A Textless Anonymous Setting of a Psalm of David in the Kražiai Organ Tablature. Text Reconstruction and Attempted Attribution
Tomasz Jasiński
Maria Curie-Sklodowska University, Lublin (Poland)
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5916-6254
Abstract
This article concerns an anonymous Psalm of David entered in a seventeenth-century organ tablature from Kražiai (Lithuania). It is a four-part composition ‘a voce piena’, quite long (96 bars), in two sections, written in vocal notation in the form of a score, but without a verbal text.
In the first section of the article, the author demonstrates that this is a setting of the first Psalm of David in a poetic rendition by Jan Kochanowski (‘Szczęśliwy, który nie był miedzy złemi w radzie’ / ‘Blessed is the Man Who Walks Not in the Counsel of the Wicked’), based on the melody of the same psalm found in Petrus Artomius’ ‘Cantional’ of 1640. In the transcription presented here, no real difficulty was encountered with underlaying Kochanowski’s text. Only in some sections (e.g. bars 57–85) was a degree of intuition required. The Psalm of David stands out in several respects: a motet with vernacular text (a generic novelty in early Polish music), it is a previously unknown motet setting of verse by Kochanowski, distinguished by impeccable counterpoint, excellent voice-leading, a full sound, clear tonal relations, motivic unity and rhythmic-textural diversity, as well as expressive coherence in the correlation of words and music.
In the second part of the article, the author hypothesises that the Psalm of David may have been composed by Mikołaj Gomółka (1535‒after 1591) and presents a comparative analysis between this work and Gomółka’s ‘Melodie na Psałterz polski’ (Melodies for the Polish Psalter). The author lists numerous differences between the two, but also points to various affinities and similarities in the melody, rhythm, harmony and other elements which seem to support the thesis that this work was written by Gomółka. There is no unequivocal conclusion to this research study; instead, it leaves the reader with an intriguing question.
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Authors
Tomasz JasińskiMaria Curie-Sklodowska University, Lublin Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5916-6254
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