Chapter 5
The Middle Ages
Music and the
Church:
Plainchant
Key Terms
Jongleurs
Plainchant
Medieval modes
Vihuela
Recitation
Reciting tone
Preface
Antiphon
Sequence
Drone
Middle Ages Timeline
The Middle Ages
From fall of Rome (476 C.E.) to c. 1400
Access to international trade waned
Feudal economy
Primitive, often brutal living conditions
Mass migrations due to invasions, famine,
plagues
Much of the education and technology of
Greco-Roman civilization lost in the West
The Middle Ages
Slow but sure movement away from the
absolute authority of the Church
New musical concepts originated and
evolved—“quantum leaps” in music
history
• Music notation
• Polyphony
• Tunes
Music and the Church
The Church held a central position in all
areas of life
The single greatest preserver of western
civilization in the Middle Ages
Patron of the arts: music, art, architecture,
poetry, learning
Most musicians trained in the Church
Except at the end, most notated music was
Church music
Plainchant
Chanting sacred texts is a nearly universal
phenomenon
Practiced by Christians, Jews, Muslims,
and Buddhists
Also used by many smaller traditional
religions, as in Hawai’ian or Navajo
cultures
Plainchant (Gregorian chant) is the body of
chant melodies sung in the Catholic
Church from the Middle Ages to 1964
Plainchant
Music was used at services in cathedrals,
monasteries, and convents every day
• The Mass: the major worship service
• The Divine Office: eight shorter services at
various times of day and night
Thousands of texts and melodies required
for these daily services
• Prior to notation, all sung from memory!
Pope Gregory I supposedly mapped out
the standard order of chants for these
services—thus, Gregorian chant
Medieval Modes
Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, and Mixolydian
White-key scales starting on D, E, F, and G,
respectively
These scales don’t use same patterns of
whole steps and half steps as major or
minor scales
As a result, “pull” to tonic is weaker
Richer palette of possible scales
Medieval Modes
Listening to Plainchant
Describe the style of plainchant
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Melody
Harmony
Key and tonality
Rhythm, meter, and tempo
Dynamics
Texture
Tone color
Form
How is this music not like a tune?
Features of Plainchant
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Legato melody moves mostly by step
Based on a medieval mode (Mixolydian)
Tonality weaker than with major scale
Nonmetrical: no fixed rhythm or meter
Rhythms follows text at moderate tempo
Unaccompanied, monophonic music
Sung by male (or female) voices
No obvious patterns of repetition or return
Avoidance of repetitions, dance rhythms, and
strong tonic gives it a floating, otherworldly,
spiritual quality—passionate yet serene
Antiphon, “In paradisum”
Burial antiphon from the Requiem Mass
(funeral service)
Sung over and over while the coffin is
carried from church to graveyard in a
processional
Preface, “Vere dignum”
Preface from the Mass for Whit Sunday
Part of the Liturgy of the Eucharist, the
Preface introduces the Elevation of the
Host
Sung by the priest as he presents the
bread and wine
The Preface immediately precedes the
Sanctus (Holy, Holy, Holy), one of the most
awe-filled moments of the Mass
Preface, “Vere dignum”
• Legato melody with many repeated notes
• Heightened speech; not as “melodic” as “In
paradisum”
• Based on a medieval mode (Dorian)
• Nonmetrical: no fixed rhythm or meter
• Rhythms follows text at moderate tempo
• Unaccompanied, monophonic music
• Sung by solo male voice
• Based on a reciting tone, repeated three times
Hildegard of Bingen
Lived 1098-1179
Abbess: founded Rupertsberg Abbey
Mystic: author of Scivias, a record of her
visions
Author: wrote 13 other books on theology,
medicine, and physical sciences
Composer: wrote some 77 works,
including Ordo Virtutum, a liturgical drama
Hildegard, “Columba aspexit”
• Legato melody mixes in more leaps, covers
wider range than earlier plainchant
• Based on a medieval mode (Mixolydian)
• Nonmetrical: no fixed rhythm or meter
• Rhythms follows text at moderate tempo
• Monophonic music over instrumental drone
• Sung by female voices
• Sequence form: AA’BB’CC’ etc.
 Series of solo tunes repeated by chorus
• Ecstatic yet serene
Hildegard, “Columba aspexit”