October 11th, 1995, Serial No. 00947
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Camaldolese Artists. Lecture 1 (of 5). Guido d'Arezzo (musician)
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What I'd like to do in these five sessions is to give you a taste, a little taste, mostly factual. I don't know a lot about music itself, the intricacies of Guido, for instance, but I can give you some facts about him and his Kamal Dali's connection, and that sort of thing I'll be doing with the artists also, our most famous artists, anyway. Anyway, I had suggested that if there was extra time, see I'd originally done a sixth class for Saturday, which I bumped out of this series, because technically they're not artists as such, and we could easily do without, and I really can use them probably next time, whenever that is in the future, that I come here and give lectures on our most famous houses, their histories, because they would fit there also, and if I would talk about Murano, I would necessarily speak of two of the abbots of Murano, anyway, and
[01:05]
the people who took the Annales, and also Fra Mauro, so it's not necessary. So what I'd rather do is after each session, if there's extra time, just open it up. Also, as we're going along, just yell out questions or comments as we go. So, his first session is on Guido Monaco, and you will run across all of these different names for him that he goes by in history, different appellations, but probably the most famous is Guido d'Arezzo and Guido Monaco, those two are the ones you'll run across mostly. This one here, Guidone Pomposiano, Guido of Pomposa, only comes in the 15th century at the earliest, and it's really, it comes by way of, shall we say, polemics, anti-commodities,
[02:12]
polemics, slightly anti-commodities, matter of Guido really, you know, wasn't commodities from the beginning, and so Pomposa, and some of the monks in history connected with Pomposa, or music, in the Benedictine order, got a little polemical at times. Anyway, one of these most famous polemicists was Pellegrino Ernetti. I met him at San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice, and he has since died, but I have a copy of an article he did, which is nasty, [...] against the commodities and their contentions and all this stuff, and he was a fairly nasty man, actually. He was a real bone of contention in their community. He was the one who had kept them from changing any of the liturgy to Vatican II. It was the best.
[03:16]
Remember we talked about that with Robert? Anyway, he's now a pastor, he's remored, and they've changed their office into Italian, but if anyone's interested in reading that bombast of his, which is fun to read, just ask me, I'll get you a copy. We don't know for certain whether Guido even was from Arezzo. Well, in fact, we don't think he was from Arezzo at all. Most people assume that because of the name given him, but we're fairly certain that the name is given him because of his famous stint that he did with Bishop Teodaldo of Arezzo later on, in the actual time when Camaldoli was being founded. Bishop Teodaldo is that famous bishop who actually deeded the church of the Sacraerum to the first five monks to the founding fathers. So there's already in the beginning, and this is while Guido was with
[04:21]
Teodaldo, there is a connection between Guido and Camaldoli, we're fairly certain. There are a number, Arezzo by the way, does claim him. In fact, to Robert, when we were walking down the street, remember we walked past that one window and it had a great big plate underneath? This was where Guido was born, the very room, and you'll see Guido, Arezzo stuff all over the city, and a statue of Guido in one of the major piazze, I don't remember which one, probably near the Duomo in Arezzo. And there's a whole number of little towns around Arezzo that all claim him too, so periodically they all fight about it whenever an anniversary comes up, and they all have their own claims to Guido's birth and rearing in their town. But we're fairly certain he wasn't from any of them.
[05:23]
He was born somewhere around 990, right around the millennium, and he either died in 1050 or 1058. We're fairly certain he died on May 17th, we just don't know which year. There are two traditions, and depending on whether you believe he went back to Pomposa at the end of his life and lived that final eight years at Pomposa, you'll date it accordingly. But there is a Camaldolese tradition, by the way there are Camaldolese traditions throughout the centuries that disagree with one another too, so it's not like there's a straight Camaldolese tradition and everybody else differing. Camaldolese traditions differ also on Guido. But there is a Camaldolese tradition I'll talk about a little bit later where Guido is listed as one of the priors of Fonte Avalana, and that he died at Fonte Avalana
[06:31]
as prior on May 17th, 1050. That's probably not true at all, but he was there, and he was an esteemed monk there, and he spent years there at Fonte Avalana. Anyway, we'll get to that. There are also claims that he was German, and that he was a French monk, so we bring in other countries. Everyone's trying to claim him because he's so central to what happens with the scale in modern music, and he invented it. And so he's a biggie, and everybody wants a piece of the pie. If you've been to the Uffizi, did you go to the Uffizi this year? No. But you've been there before, yeah? There's a large statue of Guido there also. I think there are duplicates, the ones I know that I saw in the Uffizi gallery in Florence. Regardless of all the nitpicking
[07:32]
about dates and whether he was Camaldolese and all that stuff, everyone is fairly agreed upon the fact that he was a great man, and he was a great musician, and he did wonderful things, and he got a lot of music together, chant music together, at a time when it was quite a mess. We'll get to that a little bit later too. Titles that do come down to us connecting or concerned with Guido are that he was Beato, so that he was beatifying, blessed Guido, that he was Venerabilis, and that's from our own tradition, and that he was also Santissimo, not only holy, but the most holy. He has a very revered name and history, and it's very important too,
[08:34]
as I say, the history of music. We know that he was a monk of Pomposa, Santa Maria di Pomposa. Sometimes it's della Pomposa, sometimes it's di Pomposa. This is a monastery which was part of the Romualdian Reform movement. It was an abbey that already existed and joined the Romualdian movement, that Romualdian branch that was centered around Fonte Avalana and the work of Peter Damian. In fact, Peter Damian, if you've read his life, you'll remember that after he had been at Fonte Avalana only one year, he was called by the abbot, the famous Abbot Guido. This is another Guido. Abbot Guido, Abbot Saint Guido of Pomposa to come and lecture on the scriptures to the monks of Pomposa and the prior of Fonte Avalana, let Peter Damian go there, and he was there for two years
[09:38]
lecturing on, this is as a junior monk, not really, but I mean it's equivalent to that. Thus, their connection, which became stronger throughout the years, and later they were quite officially listed as Romualdian, was begun with Abbot Guido and Peter Damian himself. This monastery of Pomposa is between Ravenna and Ferrara, where Alessandro is from. Alessandro is from Ravenna. We know that this monastery, in line with its Romualdian roots, had a hermitage. There was a connection already predating Abbot Guido.
[10:45]
The former abbot, William, became a hermit. There's a connection there between William and what's going on in that area, hermetically speaking, but it becomes quite firm once Peter Damian steps into the arena. Anyway, there is evidence that there was a hermitage attached, that the former abbot was in that hermitage, and we have that fact through this particular tome, or set of tomes, the Rerum Pomposianorum Historicorum, and I saw those come out also, I believe, in the monastery library. Anyway, book one mentions that this hermitage was under the obedience to the abbot of Pomposa, so it shows you right there that they're not
[11:47]
Romualdian yet, because under the Romualdian movement of reform, there's no abbot of a cenobitical house that's over the hermitage. Romuald, in fact, in his movement, changes that. It's always the hermit who's in charge of those things when the two are together. History has assigned the year 1010 as the date for Guido's entrance into Pomposa, and once we get him into Pomposa, there's a brilliant musical career there. He becomes the scola master at Pomposa, and he decides that things are not, he must have been a fairly high J, and probably a 1 on the enneagram, and everything, the chaos of the musical situation was driving him crazy, and so he decided to set things right, especially for the younger monks coming into the community so that he could at least start off the
[12:51]
new crop, understanding music, and having some method for singing the chant, because at that time, until Guido, you had chant being sung differently in every monastery, every house, and I mean, we don't just normally think that it's going to be not so. I mean, whoever is in charge of the chant in the house would decide how high to go between the intervals, and that's the way it was, which was driving Guido nuts, and would drive us nuts, too. He decided that it was much more advantageous to set a system where chant would sound more or less the same wherever one went, and as simple as this sounds, this sounds a little ridiculous, Guido's golden rule that if a note appears on this line there, that down the line, if it appears again, it's
[13:52]
going to have the same sound, was very controversial in his day, and he got into a lot of hot water over this. In fact, it got so bad at his house that he had to leave. He was asked by the abbot, Guido, to leave the community for a while, not to leave, stop being a monk, but just to go elsewhere and let a little fresh air breathe through the cloister, and he was in much demand at that time. People were hearing what he was doing, and he had great success with the young monks at Composa, so a number of bishops wanted Guido to come to their cathedrals and teach the cathedral choirs how to sing chant that way, so that they could get their feet on the ground, musically speaking, and we know that he went to a number of these cathedrals, and I don't have
[14:57]
them listed here. We know of at least three that he went to, the most important being Arezzo with Bishop Teodaldo. Teodaldo wanted him to instruct his cathedral choir, too, because he had already heard that Guido had great success in two other cathedrals, and we have a document commending, a document by Teodaldo, commending the work that Guido is doing with the choir at the cathedral, dated 1025. Well, this is right at the time Romuald is founding Camaldoli. There's an earlier tradition that Camaldoli was founded in 1012, and no, Camaldoli was, you can date the founding of Camaldoli in the 20s, 23 to 25, 26, right on down there is when Camaldoli is actually
[16:02]
being founded, and this is right when Guido is there with Teodaldo. Pope John XIX, I've put, I think, all the spellings and dates up there, if you're interested in that sort of thing. He had heard about Guido from various bishops for whom Guido had worked, and he invited him to Rome. Now, you have problems if you're going to look this up, because there are, there's real historical problems with the enumerations regarding Pope John, especially from John, is it John VIII, John VIII and onwards. You have anti-popes and popes who were not sure existed, and the numbers will differ because of that. But anyway, they assigned this man, the name John XIX, and he was begging Guido to come to Rome and teach the choirs at Rome
[17:16]
his new techniques for singing, and Guido wouldn't go. Guido liked it in Arezzo, and he stayed on there, and we're fairly certain that he went to Camaldoli for a period, that is the Sacraerum. We actually have a document listing the visiting of a monk named Guido, not a Benedictine monk, a monk. At that time, maybe we said Benedictine, but we're not certain that it was Guido, this Guido, but it was a monk who was connected with chant, so it's quite likely, but we can't prove that. Camaldoli's sources assume that it was Guido, and that he taught, or was, no, too, wasn't he, and he taught his techniques to the hermits at Camaldoli, who embraced both Guido and his music from there on. Finally, at the third invitation,
[18:22]
Pope, Guido went to Rome, and the Pope studied his techniques, his music, and highly approved and recommended him to bishops all over the place, and Guido quickly got malaria and had to leave Rome. The Pope wanted him to work in Rome, but he wasn't there very long, because he got what we think was malaria, at least the symptoms sound like it, and malaria was quite common at that time in Rome anyway. Much of the precise dating and chronological order for Guido's life and works have been derived from various deductions people could make, piecing together evidence of his presence there, his writing this letter, various documents of bishops referring to him, not always with dates, however, so they've had
[19:26]
to bring in other dates, other documents, and correlate, but not without some suppositions and hypotheses being made. We get to know a little bit about the history, general history, of Guido from a letter he wrote from Rome to Fra Michele, a brother of mine at Pomposa, his good friend, and in that letter, Guido talks about the situation where he had to leave because of the jealousy of his brothers, and the urging of Abbot Guido in order to preserve the peace of the house, and Guido mentions in the letter he isn't ready to go back yet. There is some urging, especially from the Abbot, now is the time to return, but Guido won't do it, and this is where we think he went to Fonte Adelan, after his Roman sojourn.
[20:31]
Basically, other than that one little mention of Guido and something to do with Chant being at the hermitage, we don't have any direct connection that we can absolutely scientifically prove between Guido d'Arezzo and Camaldoli himself. Everyone is fairly certain he was at Fonte Adelana, and for a protracted period, but Camaldoli itself we don't know about. It would be strange if he hadn't gone to Camaldoli, considering all the opportunities he had, and since he was with Bishop Teodaldo, was his musician master, and Teodaldo in 1027 deeded over the church at Camaldoli, and was there, and it would be crazy if he weren't there, but we don't know that for sure. There is evidence that he was at Fonte Adelana, but we don't know in what capacity he was there, and there's the cherished tradition
[21:44]
at Fonte Adelana itself that he was one of the priors, and one of the actual listings of the Fonte Adelana, I think from the 1200s, if I'm not mistaken. He's listed as a prior of Fonte Adelana, but I remember Lino, I asked Lino when I was there whether he thought Guido was really a prior of Fonte Adelana, and Guido, Lino gets this sort of half mood, and made sounds that made me believe that he didn't believe it at all, but discreet moment that Lino is, he wouldn't come out and say for sure that he wasn't. Anyway, we know that he was there, and he had had some influence at Fonte Adelana. We also know that he was drawn to solitude, and so that was probably another reason
[22:45]
he was at Fonte Adelana in those years. We have a number, and I can give you them, a number of instances where historians during the centuries, and some of them quite eminent historians, mostly Benedictine and our own Camaldolese historians, and the ones with asterisks are Camaldolese historians, refer to Guido as the prior of Fonte Adelana, or a monk of Fonte Adelana, or in some cases the abbot of Fonte Adelana. Fonte Adelana didn't have abbots at that time, so we don't quite know what to make of that. Guido Grandi, in his dissertation on this Camaldolenses, refers to Guido d'Arezzo being
[23:47]
there as a prior, as a prior with a sort of a co-adjutor abbot type status, so he was there and he was ready to take over as the next prior. That could be true, and it could be that he was acting as prior, that he was a prior of Fonte Adelana for a while. It's also quite true that he, in the end, did go back to Pomposa and died back in his former monastery, Benedictine Monastery, although we're not sure. We're just not sure. They're not sure about anything. They know that he existed and that he wrote a couple things, and everyone's claiming him, and there's good cause for us to claim some connections, especially to Fonte Adelana, but a lot of it you can just sort of put in parentheses and think, I mean, historically there's not much to say. We do have one codex, a chronicle of Camaldolenses,
[24:56]
which is dated 1050, or excuse me, Guido was found under the year 1050, and it reads, Blessed Guido of Arezzo died 10 years after the death of Beato Forte, Permanent of Adelana, May 17, 1050. So this is the Camaldolese tradition, is that he died on May 17, 1050. But as I say, Pomposa has something different to say, and there are sterns on both sides, and nobody knows for sure. So what do we have regarding Guido and Camaldolese? Well, we know that he was Romualdian. In other words, we know that he was part, through Pomposa and Fonte Adelana, and possibly from Camaldolese, of St. Romuald's influence that's going on in monastic reform at that time. We know
[26:05]
that. We know that he most likely lived for a number of years at Fonte Adelana, and he could perhaps have been superior of Fonte Adelana, but not likely, to be honest. It's quite likely that Guido lived his last years out back at his abbey of Santa Maria della Pomposa, or di Pomposa. And certainly, if you're reading anyone that says he died in 1058, that's the tradition we're holding, that he went back to Pomposa. And because during this time you have the abbot of Pomposa pleading with Guido to come back, it's time to come back. And his stability is to Pomposa. His works that we have are the Micrologos, and then a collection of chants, a collection of antiphons, which is an antiphonarium. We have those two. He may have written other things,
[27:08]
but we don't know for sure. We have two letters of his, also a famous one, to Brother Michael of Pomposa, in which he talks about earlier problems with the monks and regarding music and all of that. And one to Teodaldo of Arezzo. That's all we have. But the Micrologos is what's given him his fame. This is a dissertation on music, and it's dated after 1026, but it doesn't, I mean, people give it dates, but there's no certain date for this. We just know it happened after 1026 and before, probably before 1028. So one of those three years, 1026, 1027, 1028. Right around the time of Camaldoli's actual formal founding at the Sacro Aereo. He wrote this work as a teaching device, a didactic tool for his boys
[28:13]
in the choir of Arezzo. So it's under Teodaldo, his patronage, that we actually get Guido's work in a written form. The Antephenarium is dated somewhere between 1028 and 1032. So before he goes to Rome, he gets the volume of Antiphons done. We know some of his sources. We know that he uses Cassiodorus, those of you who took the monastic history course, the founder of Vivarium, the monastic experiment of Vivarium. Also Boethius he uses as a source, but those two he's using philosophically as a source. His real musical source is the Dialogus, the Dialog of Pseudo-Odo, or Pseudo-Odo. And it's through this Pseudo-Odo, that you see
[29:28]
many of the elements of Guido putting things together and coming up with a composite picture for music, a composite technique, let's say. And he's using that Dialogus to a great extent. He gets his stuff, I'm not going to go into this stuff, monochords and octaves and all of that. Sipri someday can talk about that sort of business, because most of us are generally equipped. I'm certainly not to be talking about that sort of thing. But in general, the theory of modes and modalities in music, the general music theory regarding intervals and stuff, at least the basic groundwork that he's going to use to come up with his system, the realities of range and pitch are going to come from this work. Also, what Pseudo-Odo has to say about Organum. And some of these pieces in the Antiphonarion,
[30:33]
evidently, I haven't seen it, are Organum pieces. Do you know what Organum is? Diaphany or Organum? We should sing some Organum. It's in fifths or fourths. Yes, when we go off into two parts and it sounds kind of oriental. That's Organum. That's Organum in fifths. Often, often it is, yeah. Or it's using Organum from time to time. Anyway, those are his sources. Guido's golden rule, I repeat, is every note placed on the same line must have the same sound, period. This is one of the things that caused the most problems for people. It's no wonder that there is reportedly chaos in the field of music, if even something
[31:41]
like that hadn't been settled. If you read the sources we have, and they describe, most of these books on Guido try to give you some background, and they describe what it was like in these monasteries. It must have been horrifying because it all depended on who was in charge of the music at that time and how he wanted things sung. It could mean that there's long slurs and dips and you know, trills or whatever. All of that was up to the person, individual person at that time. It still comes that way. What he's most famous for is the six-tone scale. That is, Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Ti, Quim, Le, Do. We have the six-tone scale, and what he did was he took the
[32:43]
first paragraph, let's say, the first strophe, of the hymn, the first verse, locked in the background area, of the first Vespers hymn, the Feast of John the Baptist on the 24th of June. He took that first strophe, and he just took the first words off each beginning of each line for his Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La. And that's why we have Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La. Still 10, well a millennium later. And that's where it comes from. This is what he's most famous for, which doesn't seem like a lot, but when there was nothing to begin with, this was a lot, because this gave a basis for music to have rules, and for music to sound the same, more or less, wherever you were. If you're interested in what it was like, descriptions of what it was like, or with his
[33:54]
actual method and the history involved, we have some things in the library. They're all relatively new. This one I stole from Italy, a pile of discarded books. I found it and yelped with glee. It's just a fun fact. If you read Italian, we have this one, entitled Guido d'Arezzo. It's by our own people. That was our name before we turned to Benedictine order. If you read Latin, this is the authoritative work, and it's a German scholar. What's his first name? Joseph Schmitzmann, I don't know, Wiesberger? I don't know German. And he did his doctorate
[34:56]
dissertation, and it's all in Latin, but it has wonderful pictures, if you're into pictures. Nice charts. The Latin isn't all that difficult. This kind of Latin is actually fairly easy. When you're talking about university Latin, they have to make things comprehensible. So it's not all that bad. In English, I was able to hunt down, through the University of Michigan reprints, this volume here, originally 1950-something. The reprint is 78. Anyway, translations by Warren Babb, and one of the three treatises he translates in a nice, readable English, is the Mikrokosmos of Guido. So we have it in English. The most delightful of the sources that we have, I don't have it with me,
[35:57]
Cyprian has it checked out to him. And this is David Hydey's relatively new Western Plainchant that comes out of Oxford. I found a reference to it in one of the book reviews of the historical volumes that we get, and I ordered it through Blackwell's, and it's a marvelous, marvelous book. And there's a nice section on Guido there in core, and then they keep referring to Guido later on. So if you're interested in Guido, we have something now. We didn't have anything until just a couple years ago. So at least we can look at what he did. And if you want to read about the flavor of the times, and what he had to deal with, and what he's given to music, I would say David Hydey is the one to read that. Well, he's the only one to read, unless you want to read a different language. This is something that Claude Paliska wrote in the
[37:05]
introduction to the Micrologos. I think it must be this one that I got from the University of Michigan about the Micrologos. Quote, the message of Micrologos is so rich in significance, both for understanding the music of its time, and for the real beginnings of indigenous Western theory, that the full meaning of its text has not yet been fathomed, even after generations of commentary. Because it was so basic, and so simple at the time, that we really haven't quite managed yet to trace how powerful it was to the formations of various lines of music theory. And so they really, honestly, do look to Guido as one of the pillars of modern music. It sounds strange just to say modern, because we're talking about a man who died in 1050, by 1058, but that's how, you know, that's how powerful it was. He's really one of the pillars
[38:10]
for modern music theory. What I hope to do with these lectures as I form them, and I'm just going to do it segment by segment, I started with the artists, I'm going to do the houses next, and then the scientists, I think, is hopefully get together enough material that I can, we can publish a history, a more comprehensive history than what we have with Nino. Nino's a very beautiful digest, and hopefully we can really get something more comprehensive. I don't know, we'll see, but at least we'll have it in the community library, all the collective talks and whatnot, in English, so that later on our young ones can, people coming in can read our history and our heritage, which is quite rich. Of the five talks I'm giving, this is the most iffy
[39:19]
regarding how Kamaldolese is Guido. Later on we're going to be talking about people who were verifiably Kamaldolese, and very powerful in their own ways, too, in the arts, in Kamaldolese history. With Guido, it's just nothing one can say authoritatively. There is a very strong tradition, not just within the Kamaldolese family, but outside, that says, yes, he's connected with Fonte Abalama, and perhaps a little bit with Kamaldolese, but to claim him as a prior of Fonte Abalama and Kamaldolese, and to get involved in all of the polemics that went back and forth, yes, even with the Kamaldolese in the early part of this century, is, you don't go anywhere with something like that, because there's not enough evidence to say one thing or another. But we have a man who's connected with our heritage at least, and certainly had influence
[40:25]
musically on Fonte Abalama, and was a monk of a house in the Romualdi movement, if you thought, so there are definite reasons for calling him at least Romualdian. This isn't a time to call him Kamaldolese anyway, because we don't have Kamaldolese at this time. Not until 1105 can you say that in any serious way. But in spirit, in spirit, too, he loved solitude, and obviously has that connection with Fonte Abalama, so he's at least Romualdian. I tried to find other musicians in our heritage, and we just don't have anything written in any language about our musicians, except a few references to some of our more gifted recluses of Kamaldolese who were also musicians, and wrote chant, and actually scribed and illuminated their own. This is Simone, and
[41:29]
this is another Simone, not the one whose cards we have for sale on me. Simone and Pellegrino, I think, of Kamaldoli, and they were two recluses who ran the music. The recluses now, when we're talking about recluses in Kamaldoli, this strong tradition, the recluses are not walled up. A lot of their time is spent in solitude, but the recluses in Kamaldoli over the centuries were quite often the teachers of the young for the community, the designated confessors and designated lecturers and homilists at Kamaldoli. So when there were recluses, they usually held these posts, and these two were intricately involved with the library, with manuscripts, and with the composition of music. But other than those two recluses at Kamaldoli, I've never
[42:36]
run across much of anything regarding famous musicians in our own tradition, historically. And, you know, undoubtedly they're very competent musicians from time to time at various houses, and the status of our own chant goes up and down through the centuries, just like anything else. We will run across references to the beautiful music, the beautiful chant at Firenze or at Murano at a particular time. It was remarked by Serenissima in Venezia or something like that about how beautiful the music is at San Michele or whatever. But we don't know anything about the musicians as such, outside of Guido and, as I mentioned, these two recluses. We do know something about functioning, or artists functioning in the areas of painting, fresco. When I talk about
[43:46]
Bartolomeo Legata on Monday, he's just an incredible man, a very holy man also. And I think, as much as I love Lorenzo Monaco, much more talented than Lorenzo, in the sense that he did everything, and he did it well. I mean, he did frescoes, organ building, painting, oil, tempura, design, architecture. He designed three, just an incredible man. So we have a number of artists of whom we can be very, very proud in our heritage, and we'll cover those names, artists. Tomorrow will be Lorenzo Monaco, and I will talk generally on Friday of the various miniaturist schools we had, and evidently these new books that have come back from Italy on these, or at least especially, who is the one artist from Da Venezia?
[44:50]
This focus is on a miniaturist of Da Venezia. See, and that's relatively new. Beautiful books. Yeah, as far as it being in a written form and accessible. You sent an email, in email form, the name of the particular artist that they think, and I forget, but I had run across his name once, but I never thought of him as a commodities miniaturist or artist as such. I had run across him in reference to Lorano, but not as a monk, and that, you know, I'm anxious to look at those things. Then there was another book about a later artist who was thought first to be secular, and just recently it's been discovered that he was a Camarales monk, maybe of the other congregation. Coronets. Yeah, but that's quite later. That's the, what, 16th century? Those were the paintings at the Hermitage that had just been restored. And where are those, those paintings? The paintings are now back at the Hermitage.
[45:55]
There was a lovely exhibit at Holtby, at the Castle of Holtby, and they came out with this book on this artist along with other artists. Just, just came out with it now? Yeah. Or two years ago? Well, I think it's just out now. Two years ago, I think it was the manuscript booklet that came out from Holtby on illuminations. Well, this is a book on these recent restorations of Camarales paintings. Neat. I look forward to seeing that. Does anyone have anything to say or ask about Guido? I probably can't answer it. Proposal was Benedictine? Yeah. I've been telling everybody it was Camarales now. I have all these music people and I have nothing to hide from them. Well, it was, it was Rewaldian and later on it is Camarades. In what sense later on? Later on, once, once in the 12th century,
[46:57]
once we got the official papal bulbs on 1105, 1113, that set us up as a congregation. And at that time, gathered a whole number of monasteries and gave them to Camarales. They were put on a cone. Within the subsequent years, there was tremendous growth. And at one point, within a century, one pope, I forget who, I don't have my notes with me, gave Camarales permission, not only to take in houses, but whole congregations, whole monastic congregations, there were a lot of little congregations. And so during the 12th, 13th hundreds, it's at that time that houses like Santa Polonare in Clase becomes Camarales and Pomposa becomes Camarales. Pomposa becomes Camarales, is it? I'd have to look that up. I can't, I can't say. There were certainly Rewaldian and considered Camarales, but I'm not, I'd have to look it up. It's still around there, Pomposa.
[47:59]
Yeah, it's not Camarales. But, I mean, since the suppression, everything that's Camarales, most Camarales houses are not monasteries anymore. Is there some of his own original work in it? They think so. Yeah, they assume that that's what it is, his own compositions. But I don't know where there's a copy of that. I mean, there are copies in Italy, but, and there could very well be at some place like Yale. Yale has an incredible amount of things we can get our hands on, Camarales-wise. So does Harvard, I've discovered. Because we're trying to build up a collection of antipathos for ourselves. It'd be interesting to hear anything that we could take out of him from his... We wouldn't want to do that unless we were sure he was a prior at Fonterra. For sure. I think Berkley does have the Psalms and the Bibles, as he corresponds with someone. So they have something about all seven.
[49:00]
Oh, I saw those letters, yeah. And also the Psalms. Or the, not letters, but the information. They have one from the late 13th century from one of our houses. Do you remember which one, Christopher? I don't either. One of our Camarales. But each house had its own, you know. Not that it didn't have its own tradition. Well, it did in a certain way. But I mean, they each had their own sets that were being done by our miniaturists. In fact, that's why our miniaturist schools actually got started, was to do our own choir books for our own houses. And, of course, the choir books were this big. So a whole group of monks could read from one to two, basically two to three on each side, facing both ways. So you had groups of monks around these huge books. Well, once they got their own copies made, people started paying for that sort of thing.
[50:01]
And we'll talk about the miniaturists on Friday. But it became very lucrative to have, and, of course, by that time our miniaturists were so good at it that they became renowned. And we would, you know, Camarales weren't the only miniaturists. I mean, there were wonderful Franciscan miniaturists. I think other Benedictines also would have to admit that. Period. And some of the Franciscans and Camarales worked together. For instance, they're fairly certain that towards the end of Lorenzo Monaco's life, he worked with Raphael. Raphael was a Franciscan. Also, that he worked with, um, who's the one that was just black? Angelic. On some miniatures for one of the projects that our Florence house was trying to get
[51:07]
done, and ran into some problems, and that Angelico came and helped with this. Forget that business I said about Raphael. I meant Angelico. You are twice, I think, in reference to the work of Guido of Solitude. How would you know that? From his letter? Well, I don't, you know, I don't remember from the letter itself. They deduced that from Fonte Alvalona, because of Fonte Alvalona at the time. It's always in connection with Fonte Alvalona that that's mentioned. And of course, this is more or less from the Camaldolese tradition that his love for solitudes is mentioned. And then his monastery at Pamposa has this hermitage, that's interesting.
[52:09]
Yeah. Because our upcoming monastery is in California. Yes. Epiphany has already started the fun time. Oh. Pamposa is, where is that? Is that, is that something you remember? No, but that's one from between Ravenna and Ferrari. That doesn't sound very Italian. Yeah. Are there any Camaldolese that you ran across that were famous for, like, sculpture and mediums of art? You were mentioning the musicians and then the frescoes or paintings. Do you know what sculpture? No. No. Ceramics? Yeah. And a little bit was done, a little bit was done in Muran, but nobody's famous.
[53:14]
I mean, there are references to busts being done. And also working with metal. And doing commemorative metals and whatnot. Carving and some of that in Muran, but no, no sculpture. Did he compose any original mediums or poetry? Maybe that would indicate, you know. You mean, words-wise? I don't think so. I mean, I don't think that was his, he was using texts that existed, you know. He's known for some of his antiphonics, true pre-existent texts, liturgical texts. Yeah, there's a number of them. And in print, if you want.
[54:16]
Are you looking for texts? I was wondering what sort of... For the hymnal? Or a spiritual hymnal or whatever. The influence of just the creative, you know, like, it's hard to say that in that music, but in words, at least you can sort of say, there seems to be an element of influence in that sort of thing. What was the influence of the hymnal and the creative? Yeah. No, I don't know of anything written poetically, you know, by Krita. For what? For this? You mean, when he came across with this scale? Oh, gosh, no, is when this, you mean the original first hymnal which was set up? He's using here, he's using a hymnal that already exists, and then he's doing this and this is being the 1020s, when he's in the rest, 1020s.
[55:21]
I don't know when the original first hymnal was set up. In that hymnal, in fact, does it go from a do, to a re, to a mi? That is, what's the connection? Is it totally arbitrary? This is the first stanza. Yeah, and is the first line, does it start with a do? Or does the second line go to a re? No, not musically, just word for it. Just word for it. Have you ever heard any of his music? Whose music? One out of Krita's. I don't know. You've never heard any of his stuff? Well, I don't know in the sense that I, I just, a lot of chant. When I was, I was singing chant, most of the time. I mean, who knows, maybe, some of that was Krita's, originally, just so long ago. Lord knows how many modifications it might have gone through. And I, I've never seen, I'd love to see the next time. We have no manuscripts from that time. That have Guido?
[56:24]
If you read these people, you're going to run across a couple of supposed compositions and whatnot. But again, we're not, we're not certain. But if you can get your hands on that Etta Fanarian, you know, when you're over there in Italy next time, you'll be there. You can look. Well, in this technological age, who knows what's going to happen. You know, St. John's, they have an amazing microfilm by great people from all over Europe. It'd be interesting to just look up Guido and all the Chinese, We'll have a contact there next year. That's what I mean. If you could steal something. I mean, if you could go and look up something. My understanding of a chant in the 21st century is, they're really, they have very little pain in it written down. That's why the Abbey of Solemn had to, basically,
[57:27]
look at what they might have intended. Sort of rewrite it almost. They have some things that I see going on. But the thing is, they have some things like this. But it's just chaos. And it's just very sporadic. And just sort of like, sometimes instead of doing notes, they'll just do... And you can feel it in the glance. I mean, one group might put 15, you know, or Lissando down, like 15 notes, and then one might jump one to another. I mean, that was Guido, so... I'm not going to get into this dialectic. Okay, we've gone over an hour. So tomorrow we do Lorraine's. Thank you.
[58:15]
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