (erroneously) interpreted as tripla--that some later copyist messed up.
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  • dad29
    Posts: 2,217
    CH, yours is almost identical to the arrangement Roger Wagner used in his recording of the piece. I have no idea whose arrangement that is, however.
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  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,151
    #dad29, nothing special about mine or Roger Wagner's, or indeed many other editions. See the much older edition (from IMSLP) attached.

    One other point. In the source cited by Ari on the CPDL page, there are numerous accidentals (sharps) that appear, at least to me, to have been added by a later hand, which makes for some interesting sounds in Ari's edition (listen to the sound file, compared with, say, mine).

    IMSLP38085-PMLP84099-Victoria_Ave_Maria_gratia.pdf
    106K
  • Aristotle EsguerraAristotle Esguerra
    Posts: 1,185
    I have had my choirs sing early-music triple sections in tripla pretty much exclusively; I cannot recall an exception, anyway. For the piece in question, I also let my sopranos ignore the accidentals attached to "ora pro nobis" found in my CPDL edition. :)

    For a Handl-to-Handl comparison, here's a screenshot of the Tenor part from the 1589 print of Obsecro Domine. The recording that persuaded me to put this in the Advent repertoire is sadly no longer available on YouTube, but I do remember its singers executing its conclusion in tripla (and adding a few melodic ornaments here and there to good effect).
    Obsecro-Handl-Tenor.png
    413 x 311 - 298K
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