Word: plainchant
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...countertenor David Daniels, opera's freshest star, makes his triumphant return to the New York City Opera in a new production of Handel's Rinaldo (Oct. 31). And Chanticleer, the Grammy-winning 12-man a cappella vocal ensemble, backs up Magnificat (Teldec), its elegant new CD of plainchant and Renaissance motets, with tour dates in Princeton, N.J. (Oct. 3); New York City (Oct. 6 and Dec. 3); Detroit (Oct. 8); St. Louis, Mo. (Oct. 11); St. Paul, Minn. (Dec. 1-2); and Chicago...
Gregorian -- more properly known as plainchant or plainsong -- first surfaced as a popular phenomenon last year in Spain, where a two-disc version of Chant sold 325,000 copies in four months. The Benedictines' run-down 8th century abbey in northern Spain became a Mecca for music lovers, who came in throngs to hear the monks chant their communal prayers seven times a day. All this attention has flummoxed the abbey's 36 residents. "You have to understand," said one, "we are not rock stars...
...origins of plainchant are obscure. The music takes its name from Pope Gregory I (A.D. 590-604), but probably developed in the Carolingian empire -- part of which is now Germany -- during the 8th and 9th centuries. There may be as many as 11,000 Gregorian melodies, ranging from relatively simple psalm settings to elaborate tropes that were included in the Mass. The Second ^ Vatican Council's reforms, particularly the mandated use of vernacular instead of Latin liturgies, relegated chant to a few churches and religious communities like Santo Domingo de Solis that kept the old ways as best they could...
...kind of lyrical overture accompanied by slides projected on a large screen to announce the oratorio title and introduce the protagonists. The performance proper commenced with a mixed choir clad in garments befitting Gregorian monks. Appropriately enough, the introductory segment was a melodious theme calling to mind twelfth century plainchant. The show proceeded faultlessly without elaborate ornamentation or stage settings, which was just as well, since it allowed the audience to concentrate on the musical side of the production...
...quite unnecessary to add the off-stage roll on the cymbal. And must we have another crude cymbal roll when Brutus runs on his sword? As a background to the aura of death at Philippi, Susa has also introduced on the harp an ostinato pattern from the Dies irae plainchant, which recalls the identical ostinato near the end of Rachmaninoff's tone-poem Isle of the Dead. At any rate, I suspect that even Sousa would have done better than Susa