Pérotin: Viderunt omnes [with score - original manuscript]

Pérotin's Viderunt Omnes (1198), performed by the Hilliard Ensemble.

The foundation of Viderunt omnes is a plainchant that likely served the Parisian liturgy for Christmas Day. The text comes from verses of Psalm 98 in the Vulgate's Latin (Ps. 98:3b-4a, 2), jubilantly singing of the moment when God's salvation is made known to all the Earth. (Incidentally, the text naturally seems to call for such a concord of many voices!) Following the responsory form of plainchant, Viderunt omnes consists of a solo incipit, a chanted conclusion, a short verset (also perhaps for solo), and a repeat of the opening section. Pérotin's setting preserves the form and retains the liturgically correct chant melody, but embellishes it by two "discant clausulae," sections of composed polyphony that substitute for the solo chants. For each clausula, the choir sings the notes of the chant melody, but each note is greatly extended. Above this abstracted chant is woven a web of three solo voices dancing about one another in long, metrical melismas on the chant syllables. The most astounding innovation of Notre Dame polyphony was the addition of rhythm to such ornamental voices: the upper voices sing dozens of notes above each step of the chant, regulated by the six modal rhythms. The rhythmic patterns possible (which may shift in each voice phrase to phrase) are each related to a poetic foot: long/short (trochaic), short/long (iambic), long/short/short (dactylic), short/short/long (anapestic), long/long (spondeic), and short/short (pyrrhic). Within the limitations of these rhythms, the voices move freely as if by elaborate improvisation. Often sequential melodic motifs are expounded, and in this piece Pérotin even uses canonic relationships between voices. But the power of the piece doesn't come from this intricacy, but rather from the deep sense of harmony. Each phrase begins with a "perfect" harmony of fifths and octaves; the music then progresses in a compelling filigree upon the chant tone, a lengthy marginal gloss. But each phrase returns irrevocably from dissonance to perfection of harmony.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• pérotin
• perotin

[pawn62]

I'm slogging my way through "Music, Body, and Desire in Medieval Culture" by Bruce Holsinger (Stanford U. Press). He cites contemporary opinion that this Notre Dame polyphony is essentially effeminizing and homoerotic. Happy listening!

[flammesombres]

@pawn62 Thanks for the heads-up. I'll be sure to steer clear of that book...

[12dl196]

Does anybody else find this music beautiful?

[thetruetallboy]

Only one thing I can say...This composition doesn't date 1198. Almost all historians agree that Perotinus Magnus earliest works began 1208. I think OP is thinking of Leoninus work by the same name.

[eulero75]

I am the number 59.000 who watch this video :)

[YoussefFishere]

@pawn62 Homoerotic?

[jtv123vols1]

@12dl196 no

[pianiplunker]

@flammesombres It's a good scholarly book. It is indeed true that Perotin's contemporaries viewed the new Notre Dame polyphony with hostility and some certainly did go to the extremes of describing it as effeminate and homoerotic. It's hard for us in the 21st century to believe this music could be controversial but church music before this was much simpler.

[orrycat]

@pawn62 effeminizing and homoerotic music? Nonsense :)

[Marsuvees1298]

@flammesombres Quite a while indeed! Although, It is surprising to most how much in common the notation of chant, and our modern notation have!

[jcracker]

@pawn62 thats why i can never get into many musical analysis books about composers, even tho i want to. too much pretentious academic bullshit, not enough substantive theory about the music itself. that's what i've noticed anyway.

[DeathBySparkles]

My jaw dropped when I saw the year 1198. Thank goodness for written music. We're able to reproduce this millennium-old piece and experience something like what people commonly listened to so long ago. It's surreal when pondering it; though, I find that curious in itself. I do not feel such when considering visual works from the Middle Ages or any other time. Perhaps music is different because verbal communication from long ago is so much rarer, less likely to have been preserved.