Léonin

Léonin, or Magister Léoninus, is identified through a thirteenth hundred years English supply, Anonymous 4, seeing that the composer and compiler from the Magnus Liber organi de gradali et antiphonario pro servitio divino. This substantial work originally contains musical settings for the whole church season, feast times and Saints times, with two-voice polyphonic replies for every scripture reading. The Magnus liber was put together about 1170, and was used initial with the choir from the Cathedral of Notre Dame, still under structure at that time the reserve made an appearance. This music is well known in four main manuscripts; Wölfenbuttel 677 (W1) and 1099 (W2), Codex Florenz, and Codex Madrid, the final named including a condensed edition from the Magnus liber. W1, though chronologically the “youngest” of the past due thirteeth hundred years manuscripts, can be believed to support the music which can be closest to Léonin’s first idea. Anonymous 4 identifies Léonin as “optimus organista,” and in his function he used a two-part polyphonic consistency which Léonin termed Organum Duplum; the tenor was the “primary tone of voice” (vox principalis), generally intoning very long syllables attracted from plainchant, and an “arranging tone of voice” (vox organalis) which added openly rhythmic melismata up above. Léonin generally alternated these passages with discant areas, where in fact the tenor and organizer would move pretty much together inside a note-per-syllable design. Parts of chant not really arranged by Léonin will be sung out from the choir together, and occasionally the choir would read combined with the tenor through the discants. However the arranging and primary parts had been sung by professional vocalists who have been placed at the guts from the choir. As building from the large sanctuary advanced at Notre Dame, the desirability of added “triplum” as well as “quadruplum” parts towards the Magnus liber became a concern; the written text of the task began to modify under additional hands, many famously those of Léonin’s alleged pupil Perotin. It really is obvious in the Florenz, W2, and Madrid resources that long parts of the organalis observed in W1 have already been wiped aside and only new, and even more elaborate material. That is why it’s challenging to split up out specific parts inside the Magnus liber to be safely inside the camp of Léonin and his college, aside from 13 replies designed for the Canonical Hours and 32 replies to specific public. In the initial work, greater than a hundred parts could have been conserved in Organum Duplum. Some scholars possess suggested Léonin just as one author of a number of the three-voice organa, though Anonymous 4 areas in any other case. Léonin was also called a poet, and it is said to possess written a making from the initial eight books from the Holy Bible in verse. In the past due twentieth hundred years, a scholar suggested that Léonin was most likely the author of the salacious reserve regarding carnal behavior among the clergy which made an appearance in the 1180s. While Perotin’s configurations from the Magnus liber are more often performed, Léonin’s accomplishment in compiling the reserve can be on the par within Traditional western sacred music using the Lutheran hymnal or Bach’s cantata routine. Although Léonin passed away a lot more than eight generations ago, scholars are however engaged on a keen seek out Léonin, including information regarding his lifestyle and his position among the initial great composers in traditional western music history.