THE RECOMPOSITIONS OF BUUS´S RICERCARI FROM HIS LIBRO PRIMO…(1547) IN MANUSCRIPT P-CUG MM 242 AND THE DIDACTIC PROCESSES OF THE FRIARS OF THE SANTA CRUZ MONASTERY IN COIMBRA.

• Author(s): Oliveira, Filipe
• Date: 2012
• Persistent ID: http://hdl.handle.net/10174/4037
• Origin: Repositório Científico da Universidade de Évora
• Subject(s): ricercare; Jacques Buus; Mosteiro de Santa Cruz de Coimbra; P-Cug MM 242; P-Cug MM 48
• Document Type: Lecture
• Language: English

Description

This paper addresses the presence of seven recomposed ricercari by Jacques Buus in the manuscript P-Cug MM 242, based on the Libro primo de ricercari a quattro voci, published in Venice in 1547 by Antonio Gardane. These recompositions, probably copied in the third quarter of the 16th century, were made after the previously copied Buus´s ricercari in P-Cug MM 48. Besides the works mentioned, these manuscripts include mostly copies of motets and chansons from some of the most important Flemish and north Italian mid-sixteenth century prints. Two years ago I presented in Utrecht´s Med-Ren Conference 2009 the initial phase of the investigation done upon this manuscript and P-Cug MM 48, the other Coimbra manuscript in score-format which testifies the instrumental activity in mid-sixteenth century Portugal. P-Cug MM 242 includes copies of Buus´s recomposed ricercari in score-format, and this paper addresses the idea that the score-format served once as a pedagogical tool in the teaching of counterpoint through the music of a northern European master in the Santa Cruz Monastery in Coimbra. I show that the copies in the manuscripts were never intended to be used as a performing support – they contain many errors of vertical coordination between the voices that make the performance impossible – but testify instead to the didactic procedures of the friars. Through Buus´s recomposed ricercari, which were the object of many cuts, brief recomposed bridges, newly inserted sections, and written glosa figurations, I will describe the theoretic assimilation of formal processes, of style, mode, counterpoint and performing practice.