Description

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.

Features

• Offers a detailed demonstration of how oral transmission works in specific groups of Roman melodies
• Places Gregorian offertories in an international context
• Includes a critical edition of 94 chant melodies, presenting Gregorian and Roman versions in side-by-side transcriptions

Reviews

"Inside the Offertory is an important contribution to the history of the offertory, exploring its origins and transmission through close textual and musical analysis of the Franco-Roman, Roman, Milanese and Old Hispanic repertories. The companion edition is a most valuable resource." --Emma Hornby, Lecturer in Music, University of Bristol, UK

"Rebecca Maloy has approached the Gordian knot of the offertory and its verses with exceptional--indeed exemplary--thoroughness, reason, and persuasiveness. Her monograph, supported by analyses and editions, significantly advances the dialogue concerning the origins and transmission of medieval chant." --Calvin M. Bower, Department of Music, University of Notre Dame

"Rebecca Maloy's book is one of very few to put a particular type of Gregorian chant under the microscope, and it reveals a fascinating world of liturgical and musical enterprise, achievement and decay, in times so remote as to seem beyond hope of recall. Offertories are among the grandest of all chants, and those who follow Maloy into their secret depths will be amply rewarded." --David Hiley, Professor of Musicology, Regensburg University

"Brings together a large part of the discussions that occupied chant scholarship in the last sixty years...Should be read by everyone interested in the early history of chant, not only by offertory speialists." --Journal of the American Musicological Society

"Maloy's contribution is immensely valuable, and the edition and notes of the offertories are a veritable gold mine of information that should spur continued and intense study of a repertory that is the most problematic in both the Roman and Gregorian traditions." --Music and Letters

"Maloy has convincingly established a chronology for Roman and Gregorian offertories. Throughout the monograph, references are made not only to musicological studies but also to monastic, liturgical, political, and other historical writings, thus providing a wide context in which to view this single genre of chant. Future studies will most certainly rely on Maloy's methodology and conclusions as new investigations are begun into other bewildering aspects of medieval Latin chant." --Speculum

"The accomplishments of Maloy's scholarly study are many...The website containing her edition of the offertories makes a significant contribution to scholarship on this subject...Maloy does a superior job of presenting the most comprehensive evidence to date on the subject and allowing the expert reader to make further inquiries into the topic independently using the tools she so skillfully provides." --Religion and the Arts

"The transcriptions of all 94 offertories in both Gregorian and Old Roman traditions, published here for the first time, are an invaluable resource of information about variants and historical traditions for the informed chant performer." --Early Music

Product Details

464 pages; 17 music examples; 6-1/8 x 9-1/4; ISBN13: 978-0-19-531517-2ISBN10: 0-19-531517-0

About the Author(s)

Companion Resources

The following resources are available from the "Inside the Offertory" companion site:

• About the Author
• About the Book
• Edition