Liturgie

2010 · 512031 — Oxford University Press 2010. Hardcover with Dust Jacket. VERY GOOD/Very Good. 464pp. Perfectbound in burgundy hard covers. Ex-library with external labels removed; exceedingly clean and sharp with sound binding and no evidence of use; DJ spine sunned. 'The offertory has played a crucial role in recent vigorous debates about the origins of Gregorian chant. Its elaborate solo verses are among the most splendid of chant melodies yet the verses ceased to be performed in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries making them among the least known and studied members of the repertory. Rebecca Maloy now offers the first comprehensive investigation of the offertory drawing upon its music texts and liturgical history to shed new light on its origins and chronology. Maloy addresses issues that are at the very heart of chant scholarship such as the relationship between the Gregorian and Old Roman melodies the nature of oral transmission the presence of non-Roman pieces in the Gregorian repertory and the influence of theoretical thought on the transmission of the melodies. Although the Old Roman chant versions were not recorded in writing until the eleventh century it has long been assumed that they closely reflect the eighth-century state of the melodies. Maloy illustrates however that rather than preserving a pristine earlier version of the melodies the prolonged period of oral transmission from the eighth to the eleventh centuries instead enforced a formulaic trend. Demonstrating that certain musical and textual traits of the offertory are distributed in distinct patterns by liturgical season she outlines new chronological layers within the repertory and along the way explores the presence and implications of foreign imports into the Roman and Gregorian repertories. Carefully weighing questions surrounding the origins of elaborate verse melodies Maloy deftly establishes that these melodies reached their final form at a relatively late date. Available for the first time as a complete critical edition ninety-four Gregorian and Old Roman offertories are presented on a companion website in transcriptions which readers can view side-by-side. The book also provides music examples and essays that elucidate these transcriptions with significant insights into their similarities and differences. Inside the Offertory will be an important and longstanding resource for all students and scholars of early liturgical music as well as performers of early music and medievalists interested in music.'. Oxford University Press hardcover