Plainsong or Plain Chant

All this music arises out of the recitation of psalms. For the purpose of declaiming the lessons of Scripture only the simpler inflexions were used ; and the same is true of the prayers or col lects, except a few which are of exceptional solemnity such as the "Preface" or the Lord's Prayer, as used in the consecration prayer at Mass; or the Hallowing of the Font at Baptism.

Antiphons.---Next to

be considered is a totally different way of beautifying the recitation of psalms or other prose texts. In stead of elaborating the chant itself there was interpolated be tween the verses a suitable refrain. These refrains came to be known as "antiphons": and thus side by side with the older method, which came to be called "responsorial" from the responds which represented it at its fullest development, there arose the newer "antiphonal" method. The former music developed from recitation, and even in its most elaborate forms in more or less degree it hung round a reciting note. The antiphons were purely melodic and the method had its quality and meaning determined, not by reference to a "dominant" reciting-note, but to the "final" note on which it ultimately came to rest.

Antiphonal music underwent modification and development just as the responsorial music did. Its relation to the psalm al tered ; the singing of the refrain after each verse survived mainly in processional use. In choir offices the refrain was dropped so that it was sung only at the beginning and end of the psalm, or else in a curtailed form at the beginning and in full only at the end. In the psalmody of the Mass the opposite form of abbrevia tion was adopted. For at the Introit and the Communion the psalm became restricted to only one or two verses, and at the Communion it ultimately disappeared altogether, leaving the Antiphon alone.

Some antiphons composed on a large scale arose independently of any connection with a psalm. These were used especially in processions. Others retained the idea of a psalm-verse, hut util ized for such verses not the normal psalm-tones, but independent melodies, perhaps as elaborate as the psalm itself. Such antiphons especially prevailed at the Offertory in the Mass.

The greater part of the classical Gregorian plain-chant falls into one or other of these two classes. The amount of elaboration depended mainly upon two considerations (I) the importance of the occasion; and (2) the capacity of the singers. A great festival or a specially dignified part of the service demanded richer treat ment : and the trained singers undertook more difficult music than the congregation, the soloists than the choir generally.

The Gregorian Music.

The Cantilena Romana, Gregorian chant proper, is thus a body of music, purely vocal and ecclesi astical, evolved by the Papal choir in the course of the fifth and sixth centuries. This was codified in the time of St. Gregory (c. (q.v.) and it stands as the basis of all the Gregorian Music. The Milanese tradition was similar but less artistic. It is called "Ambrosian" (see ST. AMBROSE) but the term has no historical significance as the term Gregorian has. A comparison of these two families of plain-chant brings out clearly the compara tive crudity of the Ambrosian tradition as distinct from the artistic balance and delicate finish of the classical Gregorian chant. The same is true also of such other specimens of Western ecclesi astical chant as are known. The Gregorian reform marks the close of a golden age of classical monody. The middle-ages subsequent to St. Gregory produced nothing so good; and the later part of them while producing only little and decadent plainsong depraved also the form of the classical tradition.

Something more must be said to describe the contents of the Gregorian corpus and also to explain the musical theory which lay behind it. The music covers the whole set of services of the Roman rite, but principally the Mass and the series of daily Choir Services. At the Mass some of the things sung are invariable, while others change according to the Sunday, or Festival, or occa sion generally. The unchanging elements are chiefly the Kyrie, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus dei, and Gloria in excelsis. For these the old tradition provided little or no change of music ; and what there was followed very simple lines suitable for congregational singing. The variable elements were principally the Introit-psalm, the Gradual-respond, the Offertory-antiphon and the Commun ion-antiphon. The Gradual was at times replaced or supplemented by an Alleluia with a Verse attached to it, or by a Tract. The Alleluia belonged specially to festive seasons and occasions, the Tract to penitential. Neither of these falls exactly into either of the two chief categories responsorial and antiphonal. The Tract is a very ancient but elaborate type of the developed psalmody; the Alleluia was an innovation which came in towards the end of the classical period, and extended beyond it into the "Silver Age" when little else was being composed.