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Organum (pronounced /ˈɔɹgənəm/, though the stress is now sometimes incorrectly put on the second syllable) is a technique of singing developed in the Middle Ages, and is an early form of polyphonic music. In its earliest stages, organum involved two musical voices: a Gregorian chant melody, and the same melody transposed by a consonant interval, usually a perfect fifth or fourth. In these cases often the composition began and ended on a unison, maintaining the transposition only between the start and finish (although see below). Organum was originally improvised; while one singer performed a notated melody (the vox principalis), another singer—singing "by ear"—provided the unnotated second melody (the vox organalis). Over time, composers began to write added parts that were not just simple transpositions, and thus true polyphony was born. Symbols of the International Phonetic Alphabet. ...
Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, which is often contrasted with speech. ...
The Middle Ages formed the middle period in a traditional schematic division of European history into three ages: the classical civilization of Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and modern times, beginning with the Renaissance. ...
Polyphony is a musical texture consisting of two or more independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice (monophony) or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords (homophony). ...
Gregorian chant is also known as plainchant or plainsong and is a form of monophonic, unaccompanied singing, which was developed in the Catholic Church, mainly during the period 800-1000. ...
Look up melody in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...
In music transposition is moving a note or collection of notes (or pitches) up or down in pitch by a constant interval. ...
In music theory, an interval is the relationship between two notes or pitches, the lower and higher members of the interval. ...
The perfect fifth or diapente is one of three musical intervals that span five diatonic scale degrees; the others being the diminished fifth, which is one semitone smaller, and the augmented fifth, which is one semitone larger. ...
The perfect fourth or diatessaron, abbreviated P4, is one of two musical intervals that span four diatonic scale degrees; the other being the augmented fourth, which is one semitone larger. ...
UNISON logo UNISON is the largest trade union in the United Kingdom, with over 1. ...
Improvisation is the act of making something up as it is performed. ...
The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view. ...
History
Early organum The first document to describe organum specifically, and give rules for its performance, was the Musica enchiriadis (c. 895), a treatise traditionally (and probably incorrectly) attributed to Hucbald of St. Amand. In its original conception, organum was never intended as polyphony in the modern sense; the added voice was intended as a reinforcement of the singers, who were normally in unison. It is also made clear in the Musica enchiriadis that octave doubling was acceptable, since such doubling was inevitable when men and boys sang together; and it was also acceptable to double parts with instruments. The 10th-century treatise Scholia enchiriadis treats the subject in greater detail. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
Events Bohemia breaks away from Great Moravia Arnulf of Carinthia undertakes his second Italian campaign Approximate date of composition of the Musica enchiriadis, the beginnings of western polyphonic music Births Athelstan of England Erik Bloodaxe, king of Norway 933-935 (+954) Deaths Categories: 895 ...
Hucbald (Hucbaldus, Hubaldus) (c. ...
For parallel singing, the original chant would be the upper voice; the vox organalis was at a parallel perfect interval below, usually a fourth. Thus the melody would be heard as the principal voice, the vox organalis as an accompaniment or reinforcement.
This kind of organum is now usually called parallel organum, although terms such as sinfonia were used in early treatises.
Debate about origins The Musica enchiriadis documented a practice which was already going on, although it has not been possible to establish a beginning date for the practice, which may go back hundreds of years. Since the treatise was written slightly before the reinvention of standardised musical notation around 900, its descriptions of organum are verbal only, and it is not known how closely they were followed. In addition, both of the Enchiraidis treatises are primarily works on the concept of a pseudo-scientific derivation of the gamut and the modes from theories of conjunct and disjunct tetrachords (series of four pitches involving fixed tone and semitone relationships within them). To some extent it is probable that the treatment given to organum was a treatment designed to explain it in the terms of the evolving theory of the gamut (not least by the observation that parallel fourths outline tetrachords), and was not a descriptive or prescriptive manual of practical organum (rather like the concept of "sonata form" was derived at a much later date in the 19th century in order to describe much Classical period music, irrespective of the fact that most "sonata form" works of that period are not in a invariantly strict sonata form at all, and that the composers and performers of that period certainly would not have recognised the concept in its restrictive sense once it was propounded). In music, a hexachord is a collection of six tones. ...
Sonata form is a musical form that has been widely used since the early classical period. ...
The word classical has several meanings: Pertaining to the societies of the classical antiquity, ancient Greece or Rome. ...
It is also worth noting that strict parallel organum does not generally occur in either of these early treatises as an end in itself. The treatises begin from a premise of parallelism and then move on to suggest better ways of making the organum, involving boundary tones, and the vast majority of musical examples in the treatises in fact use intervals of 2nds, 3rds, 4ths, 5ths and 6ths (by inversion/octave doubling), to create a more artistic result. The aesthetic underpinning the use of these other intervals (usually to do with the concept of a "boundary tone" to preserve the modal integrity, or in order to avoid harmonic tritones or accidentals foreign to the mode) was explored in more detail by Guido d'Arezzo in his Micrologus of around 1020 AD. Scholars have tended to describe this more varied organum as "free organum" (see below). Guido of Arezzo or Guido Monaco (995-1050) is regarded as the inventor of modern musical notation (staff notation) that replaced neumatic notation. ...
Scolarship has not yet established whether this early organum was chronologically derived from a more primitive strict parallelism, or from a kind of modally-constrained heterophony. The most pervasive examples of strict "parallel organum" in fact occur only in insular Germanic repertories of the 13th century onwards, and not in the very much earlier Enchiriadis treatises, the works of Guido, or in the various interpretations of the Winchester Troper (in which can be found passages which appear to be notated heterophony at the unison, although transcription problems confound absolute certainty in this). The oldest large collection of organum style pieces, consists of two 11th century English manuscripts used at Winchester Cathedral. ...
Free Organum After parallel organum the next development to arise in the practice of organum is postulated to be that of free organum. The earliest examples of this style dating from around 1020-1050 (the Micrologus of Guido d'Arezzo and the Winchester Troper) utilise parallel motion and oblique motion (one voice moving while the other stays still), but the introduction of contrary motion (voices moving in opposite directions) as well as similar motion (voices moving in the same direction, but to different intervals) led to progressively freer musical lines - a prerequisite element of counterpoint. There are a number of manuscript fragments of the later 11th century and into the 12th century which document the changing styles, from the works of Johannes Cotto to the so-called Chartres fragments. Although free organum is mostly still in note-against-note style, towards the end of its lifetime (some time in the 11th century) there are examples of more than one note of the organal voice against one note in the cantus firmus - another precursor of contrapuntal techniques. Counterpoint is a broad organisational feature of much music, involving the simultaneous sounding of separate musical lines. ...
Johannes Cotto (John Cotton, Johannes Afflighemensis) (fl. ...
In music, cantus firmus is the basic material to be set using polyphony. ...
Florid organum Organum as a musical genre reached its peak in the twelfth century with the development of two very different schools of organum composition: the St. Martial School of florid organum, which may have been centered around the monastery of St. Martial in Limoges, and the Notre Dame school of organum of Paris (see: rhythmic mode), which included composers such as Léonin and Pérotin, and out of which grew most of the later forms such as the motet. The St. ...
Location within France Limoges (Limòtges in Occitan) is a city and commune in France, the préfecture of the Haute-Vienne département, and the administrative capital of the Limousin région. ...
The group of composers working at or near the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris from about 1170 to 1250, along with the music they produced, is referred to as the Notre Dame school, or the Notre Dame School of Polyphony. ...
In medieval music, the rhythmic modes were patterns of long and short durations (or rhythms) imposed on written notes which otherwise appeared to be identical. ...
Léonin (b. ...
Pérotin was a European composer, believed to be French, who lived around the end of the twelfth and beginning of the thirteenth century. ...
In Western music, motet is a word that is applied to a number of highly varied choral musical compositions. ...
Melismatic Organum
Notre Dame school
See also A musician plays the vielle in a 14th century medieval manuscript. ...
Gregorian chant is also known as plainchant or plainsong and is a form of monophonic, unaccompanied singing, which was developed in the Catholic Church, mainly during the period 800-1000. ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
Johannes Cotto (John Cotton, Johannes Afflighemensis) (fl. ...
The St. ...
The group of composers working at or near the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris from about 1170 to 1250, along with the music they produced, is referred to as the Notre Dame school, or the Notre Dame School of Polyphony. ...
In Western music, motet is a word that is applied to a number of highly varied choral musical compositions. ...
References and further reading - Various articles, including "Organum," "Musica enchiriadis", "Hucbald", "St Martial" in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie. 20 vol. London, Macmillan Publishers Ltd., 1980. ISBN 1-56159-174-2
- Richard H. Hoppin, Medieval Music. New York, W.W. Norton & Co., 1978. ISBN 0-393-09090-6
- The Role of the Drone -- organum and the development of harmony
- The Organa of the Winchester Troper -- The Organa of the Winchester Troper: consonance, rhythm and the origins of organum (good bibliography here too)
- Appendix to The Organa of the Winchester Troper -- Appendix to 'The Organa of the Winchester Troper': Musical transcriptions
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