Very helpful, Thanks

I attended Fr. Columba's two-week chant course in 1998, I think. It was intensive and worthwhile. And the two weeks in the monastic environment (you could choose how much of the monastic schedule to follow...I wanted to follow it all) was life-changing. I became a Benedictine oblate of Saint Meinrad Archabbey...the two weeks led to a definite sense of being called to that affiliation.

Cardine's "Gregorian Semiology" has a chart in the beginning. I don't know if that's the kind of chart you want.

You can read many articles on performing chant from manuscript sources in the chant blog at euouae.com, including instructional videos like this performance of the Ave Maria from the Laon manuscript.

Unfortunately, there is no one book available right now that can teach you to learn to sing from Messine notation. It takes a rather broad study and a familiarity with a substantial portion of the repertoire.

I've put together a six week workshop called "Beyond Square Notes" with accompanying handouts that sets forth a method for teaching chant from the Laon and St Gall notation in the Graduale Novum. I'm working on making some of these materials available.

In Fr. Columba Kelly's two-week course, we concentrated mainly on certain markings that were clear indications to do something specific; the rest of the markings were reminders of pitch changes we didn't need so much because we had the four-line staff notation. He did point out a few spots where the Laon notation showed a variance in pitch from what the square notation had.

Mainly I look for the c for celeriter, meaning move right through or even accelerate a bit; and the t for tenere, meaning hold or emphasize. I think the t looks like an e sometimes. There are also horizontal episemas attached to some virgas; these, too, indicate a bit of emphasis.

Good points, incantu. Well said.

If you are familiar with the notational practices and with the repertoire, you will be able to figure out the proper interpretation.

It bears repeating that we cannot know the "proper interpretation" for any of the early chant schools, whether we're speaking about Chartres, Laon, St. Gall, or any of the others. I have read some articles wherein scholars try to guess at what some of those manuscripts might have sounded like in the 10c. and earlier, but all we can do is guess. One of the hardest problems is that descriptions by theorists of the time do not match what we actually see in the manuscripts.

Cross-post from euouae.com:

Here are two examples from the offertory Illumina as it appears in the St. Gall notation of Einsiedeln 121.

Look at the words “dicat” and “inimicus” [third line of text, first and second words]. The last syllable of each has a bivirga followed by a climacus. These are both the same musical figure, although they are written differently. The first one cautions “l(evate),” i.e. “the second note is higher than you think.” For the second figure, the copyist adds an “e(galiter)” to remind the singer that the first note of the climacus is the same pitch as the bivirga. The fact that the second bivirga has episemata does not imply that it is to be treated as a double long or that the previous bivirga is short.

If one encountered either of these figures in isolation, they would not be able to arrive at the “proper” interpretation because each case presents only some of the necessary information. But with an understanding of the notational practice (that not all signs are to be interpreted literally) and familiarity with the repertoire (being able to compare other notated examples of the same melodic figure) one can arrive at the “proper” interpretation: that is to say, the one intended by the copyist.

For another example in the same chant, look at the cadence on “morte” [N.B. the neumes extend over the next word] and on “eum.” They each have a double climacus just before the final syllable. In the second instance, the first climacus shows the third note as long, while in the first instance all three are written as short. Was the first an oversight? Or was the second a slip of the pen?

First of all, we know these figures are identical, even though differently notated. Comparison to the Laon manuscript of the same chant confirms this. It also confirms the “short-short-long, long-short-short” reading in both cases with its more explicit notation. Again, while the one manuscript did not provide the necessary information, comparison to another source reveals the explicit meaning of an implicit notational system.

I might add to this that Metz was at that time esteemed higher than St Gall in terms of chant and more faithful in preserving the tradition.

At what time and by whom? I'm interested to hear more about this.

Interesting. The Laon manuscript is certainly pristine compared to even the best of the St. Gall school. But that doesn't necessarily mean their singing was any better. It is because of the "sloppiness" of St. Gall scribes (pace Hartker) that we can really begin to understand more about the pre-notational oral tradition, the performance practice of the day, and the common pitfalls for contemporary singers.