Veni Sancte Spiritus and Missa Caput: Two Giant Leaps

Album: Dunstable: Sweet Harmony Masses and Motets
Track: "Veni Sancte Spiritus - Veni Creator" (Track #11)
Composer: John Dunstaple
Instruments: four vocalists
Musical Form: isorhythmic motet
Year: ~1431

Although early Renaissance composers were in many respects less experimental than their late medieval predecessors, there were still a great many musical forms and techniques that were being developed in the early 15th century. In an earlier post, I discussed John Dunstaple's pioneering the use of triadic harmony in his compositions; this technique can be heard again in "Veni Sancte Spiritus," a popular motet composed around ~1430. The piece is progressive in many respects, including its use of a musical mode that corresponds to the modern major scale and also its relatively wide range of pitches (called the "tessitura").

The wide pitch range of "Veni Sancte Spiritus" is most noticable in the tenor, which at times functions like a bass line. The tenor fails to truly carry the rest of the piece as a modern bass line would, but each time it strikes a low note, the piece is given new life. It does not move towards a dynamical climax as we might expect from a symphony, but is rather almost cyclic, as the isorhythmic tenor paces the higher voices. With each repetition, we are given a new opportunity for spiritual transcendence, but it is not just handed to us... we must find it for ourselves.

Although we hear hints of it here, a true bass part would not appear in a Renaissance composition until "Missa Caput," a cyclic mass composed by an anonymous English composer sometime around 1440. I haven't been able to locate any easily accessible recordings of this mass, but many other mid-15th century masses were modeled after it and I will review some of these in later entries. English composers were particularly influential on their continental counterparts during this period, in part because of the English occupation of France during the Hundred Years War.

Related Links: Allmusic

The Development of the Cyclic Mass: A Great Service

Album: Dunstaple: Musician to the Plantagenets
Track: "Missa Rex Seculorum" (Tracks #12-15)
Composer: John Dunstaple
Instruments: 3 vocals
Musical Form: Cyclic Mass
Year: ~1410 - 1440

When we consider the composers of early music, it is important to judge them not just on the music they themselves wrote, but also the future music they contributed to. Unlike a scholarly paper, a mass or a symphony does not include citations -- it is the task of music historians to trace the origins of the forms and styles that the composer used. In this respect, the early composers perhaps deserve more credit than our ears are inclined to give, as they helped to develop the conventions we now take for granted.

As the 15th century opened, composers were restricted to short musical forms; that is, secular chansons and sacred motets (both typically ~5-10 minutes in length). The first long-duration musical form to see mainstream popularity would be the cyclic mass, developed by the composers of the Burgundian school in the mid-15th century. You may recall that I first discussed the concept of a cyclic mass in a post on La Messe de Nostre Dame. That mass setting, which was composed by Guillaume de Machaut, may well have been the first of its kind, but was either unknown to his contemporaries or failed to inspire further development of the form, because it wasn't until the early 15th century that the cyclic mass was acknowledged as a genuine mode of composition. The first cyclic masses (after Machaut's) were written in England and were unified by a musical theme at the beginning of each section.

The example given, "Missa Rex Seculorum," was written by John Dunstaple and includes a Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei. Notice the uniformity in scoring and rhythm between the Gloria and Credo -- each starts with a duo, not adding the third voice until about a minute and half in, at which point the rhythm changes as well. The Sanctus benefits the most from Dunstaple's pre-Renaissance style, the thirds blending to create an elegant and immediately-appealing texture that wasn't possible in Machaut's sonic framework. Overall, however, the piece is lacking the energy and invention of Machaut's mass, suffering somewhat from the limited vocal arrangment (2- or 3-part polyphony). Even Dunstaple himself has composed individual mass settings with more flair.

Just as with triadic harmony, the early development of the cyclic mass has been lost to history due to the purging of the monasteries in 16th-century England. Fortunately, however, the form would quickly catch on in continental Europe and composers such as Dufay and Busnois would continue to develop it. In fact, many of their inventions would survive for over a century, as the cyclic mass wouldn't truly fall out of favor until the Baroque period, starting around 1600.

John Dunstaple and Triadic Harmony: The Burgundian Three, Part III

Album: Dunstable: Sweet Harmony Masses and Motets
Track: "Quam pulchra es" (Track #1)
Composer: John Dunstaple
Instruments: 3 vocals
Musical Form: Motet
Year: ~1410-1453
Composition for Comparison: "Twist and Shout" by the Beatles and "Surfer Girl" by the Beach Boys

The elegant melodies of Binchois inspired a generation of musicians and Dufay's epic compositions elicit awe and respect even from modern listeners, but the real revolution of Renaissance music began with John Dunstaple. This great English composer is credited with introducing a technique that is often taken for granted by the 21st-century ear: triadic harmony.

In short, a musical triad consists of the root, third, and fifth of a major scale and contains intervals of a third between successive notes. For you music-theory beginners out there, I've selected some modern, well-known songs to demonstrate what this sounds like. The first is "Twist and Shout" as performed by the Beatles, a rendition that should be familiar to anyone who has seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off. The majority of the song uses a single lead vocal with a pair of backing harmonies, but if you play to 1:25 into the recording, you'll hear the Beatles build into a triadic harmony, one note at a time. It begins with John Lennon singing the root note ("Ahhh...") over the twanging of George Harrison's lead guitar. Next George chimes in with the third, followed soon after by Paul with the fifth. At 1:28, they're in a full triadic harmony. It only holds a complete triad for the few seconds after 1:28 -- the sequence continues after that to the seventh, breaking the triad. The notes of a triad can also be struck simultaneously: C Triad.

It's not uncommon to hear full triadic harmony in modern music, particularly in pop music of the '50s and '60s. In "Surfer Girl," a song by the Beach Boys from 1963, they utilize it throughout much of the song, crafting the melody over top of the moving triads. In fact, the arrangement is in many ways similar to that of "Quam Pulchra Es," one of John Dunstaple's motets from the mid-15th century. This motet is one of the more blatant examples of how the interval of a third was being gradually promoted to the status of a consonance (that is, a stable musical interval) in the early Renaissance period. For those that have been following my Journey, this sudden addition of musical triads should be a very noticeable (and very welcome) change to early polyphony. Compare it to this early mass movement by Guillaume de Machaut, where fourths, fifths, and octaves dominate the harmonic structure. Although such intervals achieve a more "pure" sound, they are almost too easy for the human brain to process and we may be left feeling like something is missing.

Triadic harmonies were commonplace through most of the 15th century in England, but it won't be until the late 15th and early 16th centuries that the musical changes initiated by John Dunstaple and his English contemporaries begin to permeate the music coming from continental Europe. Unfortunately, because of Henry the VIII's dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530's, very little music survives from England in the preceding century and the process by which triadic harmony was introduced into polyphony may forever remain a mystery. Dunstaple was famous enough that some of his music has come down to us from continental sources, but the catalog of surviving music doesn't even approach that of contemporaries like Dufay and Binchois. This is indeed a shame, as many argue that John Dunstaple was the most influential English composer of all time.

Related Links: Allmusic, YouTube, Triads in Medieval Music, Intervals