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Authors(s): Simon Van Damme
Source: Early Music, Vol. 38, No. 2, Performing Bach (May 2010), pp. 237-247
Published by: Oxford University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40731352
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tension that are subsequently released by consonant resolutions. By attracting the listener's attention they adopt a structural function, emphasizing
Early Music, Vol. xxxvm, No. 2 The Author 2010. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. 237
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as if it were a silence.
tional understanding of the production and perception of musical sound. Originating in Violent'
motion, sound consisted of percussions of the air,
travelling all the way to the human ear.7 These per-
A theory of silence
of his theory. The first one takes each note for its
entire duration, highlighting the dissonant 4th and
in the course of a figuration are allowed. According to Aaron, the ear is not offended because of the
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g- F
te i *
ii
ii
n
/
be understood as the new instance of movement
accepted
IP " i" ^
jQ I.I
not accepted
T^T <!> a 1 ~ ~
f' I
out each note's duration. An alternative interpretation of this 'percussione del tempo', however, is the
next beat (of time) in a mensural context. In that
quale durare lo audito la accepta in loco de taciturnit'. The apparent silence of a written note
commonly held view. In correcting Aaron's assumption that figurative dissonances are allowed because
of their quickness, Spataro's answer is not that it is
demonstrates a similar kind of reasoning. The context, however, is different. After sending his col-
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Again, every sound arises in percussion, but not every percussion in time but in the termination of time. For in the
time the note takes' (i.e. its duration), an understanding of 'temporis termino' arises that is in line
cussion, transferring them from more or less metaphysical speculation to physical reality.
^^ '1. U T T T T
Ex.5 Spataro, Ave Maria, Correspondence 49
7 I I D Lu
^~ ' I D '
Such dissonance is tolerable, because in singing the syncopated semibreve the voice holds firm, and a certain
suspension is heard, a taciturnity that is noticed amid the
percussions that produce the tones and make them distinguishable from one another in time. So the ear barely
notices this dissonance, not being sufficiently stimulated
by it to comprehend it fully.
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heard'.13
His complaint, however, went further in connecting an existing singing habit to this idea. In the next
A practice of salience
weaker than its beginning. Attempting to establish functional rules for musical composition, this
finding notably demonstrates that in regular counterpoint no discords exist at places where all participating voices have a new note together. In other
words, there is always one voice that remains on
the same note, either Accepting' a temporary discord from a passing note in another voice or 'realizing' that it has become dissonant and that it should
that 'discords are not allowed in simple counterpoint, but in diminished [they are]', as can be read
from the heading of chapter 23. Zarlino's counterpoint instructions, rendered in the third book of the
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Tinctoris proclaims:
mutually opposite'.16
The question remains, however, as to whether dissonances, and their special sonorous quality in par-
La Dissonanza fa parere la Consonanza, la quale immediatamente le segue, pi dilettevole, e con maggior piacere
dall'udito compresa, e conosciuta; si come dopo le tenebre
pi grata, e dilettevole alla vista la luce, e il dolce dopo
r amaro pi gustevole, e pi soave. Proviamo per esperienza
ogni giorni ne i suoni, che se per alquanto di tempo, V udito
sound more agreeable. The ear then grasps and appreciates the consonance with greater pleasure, just as light is
more delightful to the sight after darkness, and the taste
of sweets more delicious after something bitter. We daily
have the experience that after the ear is offended by dis-
O most valid reasoning! Never ought any vice be committed by a man of commendable virtue so that this virtue
may shine more clearly; never ought any inept ideas be
inserted into a distinguished oration so that the other parts
strongly rejected by Tinctoris. However, his objection did not stop Zarlino from drawing the effects
of dissonances in exactly those metaphorical terms.
oncilable, Bonnie Blackburn has connected the dissonance theories of Tinctoris and Zarlino because of
their shared concerns with dissonance as a vital and
cal practice ('ogni giorni'). Providing a set of tangiactual aural perception, Zarlino emphasizes the role
different sounding qualities (consonances and dissonances), his account seems to meet the traditional
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and 'patiente' is applied elsewhere in Artusi's treatise to the distinction between the active ('colui che
T^' 1 -
K I il TTT
Ex.8 Spataro, Hec virgo est preclarum vas, amended version
- . patient I * agent
Q|I1
W=
EARLY MUSIC MAY 2010 243
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ogni giorni'. The city of Bologna intended San Petronio to be the largest church in Italy, outdoing even
1 Section of the intended realization of San Petronio in Bologna (Baldassare Peruzzi, 1522-3, Bologna, Museo di San Petronio)
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could only arise from the combination of experience with reason, scientific explanations of actual
of the matter of intervals (demonstratio quia - the discovery of causes through their effects) must be grounded on
the structuring demonstration propter quid of the effect by
its cause or form, for only in this way could a true rational
knowledge be ensured.29
In short, practical musical issues were inextricably bound up with the underlying speculative frame
work of metaphysical associations and mathematical arguments. With regard to the matter at
issue in this article, such a connection means that
proclaiming the apparent silence of dissonant suspensions. That this view expressed the hierarchy of
reason and judgement, more than a sounding reality, is hinted at by passages such as Zarlino's comparison of discords with perceptual aspects from
other sensory domains.
In this article, a gap between theory and practice is encountered in the writings of several 16th-
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That is why sound is continuous, motive power continually succeeding to motive power, until the force is spent,
which results in falling in the case of bodies, when the air
can no longer impel the missile, while in the case of sound
the air can no longer impel other air. Continuous sound
is produced when air is impelled by air, while the missile
continues its progress as long as there is air to keep a body
in motion.34
Simon Van Damme is a postdoctoral fellow at the department of Musicology of the University of
Leuven (Belgium) and a staff member oftheAlamire Foundation. In 2009 he completed his PhD on the
ricercars of Adrian Willaert, after having worked as a fellow of the Research Foundation-Flanders for four
years. His research interests include Renaissance music theory and analysis of 16th-century polyphony.
simon.vandamme@arts.kuleuven.be
1 K. Jeppesen, The style of Palestrina
and the dissonance (Oxford, 1946),
P-94.
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111-14).
27 Examining performing
circumstances at San Petronio during
ad auditum'.
2004), p. 26.
inch.68ofbkIII.
nave!' (p.41).
p.56.
PP-53-4.
1962), i, p. 122.
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