MUSIC 505: STUDIES IN COMPARATIVE MUSICOLOGY
In the fall semester of '99, this course will be so-sponsored by
the new Center for the Study of Religion, with the special title:
SONGS OF THE SPIRIT: WORLD TRADITIONS OF RELIGIOUS CHANT
To what extent is chanting a religious ìuniversal,î
practiced by many (not all) religions, and having similar characteristics
and purposes? Or is it more accurate to say that chant is a very
different phenomenon in each of the religions (and historical periods)
in which it is found? These are the central questions of this graduate
seminar, which will examine the liturgical chant traditions of medieval
Eastern and Western Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism,
from both comparative and historical perspectives. Our primary sources
of information will include recordings, notated liturgical books, and live
meetings with actual practitioners, though much secondary scholarly literature
will also be studied.
In the first half of the semester, we aim
to deal seriously with both the kinds of texts that tend to be chanted
and the kinds of music that are used to chant them. The seminar therefore
seeks a diverse group of graduate students and advanced seniors with individual
strengths in many different areas. Enrollees should therefore have at least
one of the following: (1) a strong background in music, OR (2) knowledge
of the liturgical or ritual traditions of at least one religion, OR (3)
competence in an appropriate language (such as Latin, Greek, Old Church
Slavonic, Hebrew, Arabic, Sanskrit, Pali, Chinese, Japanese, Tibetan).
Central in the second half will be the psychological aspects of chanting?its
relationship to language, cognition, emotion, and altered consciousness?and
the interpretations placed on it in different religions, e.g., as metaphors
for spiritual experience, ecstasy, heaven, and so on. These issues
are quite timely in a world where the conventional religions of the modern
West?Protestantism, Reform Judaism, and even Catholicism?make little use
of chant, while emerging New Religions often promote a syncretistic view
that identifies medieval European Gregorian chant with Asian practices
of meditation and alternative medicine. And they are no less timely
in a world where Gregorian chant recordings are increasingly being re-used
in contemporary rock music as ìfound objectsî?without provoking any interest
in the historical or religious background of this music?at the same time
that many Westerners (in a seemingly unrelated development) are newly discovering
Orthodox Judaism, Islam, and Buddhism, where chanting is still an important
element in worship.
Students in the course will thus be expected
to write a substantial paper, on a relevant topic as it relates to one
or more specific chant traditions. They will also be able to participate
in a conference that may help to define a new field of comparative chant
studies. This will be held in the spring semester, to take advantage of
the presence on campus of the singing group Anonymous 4 and other participants
in the Princeton Atelier program.
Graduate students at universities other than Princeton
may enroll by getting in touch with the Princeton University Registrar
. For more information, contact the instructor at jeffery@princeton.edu
.
Course Outline:
I. Texts for Liturgical Chanting
A. Scriptural and non-canonical texts
B. Prayers and liturgical texts
C. Poetic-hymnodic texts
D. Wordless melodies and nonsense syllables
E. Liturgical actions and architecture as
contexts for chant
II. Musical Phenomena in Chant
A. Approaches to text-setting
1. prosody and
melodic contour
2. syntactic
markers
3. semantic
coding
B. Pitch organization
1. gamuts and
interval species
2. tune families
and melodic models
3. melodic cells
and formulas
4. modes and
scales
5. tunings
6. drones and
organum
C. Stylistic and analytical issues
1. ìlongî and
ìshortî styles
2. melodic skeletons
3. variation:
temporal, regional, individual
4. free rhythm
D. Types of written notation
E. Musical instruments
F. Dance
III. Psychological Phenomena Associated with Chanting
A. Chant and the acquisition of literacy
B. Perspectives from the study of music cognition
C. Memory and tradition vs. improvisation
and originality
D. Soloist vs. group singing
E. Attention, meditation, and trance
F. Emotional states
G. Ethical and unethical music
H. Well-being and physical healing
IV. Spiritual Interpretations of Chant
A. Chant and typologies of praying
B. Musical cosmologies and anthropologies
C. The Heavenly Host
D. Musical metaphors in spiritual experiences
and writings
E. Chant in the old and new religions of the
modern world