Medieval Instrumental Dances

by Timothy J. McGee

Overview

In Europe the tradition of secular dance has continued unbroken until the present. In the late Middle Ages it was an important and frequent event—for the nobility a gracious way to entertain guests, for the peasantry a welcome relaxation from the toils of the day. Now back in print, this collection presents compositions that are known or suspected to be instrumental dances from before ca. 1420. The 47 pieces vary in length and style and come from French, Italian, English, and Czech sources. Timothy McGee relates medieval dances to the descriptions found in literary, theoretical, and archival sources and to the depictions in the iconography of the Middle Ages. In a section on instrumental performance practices, he provides information about ornamenting the dances and improvising in a historically appropriate style. This comprehensive edition brings together in one volume a repertory that has been scattered over many years and countries.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780253013149
Publisher:	Indiana University Press
Publication date:	02/10/2014
Series:	Music
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	194
File size:	21 MB
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About the Author

Timothy J. McGee is Honourary Professor at Trent University and Professor Emeritus at the University of Toronto. His many books include Medieval and Renaissance Music: A Performer's Guide; Singing Early Music: The Pronunciation of European Languages in the Late Middle Ages and Renaissance (IUP, 1996); and The Ceremonial Musicians of Late Medieval Florence (IUP, 2009).

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Medieval Instrumental Dances

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By Timothy J. McGee

Indiana University Press

Copyright © 1990 Timothy J. McGee
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-253-33353-7

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CHAPTER 1

Dance in the middle ages

THE EVIDENCE

Curt Sachs describes and documents the tradition of dancing as a function of religious worship as well as recreation in many cultures from earliest recorded history. During the early Middle Ages religious dancing often combined pagan and Christian ritual at weddings and funerals, at Shrovetide and on the first day of May. Dancing continued to be a part of the Christian ceremony of worship throughout the era; church documents from the late Middle Ages make it clear that dances were permitted in the celebration of certain feasts and that they were performed by clerics. Frequent prohibition by church administrators and councils suggests that dancing was not always approved, although the practice was recorded in some locations in Europe as late as the end of the seventeenth century, and it continues to this day in the tradition of some Basque communities.

Information concerning secular dance in the late Middle Ages has survived in a variety of sources. Iconographic evidence, such as the manuscript miniatures and frescos reproduced in Plates 1–4 and the frontispiece, provides images of dancing individuals, couples, and groups. A few scattered letters and diaries survive from the period containing such entries as: "Each evening the Signore calls them together with the trumpets and harps and lutes, and he dances until two o'clock." And a wealth of descriptions of dance can be found in the literature of the period, as in "Le Roman de la Violette": "The king who was so handsome and noble, arranged them well. After eating he sent them all carolling." The following excerpts from three of the best-known fourteenth-century writers in England, France, and Italy further demonstrate the scope and variety to be found in literary references:

Ful curteysly she called me,
"What do ye there, beau sire?" quod she,
"Come, and if it lyke you
To dauncen, daunseth with vs now."
And I, without taryeng,
Went into the karollyng.

—Chaucer

Some sang pastourelles about Robichon and Amelot, others played on vielles chansons royal and estampies, dances and notas. On lute and psaltery each according to his preference [played] lais of love, descorts and ballads in order to entertain those who were ill.

—Maillart

When they had put away the tables, since all the young men and women knew how to carol, play instruments and sing, and some of them really well, the queen commanded that the instruments be brought, and at her command Dioneo picked up a lute and Fiametta a vielle, and began sweetly to play a dance. At that, after they had sent their servants away to eat, the queen and the other women, together with two young men, made a circle and with slow steps began to dance the carol.

—Boccaccio

All these kinds of evidence are helpful in providing a general impression of dance, but their use is limited. Archival sources such as those that attest to the presence of religious dancing are useful in determining the varieties of settings that included dance and some of the people who participated. The iconography gives some details about dance formations, body position, costumes, and musical instruments: the frontispiece and Plates 1,2, and 4 depict dancers holding hands in small groups, making graceful movements with their feet close to the floor; Plate 3 shows couples in graceful motion; and Plate 4 includes a young lady springing on her hands. The line of text beneath the illustration in the frontispiece speaks of dancing the carol. But the dances in the other pictures are not identified, and it would be dangerous to assume on such slight evidence that the small groups holding hands in the other pictures are also dancing carols. Such a conclusion may be possible after a thorough search of the iconography of dance, but unfortunately no complete study has been made of the subject. At present we cannot be sure that the couples in Plate 3 are dancing at all; they may be merely processing in the garden. And the upside-down youth in Plate 4 may be a tumbler.

References in the letters and literature of the period supply names of dances and descriptions of dance formations, steps, instrumental accompaniment, and the occasions on which dancing took place. We can see in the earlier quotations, for example, that the carol was danced in all three countries, and that on occasion it followed dinner; Boccaccio even tells us that the dancers form a circle to dance the carol. Numerous additional quotations could be cited that would add minor refinements to the above information. Thus, although little in the way of specific detail is available in these sources individually, as a group they fill in large portions of the picture; a mention of the dance formations here, a glimpse of a step there. As with iconography, a systematic study of these references would probably yield a surprising amount of information, but none has been undertaken.

What one can learn from iconographic depictions of the vivid, frozen images of dancers, and from the colorful literary descriptions, remains mostly at the general level. They do not provide the specifics of tempo, duration, and step sequence needed for a detailed understanding of medieval dance. But when combined with the theoretical sources and an analysis of the surviving dance repertory, even some of these facts can be deduced, and the composite picture assembled here, although still incomplete, contains far more details than had previously been suspected.

On a larger level, the surviving evidence also contributes to a perception of the general spirit of dance and its importance in the lives of the citizens of the late Middle Ages. The bulk of the information is in reference to the aristocracy, for it was they who commissioned the books and paintings and kept the records. (For these reasons it is probable that the music printed here is representative mostly of that class.) But occasionally there is a reference to other classes, from which we learn that dance was for all an important and frequent activity.

THEORETICAL STATEMENTS AND THE DANCE REPERTORY

Vocal and instrumental dances existed side by side throughout the era and obviously influenced one another; indeed it is not always possible to separate information about one from that for the other. The names and descriptions of some of the vocal and instrumental dances are identical, and it would appear that in terms of function and form they were closely related. In the discussion to follow, therefore, I have frequently pooled all available information about both vocal and instrumental dances in order to arrive at a better understanding of dancing in the Middle Ages and the nature of the music in this volume.

Vocal Dances

In the opinion of a number of scholars, the most popular secular poetic forms of the late Middle Ages were intimately connected with dance. Similarities have been noted between the poetic formal schemes and those of known dances. Their names are also words used in connection with dancing, and it has been suggested that the names may have been derived from dances, although the etymological derivations are not certain nor is there agreement as to which came first, dance or poetic form: rondeau, rotta, rondellus, rond, round—round dance; balade, ballata—from the verb balader, ballare, to dance; virelai—from the verb virer, to twist; carola, karol, carole, querole—a circle or line dance.

Secular music survives in all these forms. The bulk of the earliest surviving works are in the troubadour/trouvère repertory, and they remained popular secular forms in France, Italy, and England until the end of the fifteenth century. But these forms, which may have been dances in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries or earlier, seem to be quite removed from any association with dance music by the time we find most of the musical examples, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The later repertory is sophisticated art music matching the theoretical descriptions of the formal design of the earlier dance compositions, although rarely exhibiting the kind of melodic and rhythmic patterns that would suggest the dances described in the earlier literary and theoretical accounts. The relationship of the earlier forms to the more sophisticated later examples is demonstrated by some of the earliest vocal dances with music, for example, the Latin rondeaux at the end of the Florence copy of the Notre Dame repertory (see Example 1). The illumination at the beginning of the fascicle depicts clerics in a "round" formation, probably dancing; and Yvonne Rokseth suggests that the 56 compositions are a repertory danced by clerics as a part of worship.

The clearest theoretical description of vocal dances was written by Johannes de Grocheio, in his De Musica, ca. 1300. Although he does not name the "rondeaux" specifically, his description of the round dance (rotundellus) clearly fits that form. He requires the round to have a refrain whose melody is also used in the verse. As will be discussed below, this requirement separates the round dance from all other dance forms whose refrains are melodically different from their verses. Example 1 conforms to Grocheio's definition of "round" because the refrain lines are set to melodic phrases that are also used as part of the verse melody. His "round," in fact, describes not only the rondeaux form but also the virelai and the ballade, since all three set the refrain lines to music also used for the verses. Grocheio has grouped these three forms under the common heading "round dance" even though they have different specific formal schemes, probably because they are danced in a similar fashion—in the round. The carol, the remaining poetic form related to dance, has a somewhat different musical form and dance formation, as we shall see below.

[four more verses]

Translation from Gordon A. Anderson, ed., One Part Latin Conductus—The Latin Repertoire, Notre-Dame and Related Conductus, Opera Omnia, vol. 8 (Henryville, Ottawa, and Binningen: Institute of Mediaeval Music, n.d.), p.ii.

Instrumental Dances

As with vocal dance music, the only theoretical statements about instrumental dance music exist in the treatise by Grocheio, which contains brief descriptions of three different types: ductia, estampie (stantipes), and nota. He refers to the dances and dance music popular in Paris from ca. 1300, and his information will form the basis of much of the following discussion. But for the several kinds of compositions not included by Grocheio, there is little solid material on which to build a case.

CHAPTER 2

The repertory of textless dances

We can begin our discussion of the dances by attempting to match the surviving repertory with the names and descriptions that have come down to us.

ESTAMPIE

Estampie is the only dance for which we have both description and named repertory from the Middle Ages. Sixteen textless compositions from two different sources are identified as estampies: eight from the thirteenth-century French source Paris BN fonds français 844, labelled "estampies" (Nos.3–10 in this edition), and eight from the late fourteenth-century Italian manuscript London, BL Additional 29987, following the heading "Istanpitta" (Nos.14–21). The description of the form by Grocheio is ambiguous and has been the subject of a number of interpretations. He makes two statements relevant to the estampie:

The parts of a ductia and stantipes are commonly called puncta. A punctum is a systematic joining together of concords making harmony in ascending and descending, having two sections alike in their beginning, differing in their end, which are usually called the close and open.

An estampie is an untexted piece, having a complicated succession of concords, determined by puncta.... Because of its complicated nature, it makes the soul of the performer and listener pay close attention ... [the estampie form] is determined by puncta since it is lacking in that percussive measure which is in ductia, and [the form] is recognized [by only] the differences between its puncta.

From these statements I have concluded that Grocheio's instrumental estampie has several double puncta that include a common refrain with an open and close ending, and that the puncta are of different lengths.

All sixteen estampies agree with that description. But although the dances from the two manuscripts all conform to Grocheio's general formal description, the two sets are quite different in terms of length, meter, internal formal design, and melodic style. The French estampies have relatively short puncta of eight to twenty units of measure and are in triple meter, while in the Italian source they vary in length from twenty to over a hundred units of measure and are all in a basic duple division. Even more striking are the differences in formal plot and tonal orientation. Since I have described these differences elsewhere I will summarize my findings here.

The two sets of estampies were composed according to different formal principles. Each punctum of a French estampie has completely new melodic material, followed by common open and close endings that act as its refrain, yielding a formal plot as follows (x = first or open ending, y = second or close):

Verse Endings

A x/y
B x/y
C x/y
etc.

In contrast, the formal plots of the Italian estampies are far more complex. There are a number of formal variants, with verses containing two to four sections each and involving different combinations of sections from verse to verse. The form of "Ghaetta" (No.14) will illustrate one of the forms:

Verse Endings

ABC x/y
DEC x/y
FEC x/y
GBC x/y

In this dance each new double punctum (pars) begins with new material, continues with a second section of either new or old material, and concludes with a refrain and open and close endings. Another, somewhat different formal combination can be seen in "Tre Fontane" (No.17), in which each punctum begins with a new melodic section that replaces one or more sections in the previous punctum, but always ends with the common refrain:

Verse Endings

ABCD x/y
EBCD x/y
F CD x/y
G D x/y

A single refrain, as shown in these two diagrams, occurs in six of the Italian estampies, but in "Parlamento" and "In Pro" (Nos. 19 and 20), there is a change of refrain and endings for the last two puncta. Both dances have the same form:

Verse Endings

AB x/y
CB x/y
DB x/y
EF s/t (new refrain and endings)
GF s/t

Detailed analysis of melodic and phrase construction reveals significant differences between the French and Italian estampies. The melodies of the French estampies have relatively narrow ranges and are diatonic, emphasizing a single mode. The phrases are short; and within each estampie, all the phrases are generated from a small number of melodic-rhythmic motives. In contrast, the ranges of the Italian estampies are wide, and the melodies are not modal but based on a contrast of tetrachords that include chromatic variation. The phrases are long and include a large number of melodic-rhythmic motives. That these Italian estampies bear more resemblance to dance music of the eastern Mediterranean than to European music of the same period has occurred to at least one other writer. (This subject is further discussed in the section "Performance Practices," below.) In spite of the differences, the titles of the dances and their conformity to the theoretical description are assurances that they are all estampies.

Four other pieces also conform to the description of an estampie, as stated by Grocheio and illustrated by all the above compositions: two each from the Robertsbridge and Faenza codices (Nos.43–46 in this edition). I have reconstructed the two compositions from the Faenza Codex, which in the manuscript lack all the markings necessary to provide clear division into sections. Some uncertainty remains concerning their exact forms, but a sufficient number of signs indicating repeat marks and endings survive in the manuscript to confirm that both compositions are in estampie form.

(Continues...)

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Table of Contents

Preface
Acknowledgments

DANCE IN THE MIDDLE AGES

The Evidence
Theoretical Statements and the Dance Repertory
Vocal Dances
Instrumental Dances

THE REPERTORY OF TEXTLESS DANCES

Estampie
Ductia
Nota
Other Dances
Saltarello
Dance Pairs and Trotto
Unidentified Dances
"Bel fiore dance"
"Chanconeta Tedescha"
"Czaldy Waldy"
"Chose Tassin"
No. 42
Summary

DANCING

Round and Carol
Estampie

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES

Instruments
Tempo
Ornamentation and Improvisation
Theoretical Evidence
Ornamented Manuscripts
Improvisation over a Cantus Firmus
Improvising Additional Dance Material
Preludes and Postludes
Drones
Monophonic and Polyphonic Performance
Notes

THE DANCES

Editorial Practices

Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale, fonds francais 22543
1a. Kalenda Maya
Paris, Bibliotheque l’Arsenal 5198
1b. Souvent Souspire
Oxford, Bodleian Libary, Douce 139
2.

Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale, fonds francais 844c
3. [La Prime Estampie Royal]
4. La Seconde Estampie Royal
5. La Tierche Estampie Roial
6. La Quarte Estampie Royal
7. La Quinte Estampie Real
8. La Seste Estampie Real
9. La Septime Estampie Real
10. La Uitime Estampie Real
11. Dansse Real
12.
13. Danse

London, British Library, Additional 29987
14. Ghaetta
15. Chominciamento di Gioia
16. Isabella
17. Tre Fontane
18. Belicha
19. Parlamento
20. In Pro
21. Principio di Virtu
22. Salterello [1]
23. Salterello [2]
24. Salterello [3]
25. Salterello [4]
26. Lamento di Tristano—La Rotta
27. La Manfredina—La Rotta della Manfredina
28. Trotto

Florence, Archivio di Stato, Antecosimiano No. 17879
29. Danca Amorosa—Troto

Prague, State Library XVII F9
30. Czaldy Waldy

Montpellier, Bibliotheque de la Faculte de Medecine MS H196
31. Chose Tassin [1]
32. Chose Tassin [2]
33. Ch