Tudor Partbooks: the manuscript legacies of John Sadler, John Baldwin and their antecedents
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Tudor Partbooks investigates sixteenth-century English music manuscripts as textual sources; as witnesses to changing, and now-superseded, musical practices; and as physical artefacts made, unmade and - in two conspicuous cases - in need of restoration (see source list on p. 4 below). The investigation of these manuscripts gravitates around two main themes: the manuscripts, their contents and copying between the 1510s and the 1580s (particularly within the context of the Elizabethan ‘afterlife’ of much older Latin polyphony); and the consequences of subsequent physical deterioration, and how this can be overcome through digital and compositional restoration.
Research questions
1. The sources: what can be learned from a comprehensive re-examination of the manuscript corpus? Where musical sources appear unrelated in terms of their provenance or contents, does internal physical evidence suggest possible affinities between them?
2. Changing practices: To what extent, and how consistently, did late-Tudor copyists adapt older repertories to suit later performance practices and reading methods? And how are such adaptations most effectively evidenced, quantified and evaluated?
3. Changing contexts: In what ways do scribal changes correspond with social transformations? Did
Elizabethan migrations of Latin liturgical music from institutional to domestic contexts necessitate new kinds and levels of syntactical information?
4. Digital restoration: To what extent, by what methods, and to what ends should physically damaged manuscripts be restored, especially when they carry corrupt readings? How can these decisions and readings be best conveyed to other users?
5. Contrapuntal reconstruction: Where sources are mutilated, how should we reconstruct missing voice-parts? Does collaborative reconstruction provide ‘objective’ or verifiable results, and might it facilitate more daring (and informative) restorations of fragments? How can the insights of performers inform the process of reconstruction?
Research context and methods
The manuscripts investigated by Tudor Partbooks are listed below. They constitute a varied and extensive corpus, some parts of which have received more sustained and intensive scrutiny than others. A primary aim of Tudor Partbooks is to provide comprehensive descriptions of all these manuscripts, based upon consistently-applied codicological criteria. These descriptions will include new data (where available) on provenance and dates, and will be published through DIAMM, as will images of all manuscripts newly digitized as part of the project. We envisage that the project team, including the doctoral student, will investigate questions of codicology (the structure, calligraphy, notation, texting, and artistic finishing of the manuscripts). This work package will address the first three questions outlined above. Pre- and post-Reformation sources will be considered alongside each other, regardless of repertory distinctions.
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Tudor Partbooks: the manuscript legacies of John Sadler, John Baldwin and their antecedents
Two Elizabethan copyists take centre stage in Tudor Partbooks: the Northamptonshire cleric and schoolmaster, John Sadler, and the lay clerk of St George’s, Windsor, John Baldwin. Subsequent generations of musicians have good reason to be thankful to Baldwin who almost single-handedly preserved the polyphonic legacy of Mary Tudor’s Chapel – not least the hymns and responds of John
Sheppard (d. 1558). Doubt has been cast, however, on Baldwin’s reliability as a witness of the customs and practices of pre-Reformation singers. A central aim of Tudor Partbooks is therefore to place Baldwin within the wider chronological context of scribal change (and continuity) from the early sixteenth century to the early seventeenth. This will take account of the impact of institutional and religious upheaval upon the practicalities of music-making.
Baldwin will also present the first of two restoration tasks, each of which is intended to facilitate facsimile publication. The lost Tenor partbook from his principal set, GB-Och 979-83, will be reconstructed polyphonically by an international team comprising scholars and performers
(including members of the project partners, Stile Antico). This is a large-scale enterprise and will be undertaken by a reconstruction team comprising academic, performer student contributors.
Although facilitated by online collaboration (probably wiki-style), the team will meet periodically for workshops that will also include demonstrations on related tasks and repertories.
A different kind of restoration programme will lead to the publication of John Sadler’s partbooks. In this case, the copyist’s highly acidic ink has progressively eroded the paper on which their contents were written. The partbooks are fragile and illegible in parts, and this will be rectified largely through digital restoration (drawing upon DIAMM’s experience in digitally restoring, for instance, Bologna
Q15).
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The doctoral programme
The proposed doctoral programme is one of several discrete but related work packages incorporated within Tudor Partbooks. The following description is intended to provide an indicative framework or starting-point for the doctoral research, and is certainly not intended to be an inflexible prescription:
Title: ‘The circulation and adaptation of early Tudor music in later manuscripts: a comparative study of sources, 1500-1620’
The focal case studies for this research include Robert Fayrfax (1464-1521) and John Taverner (d.
1545) whose compositions enjoyed prolonged posthumous circulation. In both cases, the music subsequently underwent scribal adaptations for the convenience of readers apparently unfamiliar with the conventions of early-Tudor musicians. Looking at later scribal renderings of perfect-time mensural notation, signatures, sharps and flats, and text underlay (for instance), you will investigate the issues raised by the first three series of ‘research questions’ above (see p. 1). The premise of changing musical priorities and scribal traditions, and the arguably 'corrupting' textual impact of these changes, lies at the heart of this research which also encompasses an editorial dimension. The thesis will comprise parallel transcriptions of votive antiphons by Robert Fayrfax in their various states, and a discussion of the questions they raise by way of editorial policy. You will contribute to the preparation of an edition of Fayrfax’s votive antiphons for EECM, which will be overseen by the series’ editorial committee (which comprises leading specialists in the field).
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See http://www.diamm.ac.uk/bologna-q15/.
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Tudor Partbooks: the manuscript legacies of John Sadler, John Baldwin and their antecedents
You need not restrict your doctoral research to these case studies, however. Given the large quantity of source materials under investigation, you can expect to broaden or adjust the focus of your investigation, and you are welcome to participate within the research project as a whole. You will have regular supervision from the PI, but will also attend project meetings with the Co-I and the research associate. You will be invited to attend reconstruction workshops in England and France, and to participate in public encounters (involving Stile Antico and other performers). You might also want to examine source materials related to, but not specifically investigated by, Tudor Partbooks
(such as the internationally important manuscripts of vernacular polyphony at Durham Cathedral and York Minster).
The core research team
Principal Investigator: Dr Magnus Williamson, Newcastle University; general editor, Early English
Church Music. Directs polyphonic reconstruction; oversees preparation of text outputs; co-ordinates preparation of inventories and manuscript descriptions; acts as PhD student’s first supervisor.
Co-Investigator: Dr Julia Craig-McFeely, Faculty of Music, Oxford University; project director,
Digital Image Archive of Medieval Music. Develops digital restoration programme; oversees RA (below); contributes manuscript descriptions and data; maintains virtual learning environment; in charge of photography.
Research associate: works with Dr Craig-McFeely in typesetting and imaging for partbook facsimiles; provides logistical support, co-ordinates events, liaises with project partners and edits web. Will be research-active, drawing upon materials and methods deployed in Tudor Partbooks.
PhD student:
Other key participants
Advisory Board: described above. chaired by Dr Owen Rees (Praelector, Queen’s College, Oxford): advises core research team; provides strategic overview; plan future developments.
Reconstruction team: membership includes subject specialists; reconstructs polyphony for
Baldwin facsimile; promotes associated projects.
Project partners: The British Library, London; the Bodleian Library, Oxford; the British
Academy, London; the Oundle Festival
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Tudor Partbooks: the manuscript legacies of John Sadler, John Baldwin and their antecedents
Median date
Number/designation of books RISM/library shelfmark
Partbook sets:
GB-Ob Mus. Sch. e.376-81
GB-Lbl Roy App 45-8
GB-Cp 471-4
GB-Ob Mus. Sch. e.420-2
GB-Lbl Roy App 74-6
GB-Lbl Add. 30480-4
GB-Lbl Add. 17802-5
GB-Ob Mus. e.1-5
GB-Och Mus. 979-83
GB-Och Mus. 984-8
Short name
Forrest-Heyther
Roy App
Peterhouse
Wanley
Lumley
Hamond
Gyffard
Sadler
Baldwin
Dow
Principal concordances:
GB-WRec 178
GB-Llp 1
GB-Cgc 667
GB-Cu Dd.13.27/GB-Csj K.31
GB-Lbl Add. 34191
GB-Lbl Harley 1709
GB-Ckc Rowe 316
GB-Ob Tenbury 1464
GB-Ob Mus. Sch. e.423
GB-Lbl Add. 31390
GB-Och Mus. 45
GB-Ob Tenbury 389/private
GB-Ob Tenbury 1486/private
GB-CHro D/DP/Z6/1
Eton
Lambeth
Caius
UJ
34191
1709
Rowe
O1464
O423
31390
O45
O389/McGhie
Braikenridge/Willmott
Z6
Minor concordances and other manuscripts:
Various 2 Drexel fragments
GB-Lbl Add. 70516
GB-Ob Mus. e.21
GB-Lbl 30513
GB-Lbl Harley 7578
GB-SHR LB/15/1/225-9
GB-Lbl Add. 15166
GB-Lbl Add. 22597
GB-Lbl Add. 32377
GB-Lbl Add. 4900
GB-Lbl Add. 47844
US-Ws V.a.408
Portland
Sadler wrappers
Mulliner
7578
Ludlow
15166
22597
32377
4900
47844
Inons
1500
1525
1525
1530
1530
1530
1565
1575
1575
1578
1585
1590
1591
1591
1529+ 6 of original 6
1530 4/4
1540
1549
4/5 (lacks T)
3/4
1550
1570
1570
1575
1580
1585
3/4
5/5
4/4
5/5
5/6
5/5 choirbook choirbook choirbook
2/5
Tenor
Medius
Medius
Bassus
Contratenor tablebook tablebook
2/?5
2/5
Bassus
1510 assorted leaves
1520
1530
1560
1565 single leaf choirbook fragments keyboard mixed
1570+ orphans
1575 Medius
1575
1580
Tenor
Contratenor
1580
1581
1590 voice+lute
Contratenor
Triplex
2 US-CLwr Spec. Coll. 3 Lge/ML431.D24 (three leaves), US-NYp Mus. Res. Drexel 4180-5* (flyleaves), *GB-Cfm
Music MS 1005, *GB-Ob MS Mus. d. 103, *GB-Wc X4/34/3.
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