Magnus Liber

Magnus Liber Organi

MS F
Author	Anonymous
Language	Latin
Subject	Musical score
Published	13th century
Publication place	France
Website	digitalcommons.cedarville.edu/sing_polyphony/2

The Magnus Liber or Magnus liber organi (English translation: Great Book of Organum), written in Latin, was a repertory of medieval music known as organum. The book was in use by the Notre-Dame school composers working in Paris around the end of the 12th and beginning of the 13th centuries. It is known from references to a "magnum volumen" by Johannes de Garlandia and to a "Magnus liber organi de graduali et antiphonario pro servitio divino" by the English music theorist known simply as Anonymous IV. Today it is known only from later manuscripts containing compositions named in Anonymous IV's description.

History

Although little is known of the provenance of the Magnus liber organi, it is considered most likely to have originated in Paris, and is known today by only a few surviving manuscripts and fragments, although there are records of at least seventeen lost versions.. The Liber is supposed to have been created by Léonin (1135–c.1200) and revised by Pérotin (fl. 1200) and contained compositions attributed to each. Today its contents can be inferred from the 3 surviving major manuscripts. The most complete is commonly known as F (I-Fl Pluteo 29.1, Biblioteca Medicea-Laurenziana, Florence), which first appeared in the library of Piero de' Medici by 1456. Of the two others, referred to as W1 & W2 (Wolfenbüttel Cod. Guelf. Helmst. 677 & 1099), both in the Herzog August Bibliothek (Ducal Library), the first is thought to have originated in the cathedral priory of St Andrews, Scotland. The Ma fragment (Madrid 20486) is, believed to be originally from Toledo. Catalogues referring to other lost copies attest to the wide diffusion through Western Europe of the repertoire later called ars antiqua. Between all the sources, some 100 different chants in two-part settings can be found.

The music from the Liber has been published in modern times by William Waite (1954), Hans Tischler (1989) and by Edward Roesner (1993–2009).

Music at Notre-Dame

Folio 8 of MS F

The early music repertoire of repertory of Notre Dame cathedral represents one of the highlights of Western culture, coinciding with the architectural innovation that produced the structure itself, from the beginning of its construction in 1163. A handful of surviving manuscripts demonstrate the evolution of polyphonic elaboration of the liturgical plainchant that was used at the cathedral every day throughout the year. While the concept of combining voices in harmony to enrich plainsong chant, was not new, there lacked the musical theory to enable the rational construction of such pieces.

The innovations at Notre Dame consisted of patterns of short and long musical notes and the system of musical notation for directing the duration of the notes in writing. This is attributed to Léonin, who is considered to have been a distinguished poet, scholar, musician, and cathedral administrator.

The innovations at Notre Dame consisted of a system of musical notation which included patterns of short and long musical notes known as longs and breves . This system is referred to as mensural music as it demonstrates the beginning of "measured time" in music, organizing lengths of pitches within plainchant and later, the motet genre. In the organi of the Magnus Liber, one voice sang the notes of the Gregorian chant elongated to enormous length called the tenor (from Latin 'to hold'), but was also known as the vox principalis.As many as three voices, known as the vox organalis (or vinnola vox, the "vining voice") were notated above the tenor, with quicker lines moving and weaving together, a style also known as florid organum . The development from a single line of music (monophony) to one where multiple lines all carried the same weight (polyphony) is shown through the writing of organa. The practice of keeping a slow moving "tenor" line continued into secular music, and the words of the original chant survived in some cases as well. One of the most common genres in the Magnus Liber is the clausula, which are "sections where, in discant style, the tenor uses rhythmic patterns as well as the upper part" . These sections of polyphony were substituted into longer organa. The extant manuscripts provide a number of notational challenges for modern editors since they contain only the polyphonic sections to which the monophonic chant must be added.