A Performer S Guide To Medieval Music

A Performer's Guide to Medieval Music is an essential compilation of essays on all aspects of medieval music performance, with 40 essays by experts on everything from repertoire, voices, and instruments to basic theory. This concise, readable guide has proven indispensable to performers and scholars of medieval music.

In this collection, by major performers and musicologists, individual chapters treat chant, organum, motet and cantilena, the polyphonic mass ordinary, non-liturgical monophony, four lyric forms after 1300 and liturgical and vernacular architecture. Other chapters address particular instruments or groups of instruments, followed by treatments on performance practice and chapters on theory.

Vocal/choral issues. The solo voice in the Renaissance / Ellen Hargis ; On singing and the vocal ensemble I / Alexander Blachly ; On singing and the vocal ensemble II / Alejandro Planchart ; Practical matters of vocal performance / Anthony Rooley -- Wind, string, and percussion instruments. Recorder ; Renaissance flute / Herbert Myers ; Capped double reeds : crumhorn--Kortholt--Schreierpfeif / Jeffery Kite-Powell ; Shawm and curtal / Ross Duffin ; Racket : rackett, Rankett (Ger.), cervelas (Fr.), cervello (It.) / Jeffery Kite-Powell ; Bagpipe / Adam Knight Gilbert ; Cornett / Douglas Kirk ; Sackbut / Stewart Carter -- Bowed instruments / Wendy Gillespie -- The violin / David Douglass -- Plucked instruments / Paul O'Dette -- The harp / Herbert Myers -- Early percussion / Benjamin Harms -- Keyboard instruments / Jack Ashworth -- Practical considerations/instrumentation. Proto-continuo / Jack Ashworth and Paul O'Dette ; Mixed ensembles / James Tyler ; Large ensembles / Jeffery Kite-Powell ; Rehearsal tips for directors / Adam Knight Gilbert ; Performance editions / Frederick Gable -- Performance practice. Tuning and temperament / Ross Duffin ; Pitch and transposition / Herbert Myers ; Ornamentation in sixteenth-century music / Bruce Dickey ; Pronunciation guides / Ross Duffin -- Aspects of theory. Eight brief rules for composing a si placet altus, ca. 1470-1510 / Adam Knight Gilbert ; Renaissance theory / Sarah Mead -- Introduction to Renaissance dance. Early Renaissance dance, 1450-1520 / Yvonne Kendall -- For the early music director. Starting from scratch / Jeffery Kite-Powell.

Over the past twenty-five years Europe and North America have witnessed an enormous revival of interest in early music. Since the late 1950s numerous professional and amateur ensembles have delighted audiences with the vocal and instrumental music of the twelffth to the sixteenth centuries, while scholars have addressed themselves to the many problems involved in its authentic re-creation. This book unites the two fields; it is both a summary of the most recent scholarly investigations into the subject and a practical guide to the performance of early music based on the experience of the author and others who have performed a sizable portion of the early repertory. McGee lays out clearly the foundation and background of each of the performance problems, presenting the most recent research and pointing out areas of incomplete knowledge and controversy, and then introduces practical solutions based on the scholarship. All the topics necessary for a historical performance of early music are discussed: tempo, rhythmic flow, instrumentation, ornamentation, articulation, improvisation, style, and singing technique, along with some practical hints for selecting a program and shoosing substitute instruments. The final chapters is a reference guide to modern editions of the music and an introduction to the scholarly literature on early music performances. At the time of publication, this book was the first to address the problem of how to perform medieval and Renaissance music. It is intended for both the amateur performing musician and the serious student.

Revised and expanded, A Performer's Guide to Seventeenth Century Music is a comprehensive reference guide for students and professional musicians. The book contains useful material on vocal and choral music and style; instrumentation; performance practice; ornamentation, tuning, temperament; meter and tempo; basso continuo; dance; theatrical production; and much more. The volume includes new chapters on the violin, the violoncello and violone, and the trombone—as well as updated and expanded reference materials, internet resources, and other newly available material. This highly accessible handbook will prove a welcome reference for any musician or singer interested in historically informed performance.

This book makes available the fruit of a lifetime's research into baroque performing practice. Drawing on the encyclopaedic wealth of material in the author's classic studies, it supplies a basic grounding for students, performers and all early music enthusiasts. From the teeming abundance and confusion of the contemporary evidence, the author has here picked out all the essential information which the modern musician needs to guide his own interpretative decisions. Wherever possible this is cited in the words of the baroque composers and writers themselves.

Provides instruction on three important tasks that early music performers often undertake in order to make their work more noticeable and appealing to their audiences. First, the book provides instruction on using early sources - manuscripts, prints, and treatises - in score, parts, or tablature. It then illuminates priorities behind basic editorial decisions - determining what constitutes a 'version' of a musical piece, how to choose a version, and how to choose the source for that version. Lastly, the book offers advice about arranging both early and new music for early instruments, including how to consider instruments' ranges and various registers, how to exploit the unique characteristics of period instruments, and how to produce convincing textures of accompaniment.