Praetorius on the Effect and Value of Choral Church Music
December 30, 2020 Leave a comment
What follows is an excerpt taken from an article submitted to the Wisconsin Lutheran Quarterly for publication in 2021. To access the full article, check back on Red Brick Parsonage’s “Published” page periodically (I will post more details there once it is published, God willing), or you can use the link above to subscribe to the Quarterly.
Translator’s Introduction
[Michael] Praetorius planned four installments for his Syntagma Musicum (Musical Compendium) series: 1) a complete overview of the history and significance of both sacred and secular music from their beginnings, 2) a description of all ancient and modern instruments, with a special focus on the pipe organ (this eventually included an appended, forty-five-page section of woodcut illustrations done to scale), 3) a treatment of music theory, terminology, and performance, and information about new musical developments taking place in Italy,1 and 4) a comprehensive composition manual. Only the first three volumes are extant, though Praetorius evidently also completed the fourth.
The first volume of this series was published in Wittenberg in 1615 under the title Syntagmatis Musici Tomus Primus (The First Volume of the Musical Compendium). Of the three extant volumes of the Syntagma, this one has received the least attention, probably because it was the only volume Praetorius authored in Latin and because it is the most religious of the three (and therefore of less interest to secular music historians). …
In light of this anniversary year, and in light of ongoing discussions and debates about church music in Lutheran circles, I decided to provide for this submission a fresh translation of Chapters 3, 5, and 6 of Part 1, Section 1 of the first volume of Praetorius’s Syntagma (pp. 8–10, 16–19), which deal with the purpose, effect, and value of choral church music. [Only Chapter 3 is included in this online excerpt.] In these chapters, Praetorius regularly uses the term psalmody (which literally means “psalm-singing”) to refer to sung church music in general, though he also uses it to refer to the actual singing of biblical psalms.2 The context usually makes clear which he has in mind. All of the content in brackets and parentheses is Praetorius’s own, except in the case of Scripture citations and where I include Praetorius’s original Latin.
How much Praetorius himself was influenced by the content of these chapters is evident from his inclusion of its content in his other writings, most notably his dedicatory epistles for Urania (1613) and Polyhymnia Caduceatrix & Panegyrica (1619). Between these three sources, we find basically a threefold purpose for choral church music:
- To aid believers in proclaiming God’s grace and truth and in praising and honoring him “all the more joyfully and gladly”;
- To more easily and deeply inculcate “the doctrine about the true God and all divine exhortations, comfort, praise, and thanksgiving” in human hearts, which are naturally inclined away from God and toward sensual pleasure;3 and
- To ready believers for their participation in the glorious music of heaven.4
Since Praetorius prominently quotes two longer sections from Basil the Great’s (330–379) brilliant introductory remarks on the Psalms in affirming especially the second of these purposes, I include a fresh translation, from the Greek, of those sections taken together in an appendix at the end [not included in this online excerpt]. Praetorius also quotes a number of other church fathers; my abbreviated citations “PL” and “PG” refer to Jaques Paul Migne’s Latin (1844–1855) and Greek (1857–1886) series, respectively, of his Patrologiae Cursus Completus. …
Syntagma Musicum
Volume 1, Part 1, Section 1
Chapter 3
The Effects of Psalmody in General, When Combined with a Procedure and Discipline of Singing Devoutly and Modestly
This marks the μετάβασις or transition into the efficacy and benefits of psalmody, and the second and most important part of the Διανοίας [Discourse].5
Justin details just how supremely wonderful the effects of psalm-singing are: Ἡδύνει γὰρ [ἡ ψαλμῳδία] τὴν ψυχὴν πρὸς ζέοντα πόθον etc.6 That is:
- The singing of psalms arouses the soul to a burning desire for that which is desirable in song-tunes.
- It stifles the emotions that arise from the flesh.
- It disperses the wicked thoughts that are inspired in us by our invisible enemies.
- It incites the soul to bear the fruits of God’s blessings [bonorum].
- It makes the noble combatants [1 Tim. 1:18; 6:12] perfect in piety so that they can persevere in adverse circumstances.
- It is a remedy for the pious for all their griefs in life.
- Paul calls it “the sword of the Spirit” [Eph. 6:17], since it equips the soldiers of piety with weapons against their invisible enemies. Ῥῆμα γὰρ ἐστι Θεοῦ, τὸ καὶ ἐνθυμούμενον, καὶ ᾀδόμενον, καὶ ἀνακρουόμενον. (For it is the Word of God whether it is pondered in the mind, or sung, or conveyed by striking an instrument.)
- It is an ἀπελατικὸν for demons, that is, it drives them away.
- Those things that the pious acquire from ecclesiastical songs make the soul perfect in the virtues of piety.
So says Justin.7
Pope John XXII also suggests that there is a twofold effect of hymns in the church: While psalm singers are reciting the divine words, they are receiving God in their heart, and devotion is kindled toward God by songs of this kind. He says this in Extravagantes communes, Book 3, De vita et honestate clericorum:
An altogether sweet sound resounds in the mouth of psalm singers, since they are receiving God with their heart as they recite with their words, and they are kindling devotion toward him with their songs. And that is exactly why the singing of psalms is commanded in the churches of God, that the devotion of the faithful may be aroused. For this purpose the nightly and daily office and the celebrations of masses are continually sung by clergy and people with a mature pitch [tenore] and distinct inflection [gradatione], in order that they may take pleasure in that same distinction and delight in the same maturity.8
Here the pontiff likewise teaches that hymns were introduced and accepted in the church especially for this purpose, that devotion toward God might be kindled and stirred up.
But in order for psalm singing to awaken its virtue in souls by the effectual grace of the Holy Spirit, it is also truly necessary to observe a manner of psalm-singing that is pleasing to God. And in this regard, the following sentence was prescribed for hymns and cantors in the Fourth Synod of Carthage: “See that what you sing with your mouth, you believe in your heart, and what you believe in your heart, you prove with your deeds.”9
The apostle also requires of them that they sing and make music to the Lord in their hearts in Ephesians 5[:19]. When Jerome explains this passage in Book 3 of his commentary on Ephesians 5, he addresses singers thus: “Let those who have the duty of singing psalms in church listen carefully: Songs should not be sung to God with the voice, but with the heart. … Songs should be heard in fear, in deeds, in knowledge of the Scriptures.”10 The same precept of Jerome is included in canon law, Part 1, Distinction 92, Chapter 1.11 The gloss there adds two lines of verse:
Non vox, sed votum: non chordula musica, sed cor:
Non clamans, sed amans: cantat in aure Dei.Not the voice, but prayer; not a musical string, but the heart;
Not one who cries out, but one who loves—sings in the ear of God.12
And Chrysostom says in a sermon on the Davidic songs:
So let us sing Davidic songs to the soul [troubled by the devil or by terrible suggestions of the flesh], in addition to other passages from Sacred Scripture, and in such a way that the mouth, by singing, may educate the mind. Nor indeed should this be regarded as petty and trifling since, whenever we instruct the tongue to sing, the soul—even the one [otherwise] feeling the opposite way—is ashamed not to imitate what is being sung, at least while singing it.13
And in the church, diligent care was taken that nothing would be done casually and without restraint [leviter & lascivè], but that everything would be done in a dignified and decent manner, accompanied by singing, and we read that the utmost reverence and decorum were observed by the singers and attendants. For “the learned authority of the holy fathers has decreed,” as the supreme pontiff, John XXII, says at the beginning of his decretal De vita et honestate clericorum in Book 3 of Extravagantes communes, “that in the services of divine praise, whatever belongs to the submissiveness of servitude should be exhibited, everybody’s mind should be alert, the sermon should not falter, and the unassuming dignity of the psalm singers should echo in their gentle modulation, since a sweet sound was resonating in their mouth.”14 In this decretal letter, the pontiff strongly reprehends those singers who were taking undue liberties [nimis lasciviebant] in their melodies, contrary to clerical respectability, and, in order that they might abstain from such levity in the future, he forbids them under threat of punishment. Nor indeed “should the throat and pharynx be coated with sweet medicament like the tragic actors do, so that theatrical modes and songs can be heard in church,” as Jerome says in the decretal in Part 1, Distinction 92, Chapter 1 of canon law.15
Likewise, the value the fathers placed on Paul’s rule about veiling the head, handed down in 1 Corinthians 11, is evident from the book On the Veiling of Virgins, which Tertullian, a very ancient ecclesiastical writer, wrote in its entirety. In this book he demonstrates, among many other arguments, that it is dishonorable for virgins16 to be uncovered during the psalms or at any mention of God:
How severe a chastisement do those women deserve who insist on remaining uncovered during the psalms or at any mention of God? Are they in the right when, even during prayer itself, they so readily place a fringe or tuft or any sort of thread on the crown of their head and then think themselves covered? So highly do they value their head!17
Now then, up to this point in the discourse, we have been able examine choral music’s origins in ecclesiastical psalmody and the practice of singing in multiple choirs that was introduced in the churches of the Old and New Testaments. We then examined its actual singing, the distinct variety of its modulation, its manifold effect, the manner of singing it devoutly, and the discipline and reverence of which it was deemed worthy. Now we must press the discourse more deeply into the broad field of its very frequent usefulness—a field of study that will amply demonstrate that choral music is filled with the activity of the Holy Spirit, pleasing to God, necessary for the Church, and beneficial to pious souls.
Endnotes
1 As you can imagine, volumes II and III are of incalculable worth to the study and practice of period-correct performance.
2 In Chapters 1 and 2, Praetorius discusses the “choral psalmody instituted by David and Solomon, which was later adopted by the choirs of the Greek and Latin churches,” and “the modulation [or melodies] of the ancients in psalm-singing, its purpose, the various kinds of ecclesiastical singing, and the ritual suggested in the psalms of ascents.”
3 Siegfried Vogelsänger, Heaven Is My Fatherland (Eugene, OR: Resource Publications, 2020), 61–62. Praetorius therefore also stresses in two of his dedicatory epistles the necessary balance in worship between concio and cantio—sermon (spoken proclamation of the Word) and song (musical proclamation of the Word). Elsewhere Praetorius wrote in a prayer of elegiac stanzas, in reference to his father and maternal grandfather: “One and the same is the aim (not to mention the zeal and the fervor): | What they endeavored with words, I seek with strings and with song” (Heaven Is My Fatherland, 55).
4 He makes this purpose clear in his dedicatory epistle for Polyhymnia Caduceatrix & Panegyrica; see Gesamtausgabe der Musikalischen Werke von Michael Praetorius, 17:viii–ix.
5 Praetorius divided the first volume of his Syntagma Musicum into two parts—the first on sacred music and the second on secular music. He further divided the first part into four sections: 1) Διάνοια or discourse on the choral music or sacred psalmody of the ancients, 2) Ὑπομνήματα or commentaries on the main liturgy, 3) Ἐξήγημα (elsewhere called Ἐξήγησις) or explanation of the liturgical songs of matins and vespers, and 4) Θεωρία ὀργανικῆς Sioniae or contemplation of the instrumental music used in both the Old and New Testament church. Even though he could have used the same label (discourse, commentaries, explanation, or contemplation) for all four sections, he chose different ones so that he could use each label as a shorthand reference for each section.
6 The author of this quote (not actually Justin Martyr; see next endnote) is answering this question: “Songs were devised by the unbelievers for deceit, and were introduced by those under law on account of the immaturity of their minds. Why then have those who have received the perfect knowledge of grace, and knowledge alien to the just-mentioned customs, continued to make use of those songs in their churches, the way the immature did who were under the law?”
7 PG 6:1353–56. This quote is taken from Quaestiones et Responsiones ad Orthodoxos (Questions and Answers for the Orthodox), Question 107, which Praetorius, like many before him, falsely attributed to the second century Christian apologist Justin Martyr. Scholars now generally date this work to the late fifth century.
8 The idea seems to be: The type of music used and the decorum and style employed in church singing will hopefully carry over into everyday life and have a moderating influence on one’s conduct. Since God wants us to exercise discipline and self-control (1 Thess. 5:6–8), to lead hard-working and unassuming lives (1 Thess. 4:11), to distinguish ourselves from the world around us (2 Cor. 6:14–18), and to have our minds set on things above, not on earthly things (Col. 3:1,2), the church’s music will reflect and encourage these characteristics. Regarding Praetorius’s source for this quote, the Corpus Juris Canonici (Collection of Canon Law) published in Rome in 1582 contained three volumes. Volume 1 contained Gratian’s collection of church laws and decretals. Volume 2 contained five books of additional decretals. Volume 3 contained a sixth book of additional decretals, the Clementine Constitutions, and the so-called decretales extravagantes or supplementary decretals, divided into the Extravagantes Johannis XXII and the Extravagantes communes. You can view the same page Praetorius likely consulted here: http://digital.library.ucla.edu/canonlaw/librarian?ITEMPAGE=CJC3&PAGENUM=732. Praetorius must have had a particular affinity for this quote, since he cites more of it later, and he included the entire section from which it was taken in an appendix on pages 456–57.
9 Karl Joseph von Hefele, A History of the Councils of the Church from the Original Documents, vol. 2, trans. Henry Nutcombe Oxenham (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1896), 412, no. 10. For more on the so-called Fourth Synod of Carthage, see pp. 409–410: “These 104 canons are certainly very old, but…the heading which ascribes them to the Carthaginian Synod of 398 is spurious.”
10 PL 26:528. Jerome’s entire quote may be of interest: “Let young people listen carefully to these words. Let those who have the duty of singing psalms in church listen carefully: Songs should not be sung to God with the voice, but with the heart. Nor should they have their throat and pharynx coated with sweet medicament as the tragic actors do, so that theatrical modes and songs can be heard in church. No, songs should be sung in fear, in deed, in knowledge of the Scriptures. Show me anyone you like that people are accustomed to call κακόφωνος [ill-sounding]; if he has good works, he is a sweet singer to God.” Praetorius refers to more of this quote later.
11 Praetorius cites the chapter using the first Latin word, Cantantes, &c.
12 Regarding the source, see endnote 8. You can view the same page Praetorius likely consulted here: http://digital.library.ucla.edu/canonlaw/librarian?ITEMPAGE=CJC1&PAGENUM=357. I included the original Latin so that the reader could see the play on words.
13 J.-P. Migne refers to this introduction in PG 55:31–32, but does not include it even among Chrysostom’s spurious works because of a lack of a Greek original. However, parts of this sermon are very similar to thoughts appearing in another introduction to the Psalms falsely ascribed to Chrysostom that does have a Greek original (PG 55:536–37).
14 Same source as cited in endnote 8. In other words, since what the singers were singing was inherently sweet by virtue of its content, the singers should not spoil its sweetness, or attempt to overshadow it, with their own fanciness or showiness. Praetorius would not have objected to the use of some artful and tasteful singing techniques (see e.g. Heaven Is My Fatherland, 107), but he was definitely in favor of comporting oneself with unassuming dignity while singing in church, and of putting oneself completely in the service of the music and especially the textual content.
15 See endnotes 10–12.
16 Actually, in the final chapter of On the Veiling of Virgins, from which the following quote is taken, Tertullian is making an appeal to women in general, including married women.
17 PL 2:913; cf. Roberts and Donaldson, eds., Ante-Nicene Fathers, 4:37.2.