Musical Networks and Institutions

English Church Music studies have remained so predisposed towards an established historiographical narrative of the master-composer ideal that entire eras have been treated as decayed by scholars, mainly for a failure to produce a singular figure that could rival London's imported musicality from the European continent. One of the most notable victims of this historiographical tendency is the Georgian-era, and specifically the musical culture, including its music, that existed and flourished within many Anglican Cathedrals. Therefore, how cathedral foundations fared during this period effectively remains elusive in published scholarship, given the lack of detailed study on institutions. To remedy such treatment, this study examines York Minster as an institutional model, thus establishing a template for detailed inquiry on English cathedrals' administrative practices and musical functionality over an extended period. Detailed examination of this cathedral's Chapter Acts, treasury accounts and vicar choral papers demonstrate not a moribund institution but, rather, one that took great pains in regulating ecclesiastical and musical discipline. Furthermore, the administrative work of the cathedral's precentor, William Mason (1762-1797), demonstrates musical vitality through the piloted use of a music scheme, whereby a regular rotation of canticles and anthems would be sung, and mandatory choir rehearsals instigated-authenticated by extant part-books and manuscripts which show the implementation and use of this musical rotation. What is more, Mason's music scheme provides tangible evidence that a printed musical rotation system was in practice over 100 years before John Stainer (1840-1901) supposedly instituted a similar arrangement at St Paul's Cathedral in the late-nineteenth century. Through the detailed examination of York Minster from 1760-1800, this study provides documentable ecclesiastic and musical ingenuity in the face of the challenges of this era, thus contesting the existing generalised narrative in previous published scholarship. 

The reconstruction of performance practice in early modern Italy is hampered by extant musical sources that are often incomplete and omit instrumental parts other than continuo. Therefore, the re-creation of this repertory involves a combination of detective work, archival study, and a great deal of conjecture. Tim Carter and Stephen Bonta, among others have shown that performance practices in early modern Italy relied on the mixed use of voices and instruments. Archival records show that Bergamo employed an unusually large number of instrumentalists, though their activities and repertory remain shrouded in mystery. No surviving scores from early _Seicento_ Bergamo indicate trombone, for example, but the basilica Santa Maria Maggiore regularly employed up to five trombonists. What did they play and how often were they expected in the church? Drawing from the rich archives of Bergamo's Biblioteca Civica Angelo Mai, this paper engages an unexpected source from the early _Seicento_: musicians complaining about their salaries.


For example, in an effort to negotiate a raise, the trombonist Sedio Aresio wrote to the confraternity Misericordia Maggiore in 1606, the governing body of Santa Maria Maggiore. To support his claim, he listed every day he was required by maestro di cappella Giovanni Cavaccio (d. 1626) to perform with the singers. The list included thirty-four specific days and that bass trombone was called for "every time they perform music for two choirs, as commanded by the maestro di cappella," confirming this instrument's designation for polychoral repertory, and also outlining the frequency of this type of music in Bergamo. Other letters, all of which contain grievances of low pay amidst economic turbulence brought on by external crises, could be quite specific, including which instrument doubled which written part according to the type of music and ensemble. Cross-referencing these letters with financial records, musician rosters, receipts, and previously unknown printed music from maestro Cavaccio, a picture emerges of performance practice for music that, on paper, is purely vocal. Additionally, based on the regularity of polychoral performance, Bergamo surfaces as a neglected site of almost unparalleled large-scale polyphonic spectacle in early _Seicento_ Italy.

This paper asks what the In Nomine tradition can tell us about the network of musicians who produced them. Built on a _cantus firmus_ from a section of a mass by John Taverner, the In Nomine emerged rapidly in mid-sixteenth-century England as a form cultivated exclusively by church musicians. The In Nomine has been characterized in modern scholarship, most importantly by Ian Woodfield, as pedagogical, serving as a "test piece" to exercise young musicians. I offer an expanded account: the In Nomine is a response by a community of musicians (mature musicians included) to the dramatic changes of the Reformation. Drawing on mobility theory and following Stephen Greenblatt's admonition that mobility must be taken literally before it can be extended metaphorically, I explore both the geographical networks (traversed by people, manuscripts, and instruments) and the more ephemeral social and performative networks among post-Reformation English church musicians. These networks, I argue, fostered the emergence and growth of the In Nomine.


The In Nomine differs from other _cantus firmus_ traditions, such as the _Miserere_, in two respects, both of which point to the form's network-forming abilities. First, an In Nomine connects its composer not only to pre-Reformation practices but also to John Taverner specifically. Secondly, the In Nomine tradition is extensively intertextual, providing composers opportunities to converse covertly with each other within an insular and self-conscious network that traverses geographical and generational divides. Osbert Parsley, a singer who spent his entire career at Norwich cathedral, illustrates the strength of these networks. Too old to have been a choirboy when he wrote his In Nomines and far from the geographic center of London, Parsley nonetheless participated in the mobile network of In Nomine production. Expanding discussions of the social and ritual functions of post-Reformation _cantus firmus_ polyphony, I propose that the In Nomine emerged as a specific outlet for musicians whose daily embodied interactions had centered on the memorization and polyphonic elaboration of Sarum melodies. At a moment of what Andrew Gordon terms "memorial crisis," the In Nomine offered itself as a potent act of performative remembrance.