Pitch and Transposition
Interest in performing at historical pitches is a comparatively recent phenomenon. The acceptance of a' = 415 as a standard for Baroque ensembles is not yet forty years old,1 and of a' = 430 for Classical players, even younger. So well have these standards become established, however, we easily forget the resistance they once met; the notion that we should forgo the convenience of our hard-won modern standard was at first regarded as ridiculous by many leading specialists in early performance (as it still is by many traditionally trained musicians). But ultimately the profound effect of pitch on timbre was recognized, and adherence to low pitch has become something of a badge of honor among “serious” period-instrument ensembles for eighteenth-and late seventeenth-century music.
Why, then, have performers of early seventeenth-century music generally failed to demonstrate a similar interest in the historical pitches (particularly those higher than modern) of that era? There are various reasons, mostly practical. With one foot in the Renaissance, as it were, the early seventeenth century still depends somewhat on a Renaissance instrumentarium: families of instruments (particularly winds) whose pitch has to match and that collectively represent a large investment. Baroque and Classical music, by contrast, employ specialists on a small number of individual instruments, so that the economic commitment to a single pitch is not as great. Performances of early seventeenth-century concerted works often involve church organs; they also often involve choirs, which are usually more willing to lower the pitch from accustomed levels than to raise it. (This observation is not meant as a denouncement of modern singers; as we shall see, aversion to singing too high was typical of many early singers as well.) But probably the chief impediment to the adoption of a special pitch standard for the early seventeenth century is the sheer complexity of the matter, making it difficult to come up with simple, practical, and universal solutions like those we have found for music of later eras. It has not helped that scholars have continued to wrangle over certain details, causing performers to give up and fall back on established modern conventions.
It is not that there is a dearth of information. Though there is nothing so absolute as modern electronic devices or even tuning forks (invented, it is generally thought, in the early eighteenth century), there exist many instruments from the period that are in good enough condition to give us a pretty accurate idea of their pitch. There are, in addition, numerous theoretical works and other documents that deal with pitch. But the instruments do not come with labels, so we do not know, for instance, whether a particular recorder was considered to be “in C” at one standard or “in D” at another; also, we cannot always know just how representative a particular instrument is of its time or place. Written records, on the other hand, treat primarily of relative standards, so that tying them down to specific pitches involves some detective work. The tendency to reason (or generalize) from small samples seems to have been as typical of humans then as now, accounting for some of the conflicting testimony among early sources (as well as conflicting modern reports). It is thus necessary to examine as large a body of information as possible in order not to make the same kind of error. The most thoroughgoing modern investigation of the history of musical pitch has been undertaken by the late Bruce Haynes, who reported his research first in a dissertation2 (1995) and then in a book3 (2002). As Haynes points out, he had an advantage over previous researchers, having benefited from the tremendous explosion of interest in—and practical experience with—historical instruments. Though scholars will continue to work at details, his writings will undoubtedly be regarded for some time to come as the definitive word on early pitch. The following short summary of the seventeenth-century picture owes an immeasurable debt to Haynes's work.
For his book, Haynes adopted a clear and concise method of indicating pitch standards—one that will be employed here, as well (but with a slight amendment for added clarity). According to this system, a standard near modern is labeled “A+0”; one a semitone above, “A+1”; one a semitone below, “A–1”; and so forth.4 (Here, however, Haynes's plus signs will be replaced by ↑s and his minus signs by ↓s.) Haynes's theoretical range of tolerance for these standards is a semitone, from a quartertone below to a quartertone above their values as determined at a' = 440 (meaning that they can encompass the pitches of instruments or other “witnesses” to early pitch that deviate by that amount). However, as he points out, the average levels of most Continental European pitch standards are quite close to these pitches as based on a' = 440. The main exception is a standard lying about halfway between A↓1 and A↓2, which was a common and important one for woodwinds from the late seventeenth century through the eighteenth; standing at about a' = 403, it is indicated here as “ A↓1½.” (The entire grid of English standards seems similarly to lie “in the cracks,” requiring a special nomenclature that will be explained below.) It should be borne in mind that these labels for pitch standards are intended to be anything but absolute, reflecting the rather approximate nature of much of the data; when greater accuracy is demanded, vibration frequencies can still be used.
Germany and Italy
Perhaps not surprisingly, it is Michael Praetorius who provides the most comprehensive discussion of pitch from the period. As he explains in a chapter devoted to the subject,5 the mixing of all sorts of instruments together was a comparatively recent development, to which the disparity of instrumental pitch still represented a common and severe impediment. Nevertheless, he begins by acknowledging some of the reasons for having different standards for different media. First, as mentioned above, pitch affects timbre:
for the higher-pitched an instrument (within its class and type) is made, as with cornetts, shawms, and descant fiddles, the fresher they sound; conversely, the lower the trombones, curtals, bassanelli, bombards, and bass fiddles are tuned, the more solemnly and majestically they present themselves.6
A second consideration is convenience: a low pitch is more comfortable for voices and stringed instruments, and a high one (although he does not mention this) may be better for certain wind instruments, since it eases finger stretches. A final consideration, implicit in his discussion of organ pitch, is economic: the shorter the pipes, the lower the cost (accounting, at least in part, for the trend in his day toward higher organ pitches).
Praetorius applauds the comparative standardization of organ pitch that has taken place in the princely chapels of (north) Germany. This pitch, known as Chorton (choir pitch), has risen over the years a whole step from its former level and is now equivalent to those of Italy and England (although English pitch is just a fraction lower, as evidenced by the cornetts and shawms manufactured there). Some, he says, would like to raise the pitch yet another semitone; this is not a good idea, in his opinion, since the current pitch is already too high for voices and stringed instruments. Indeed, string players commonly tune down a whole tone in order to avoid breaking strings, causing some inconvenience for other instrumentalists (who must then transpose) but making life easier for singers.
For this reason, Praetorius likes the distinction, made “in Prague and some other Catholic choirs,” between Chorton and Kammerton (chamber pitch). These pitches are a whole tone apart; the higher one—Kammerton—is equivalent to his north German standard Chorton and is used only at table and for convivial and joyous occasions, being the most convenient for both wind and stringed instruments (notwithstanding what he has just told us about the difficulties it causes for strings). The lower one is called Chorton and is used only in churches, primarily for the sake of singers, who both strain less and sound better at the lower pitch. (Students of Baroque practice will notice that this usage of Chorton and Kammerton is the exact reverse of that of Bach's day, when the higher pitches of church organs were called Chorton and lower pitches were called Kammerton; this inversion of terminology has caused no end of confusion for later writers, beginning already in the eighteenth century. See the studies by Bruce Haynes, listed below, for a detailed examination of pitch in Bach's era.) It would be good, Praetorius says, if organs could be tuned to this low version of Chorton, but he considers this to be impractical now that the high version (which he clearly intends to call Kammerton and to use as his reference pitch throughout the Syntagma) has become so well established in his German lands.
One other pitch standard figures in Praetorius's discussion, one a minor third below his Kammerton (and thus a semitone below the Prague Chorton). This, he says, is the pitch used in England formerly and in the Netherlands still for most wind instruments, and is the one used by the celebrated Antwerp maker Johannes Bossus for his harpsichords, spinets, and organs. While there is no denying that this is an advantageous pitch for harpsichords, flutes, and other instruments due to the lovely timbre it imparts, he says, it is nevertheless impractical to include instruments built at this pitch in concerted music, and one must stick by the aforementioned pitches, Chorton and Kammerton. However, the very low pitch (that is, the one a minor third lower than Kammerton) is much in use in Italy and in various Catholic choirs of Germany because of its suitability for voices. For this reason, music is often sung at this pitch through transposition down a minor third, solely for the sake of the voices; to instrumentalists such a transposition may seem offensive at first but is worth the trouble to learn to make.
The foregoing discussion treats of pitch standards in relative terms. However, Praetorius was not content to leave it at that, and he attempted to specify pitch in absolute terms as well.7 Unfortunately, however, there has long appeared to be a discrepancy of about a semitone between the two methods Praetorius chose to communicate his pitch standard: most reconstructions of a set of little organ pipes according to dimensions he provided have yielded a pitch standard just a little below a' = 440 (a' = 430, say), while the a produced by the typical sackbut of Nuremberg manufacture (with the slide extended by the width of two fingers, as he suggests) is just below a modern b?, indicating a standard of about a' = 460. (The latter pitch, it should be mentioned, is in better accord with the dimensions of most of the other wind instruments in his plates, which are carefully rendered to scale.8) This discrepancy has engendered considerable scholarly debate—some of it quite heated—as to Praetorius's intended standard.9 However, a more recent reinvestigation of the pipe data in light of more sophisticated information about early pipe-making practices and wind pressures has shown that the discrepancy can be largely—and under certain conditions completely—resolved in favor of the higher value,10 and most researchers into early pitch have readily accepted this reinterpretation of the data.11 Having settled the issue of the level of Praetorius's reference pitch (A↑1), we still find a few areas of uncertainty resulting from his occasional lapses in consistency; despite his best intentions, he apparently sometimes reverts to local usage in calling his reference pitch Chorton, and he occasionally reports the pitch names of instruments according to lower standards instead of their “actual” pitches according to Kammerton as promised. One must sometimes “take him for what he means rather than what he says,” although the resulting interpretation may then turn out to be controversial.12
The broad outlines of Praetorius's assessment are confirmed by surviving instruments and other evidence. Extant seventeenth-century German organs range in pitch from a' = 450 to a' = 501, averaging a' = 474 (on the high side of A↑1 according to Haynes's system, explained above). This range and average tend to corroborate both the comparative standardization at A↑1 and the occasional push for A↑2 that his information implies. It appears that the majority of north Germans continued to refer to these high organ pitch standards as Chorton, although just a few seem to have adopted his terminology. On the other hand, south—that is, Catholic—Germans (such as Georg Muffat, writing near the end of the century) as well as Austrians refer to a low standard as Chorton, thus substantiating Praetorius's notion of the origins of his preferred system. (It is useful when contemplating this morass of conflicting terminology to bear in mind that Kammerton seems to carry no connotation of a low pitch in his day—nor indeed until after the advent of the redesigned French woodwinds that entered Germany in the 1680s. Praetorius was not merely inverting an established north German usage, as assumed by later writers; for him to have done so would have been both perverse and futile. Thus, even though his use of the term Chorton may be slippery, we can at least be sure about his meaning for Kammerton.)
Surviving German “ordinary” (i.e., curved) cornetts from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries range in pitch from about a' = 450 to 480, with the great majority falling between a' = 460 and 470 (A↑1 in Haynes's system). Haynes has shown that in fact the one comparatively stable element throughout the period he studied is that of Cornetton (or Cornettenton—cornett pitch), apparently due to strong traditions of cornett building and playing. While Chorton in the north German sense might vacillate between A↑1 and A↑2 (and even dip down—very rarely—to A↑0 in the early eighteenth century), Cornetton remained a relatively fixed standard at A↑1.13 At the same time, however, we have to recognize that the most common level for Chorton was also A↑1, and that the majority of (north German) sources treat Chorton and Cornetton as equivalent rather than different. Praetorius himself once14 equates Cornettenton with his Kammerton—further evidence that the level of the latter was A↑1.
As we have seen, Praetorius also equates his north German standard with that of Italy, and indeed the preponderance of Venetian wind instruments from the period—surely his point of reference—are at pitches compatible with a standard at A↑1 and thus bear him out.15 However, a more thorough look reveals just a little more complicated picture. Northern Italian sources from his period and before speak of two pitches associated with the cornett, called tuon del cornetto di mezzo punto and tuon del cornetto di tutto punto. These terms might be Englished as “halfway (down) cornett pitch” and “all-the-way (down) cornett pitch” (or possibly “medium cornett pitch” and “total cornett pitch”). They differed, it seems, by a semitone; the higher of the two—mezzo punto—was by far the more common. Haynes has suggested, based on the pitches of extant Italian curved cornetts, that we can assume A↑1 as the level of mezzo punto, putting tutto punto at A↑0, or near modern pitch.16 (Far more Italian than German cornetts survive. Italian ones of the curved variety tend to cluster at A↑0 and A↑1, with scattered examples at A↑2; those at A↑1 represent the great majority.) The advantage to standards a semitone apart, as pointed out by Haynes, is that they can accommodate a wide range of performance pitches through simple transpositions of a whole tone. It is interesting to note that one organ associated with Monteverdi before his tenure in Venice is known to have been at tutto punto: the organ at the cathedral of Cremona (where his teacher Marc-Antoine Ingenieri was maestro di capella).17 Another—the one at the ducal Basilica of Santa Barbara in Mantua (where, it has been suggested, the Vespers of 1610 may first have been per-formed18)—was once thought to have been at this pitch, but more recent discoveries have called this conclusion into question.19
Italian sources also use the term tuono corista—choir pitch—by which is meant a low standard, suitable for singers. (Corista by itself can also have the more neutral meaning of “pitch standard” or “starting place for tuning”; in modern Italian it has come to mean “standard pitch” or “tuning fork.”) When a level for tuono corista is specified, it is most commonly “a tone below the pitch of cornetts” (meaning, presumably, a tone below mezzo punto), putting it at A↓1, or about a' = 415. This is very much the same level we have established for Praetorius's preferred Chorton (in the south-German sense); the similarity of both the names (tuono corista; Chorton) and their level is striking—and probably not coincidental, given the musical connections between northern Italy and southern Germany (as well as Austria) at that period. Where the pitch of organs was high (as, for instance, it was in Venice), tuono corista was achieved by organists through transposition. But organs were also often built to lower standards for the convenience of voices. Roman organs usually had credit for being the lowest.20 That of St. Peter's (where Girolamo Frescobaldi was organist, 1608–28 and 1634–43) was at about a' = 384, or on the low side of A↓2; several other organs are known to have been tuned to it. (Presumably Praetorius has Roman pitch in mind when he mentions that the standard a minor third below his Kammerton is “much in use in Italy.”) One source21 suggests that Roman organs were lowered to this pitch about 1600, having formerly been a semitone higher. In any case, an ecclesiastical standard at A↓2 remained associated with Rome through the eighteenth century and into the nineteenth. The majority of Italian organs fall between the extremes of A↓2 and A↑1; in summing up the evidence of extant Italian organs, 1500–1680, Haynes writes, “Rome is the lowest at [A↓2], Naples and Florence both show [A↑1] (Florence also shows [A↑0] and [A↑1]), and Lombardy and Venice show a similar range from [A↑0] to [A↑1] (with Venice tending a little higher).”22
Though higher pitches were considered advantageous for instruments, at least some woodwinds were built to lower pitches, apparently for the convenience of voices—or, rather, for the convenience of the instrumentalists accompanying them, who would then not have to transpose. (Sackbuts could, of course, “crook” down, and strings also could easily lower their pitch—although it is interesting to note that Antonio Barcotto, writing mid-century, specifically mentions violins as instruments that do better at high pitch than low!23) Both mute cornetts and flutes are often cited as examples of such low-pitched woodwinds;24 to these should be added Praetorius's Cornamuse (tail-less crumhorns, which were apparently of Italian provenance and which he says were at Chorton, a tone below Kammerton) and possibly some cur-tals.25 In fact, however, rather few of the surviving mute cornetts are as low as A↓1; the main cluster is at A↑0—tutto punto, in other words.26 Flutes, on the other hand, have large clusters at both A↓1 and A↑0.27 The paucity of surviving flutes at A↑1—there are but two, and even these are on the high side of A↑1—has given rise to the idea that flutes would have been used as transposing instruments when playing with other winds, or that the other winds would have transposed to meet their pitch; however, it seems far more likely that we just do not have a representative sampling of early flutes among those that survive, and that flutes matching the pitch of other winds were commonly available at the time.28
It is tempting to see some direct connection between the low-pitched winds of the early seventeenth century and those of the later Baroque, but actually the evidence of low-pitched winds decreases as the seventeenth century progresses. The majority of both flutes and mute cornetts now extant come from sixteenth-century collections, and most of the archival references to winds at alternative pitches are similarly early. The popularity of the mute cornett itself seems to have waned drastically after the time of Praetorius; its rare appearances thereafter appear confined to Germany and Austria.29 Both the Cornamuse and low-pitched curtals were even rarer and short-lived. And evidence for pitch-changing crooks on sackbuts is meager after Praetorius. All in all, the trend seems to have been toward unanimity of pitch among the winds, as well as the strings performing with them in church. (Strings performing chamber music without winds would obviously have been free to choose any pitch they found convenient.) In Germany the standard remained some form of Chorton (in the higher, north German sense): usually A↑1 but sometimes as high as A↑2.30 In Italy the instrumental standards associated with the traditional winds probably remained A↑0 and A↑1; the former came to be known as corista Veneto—Venetian pitch—in the eighteenth century, and the latter, corista di Lombardia—Lombard pitch. Although the general lowering of Venetian church organs to A↑0 did not take place until the 1740s, positives—portatili—in Venice and other north Italian cities were already being built to vocal pitch nearly a century earlier according to Barcotto.31 A↑0 may well have been the standard he had in mind as an excellent compromise, being “neither too high nor too low, so that every voice and instrument can adjust comfortably.”32
Praetorius's knowledge of English pitch seems to have been based primarily on woodwinds imported from England, possibly augmented by information from itinerant English musicians in Germany. In any case, the actuality was once again rather more complicated than he realized. We are indebted for much of what we know of English choral pitch to what we can glean from remnants of English organs, which in the Tudor and Jacobean periods were based upon a nominal five- or ten-foot pipe length (in contrast with the more familiar eight- or sixteen-foot length used for continental organs). The early English organ was, in addition, a “transposing” instrument, producing the choir's F by sounding what was to the organist a C. The organist thus played his own solo music at the apparent pitch of the keyboard but had to transpose when accompanying a choir. It was long assumed that the five- or ten-foot pipe length referred to in the documents was a precise, actual sounding length, leading to the commonly held belief among many experts of the twentieth century that the English “quire [i.e., choir] pitch” had been about a minor third above modern. More recent research has shown, however, that the five- or ten-foot designations were merely nominal lengths (just as the eight-foot lengths—and their multiples and submultiples—are for continental organs), and that the earlier estimates had been too high. The revised estimate for “quire pitch” is about a' = 473, or nearly a quarter-tone higher than A↓1. This standard appears to have been a reference point for most English organs, for the majority of extant examples are at integral semitone relationships to it. As mentioned above, this means that the entire grid of English pitches is offset from the continental one by about a quartertone. Haynes thus represents “quire pitch” as Q↓0, with Q↓1 indicating a pitch a semitone below it (at about a' = 448), Q↓2 a whole tone below it (at about a' = 423), and Q↓3 a minor third below it (at about a' = 400).33 (Again, Haynes's minus signs are being replaced here by ↓s.) Q↓3 then works out to be practically identical to the one offset continental pitch standard, A↓1½. The offset nature of another member of the English grid is confirmed by Praetorius; as mentioned above, he tells us that English wind instruments of his period were just a little lower than his Kammerton standard (A↑1), which would put them at Q↓1. Church performances mixing the traditional Renaissance-style winds (cornetts and sackbuts in particular) with choirs and organs were fairly common in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries.34 However, the semitone separating the pitch of the winds (Q↓1) and the pitch of the choir (Q↓0) would have occasioned a very awkward transposition; how it would have been managed in practice is unclear.35 Concerning secular vocal pitch, some modern scholars—basing their reasoning primarily upon vocal ranges—have proposed a level for this period of about A↓0; being thus between Q↓1 and Q↓2, this estimate might be resolved up or down a quarter tone to match either of them.
Few if any English church organs escaped destruction during the Interregnum, but with the Restoration came a rebirth; in a ferment of organ building during the 1660s, several examples of the traditional transposing instrument were produced, only to undergo replacement or extensive remodeling in the 1670s and 1680s. These changes, Haynes surmises, were occasioned by the adoption of the new French-style woodwinds. Surviving English examples of the latter from this period are mostly at Q↓3 ( = A↓1½, the usual French standard at that time). However, most of the rebuilt or replacement organs were pitched at Q↓0, with their keyboards now realigned so that they were no longer required to transpose to play at this pitch.36 Transposing would still have been necessary for the organist when accommodating the pitch of the new winds, but the minor third separating Q↓0 and Q↓3 is actually a fairly convenient interval for transposition (as will be explained below). Organs at Q↓1 and Q↓2 were also common; the latter (at about a' = 423) was identified at least once37 as “chappell pitch” and became the dominant English organ pitch through the eighteenth century. Winds were eventually produced at this pitch (at which time it also became a common orchestral standard in England), but apparently not yet in the seventeenth century; Q↓3 under the name “consort pitch” (sometimes “concert pitch”) remained the principal instrumental standard well into Handel's time.38 It may be possible to project this level for “consort pitch” backward into the earlier seventeenth century (before the French incursion), although direct evidence is lacking.39
Praetorius fails to mention French pitch standards, and unfortunately Mersenne—upon whom we should be able to rely to fill in the gap—seems to have been more interested in pitch as an acoustical phenomenon than an issue among musicians and thus has little dependable information to impart. What can be learned from him must be gleaned in part by inference. He, along with other sources, mentions ton de chapelle (chapel pitch) as a standard associated with church organs.40 The primary pitch of French organs from the seventeenth century into the nineteenth was A?2, except for a limited period (during the reign of Louis XIV) when, in court circles at least, it was raised somewhat (probably to A↓1½). Mersenne also speaks of ton de chapelle as a possible instrumental standard, at least for the fute,41 although the dimensions he gives for most winds (cornetts, shawms, curtals, recorders) suggest high pitch; in fact, most differ insignificantly from those of Praetorius. For instance, Mersenne's treble cornett (of the curved, “ordinary” variety) is just a little shorter than the corresponding one shown by Praetorius, and its size is consistent with the typical cornett pitch (A↑1) we have seen in Italy and Germany. Mersenne tells us42 that the cornett was used “in vocal concerts and with the organ,” and we know from other sources that it was often a regular member of French cathedral choirs despite the general ban on winds. It is thus perhaps significant that Mersenne's information on the cornett implies two different nominal pitches for the dessus: his chart showing the range43 starts on c', while his musical example44 specifies the more traditional a as the bottom, six-finger note.45 An instrument in a at A↑1 would indeed be in c' from the point of view of the organ (and voices) at A↓2; perhaps Mr. Quiclet—Mersenne's informant about the cornett—found it more convenient to rename his pitches than to transpose down a minor third. (The effect on actual fingering would be the same in either case.) Mersenne's only comment on nominal pitch is to point out that the cornett in the hands of a skillful player is completely chromatic and that its bottom note can thus be represented by any solmization syllable (i.e., the cornett can transpose at any interval).
Although the new woodwinds (Baroque flute, recorder, oboe, and bassoon) produced in the second half of the century are generally characterized by their low pitch, a few French examples at A↑1 exist. Haynes reports the mention of a ton d'écurie (pitch of the [royal] stable) that might logically pertain to these; however, as he points out, a direct link is lacking. With the rise of French opera came a ton d'opéra, apparently quite stabilized at A↓2—although the first real evidence of its level comes from the 1690s, after Lully's death. Slightly higher was ton de chambre (chamber pitch), the pitch to which ton de chapelle was raised temporarily during Louis XIV's reign (as mentioned above). The difference in pitch between ton d'opéra and ton de chambre was sometimes said to be a semitone. However, extant woodwinds of this early period generally cluster around A↓2 and A↓1½; A↓1 is rare or nonexistent before about 1710. Haynes thus suggests that the level of ton de chambre was, in fact, A↓1½ and that the quartertone separating A↓2 and A↓1½ might well have been perceived as a semitone.
As the new French winds found their way to other countries, they would naturally have brought with them their typical pitches. But the pitches that eventually took root were determined by local conditions. We have seen, for instance, how A↓1½ became the dominant instrumental pitch in England apparently because of a serendipitous ft with established organ pitch. In Germany the first indigenous examples of the new French-style winds are at A↓2 and A↓1½ (as well as a few at A↑1), but soon (probably by about 1700—and thus, apparently, earlier than in France itself) ones were being produced at A↓1, too. The latter standard quickly became the “usual” Kammerton of the eighteenth century, having the advantage of a simple whole-tone relation to A↑1, the prevailing organ standard. A↓2, known variously as Operathon, französischer Thon, and eventually tief Kammerton, hung on for some time despite its less convenient relationship to the organ, probably because of its timbral superiority. A↓1½ might well have been found useful as a variant of both A↓1 and A↓2 in a less stable pitch world than our own (as well as in concerts not tied to any organ pitch). The first indigenous Italian examples of the new winds are at A↓1 and A↑0—the latter a pitch not found in France until well into the eighteenth century. Being, like the earlier mezzo punto and tutto punto, a semitone apart, these woodwind pitches would have been similarly compatible with a wide range of organ standards.
TRANSPOSITION
It should be clear by now that pitch and transposition are inseparable aspects—the yin and yang, as it were—of a single issue: to transpose is what you have someone do when you dislike the pitch! The mechanics of transposition are obviously the concern of the instrumentalist, even though the singer may have a greater stake in the result. The sixteenth century saw a radical change in the concept of instrumental pitch itself, for organ pitch—usually within one or two semitones of our own, as we have seen—became increasingly the standard by which the nominal pitches of instruments were measured. Gone by the early seventeenth century are most of the wildly disparate pitch standards (high by a fifth or more for shawms and rebecs; often low by a fourth or so for viols) implicit in treatises a century earlier.46 Nevertheless, transposition for the sake of vocalists was still very much the norm, but the practice began to be phased out as the century progressed. The reason for this trend seems to be the changing nature of instrumental participation in vocal works. It is one thing to expect instrumentalists to transpose when doubling or substituting for vocal parts of limited range and technical difficulty; it is quite another when their parts are conceived with the specific capabilities and limitations of instruments in mind. In fact, transposition of concertato instrumental parts was comparatively rare. Most instructions regarding transposition—as found in both treatises and performance materials—concern the organist, who was often the sole instrumental participant.
The primary considerations were cleffing and mode.47 The great majority of vocal polyphony of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries was written using only two combinations of clefs, one the “high clefs” (treble, mezzo-soprano, alto, and baritone clefs—G2, C2, C3, and F3) and the other the “low clefs” (soprano, alto, tenor, and bass clefs—C1, C3, C4, and F4).48 (Since the bass part in each case can have a larger range than the other parts, it is sometimes represented by a higher clef, i.e., tenor clef—C4—in the high set, or baritone clef—F3—in the low one.) In the eighteenth century, long after the distinction had gone out of fashion, the high clefs were dubbed the chiavette (lit. “little clefs” in Italian) by writers who correctly understood that earlier music written in these clefs needed to be transposed downward to fit vocal ranges; the low clefs were then called the chiavi naturali (“natural clefs”). Theorists and composers from the period itself commonly call for transposition downward by either a fourth or a fifth, although other intervals are also mentioned. Among theorists the main holdout seems to be Tomas Morley, who recommends against transposing downward pieces in the “high keys” lest they lose the quality of liveliness that for him is their true nature. But even he implies that such transposition was the common practice.
Controversy has long attended the issue of the chiavette, but perhaps never so intensely as in the current dispute over their implications for parts of Monteverdi's Vespers of 1610. Here three movements—Lauda Jerusalem and the Magnificats à 6 and à 7—are notated in chiavette. About thirty-five years ago, Andrew Parrott began conducting performances of the Vespers in which Lauda Jerusalem and the Magnificat à 7 were transposed down a fourth; about a decade later he published an article49explaining his reasons, pointing not only to the theoretical and practical sources calling for such transposition, but also to the anomalies of range and tessitura that it resolves. For many performers and scholars, his approach has been revelatory, but some have remained unconvinced. Stephen Bonta,50 for instance, has shown that—as mentioned above—transposition of concertato instrumental parts of the type found in the Magnificat à 7 was, to say the least, abnormal.51 On the other hand, the year 1610 is comparatively early in the history of concertato instrumental writing, so that it may be wrongheaded to think here in terms of what eventually became normal practice. In any case, while some may continue to voice objections, transposition of these movements down a fourth remains by far the most reasonable and straightforward solution.52
Another famous Monteverdi work with chiavette issues is his Orfeo (1607). While the question of transposition in the opera has not engendered nearly as much scholarly discussion as in the Vespers, it has nevertheless occasioned some controversy among performers. At issue are two choruses assigned to the Choro di spiriti infernali (choir of infernal spirits) in Acts 3 and 4, along with their associated sinfonias (performed on cornetts and sackbuts). Specifically, the choruses “Nulla impresa” and “È la virtute” have been seen as written in chiavette, thus theoretically requiring downward transposition. What is peculiar about these Underworld choruses is, however, the compactness of the vocal ranges; there are no soprano parts. While the bass parts are indeed written in “high” clefs (F3 for “Nulla impresa” and C4 for “È la virtute”), the highest parts appear in alto (C3) clef. (A third Underworld chorus—“Pietade”—is written entirely in tenor and bass clefs and therefore does not come under discussion for downward transposition.) The argument thus hinges upon what one considers to be the prime marker for transposition: the clef of the top part (G2 generally for pieces in chiavette) or of the bottom (C4 or F3)? Or is the true marker the presence of the complete “spread” of high clefs? The full set of high clefs is, to be sure, present in the sinfonias à 7 that bracket the choruses in question (and which, by logic, need to be played at the same pitch, since the trombones in the sinfonias are to double the voices of the choruses); however, high clefs were not at the time considered to be markers for transposition of instrumental pieces or parts, as Bonta's findings make clear.53
It is important to understand that the particulars concerning transposition in Orfeo are not analogous to those in the Vespers, despite the many parallels that have been observed between the two works; it is not simply a matter of “what's good for the Vespers must be good for Orfeo.” Transposition in Orfeo resolves no anomalies of range as it does in the Vespers. For instance, the written ranges of the cornett parts in the sinfonias à 7 are quite normal (g' to a” ), whereas those in the Magnificat à 7 (up to d”') lie outside the Italian norm for the day. Similarly, transposition of the vocal parts creates at least as many anomalies of range in the downward direction as it removes at the top end.54 There is furthermore no question of derivative composition or parody in Orfeo as there is in the Vespers;55 there is no reason to assume Monteverdi was constrained to notate the opera at anything but its sounding pitch.56 Transposition in Orfeo obviously affects the flow of tonalities among the various sections involved—again, something one does not have to consider in the case of the Vespers, a collection of basically autonomous movements. Transposition down a fifth is probably less disruptive of the tonal cohesion than is transposition down a fourth; however, it can certainly be argued that the tonal plan as it appears on the page makes the most sense of all.57 Transposition also obviously affects overall timbre; this is a particularly critical issue with the choruses and sinfonias in question, because of their compact nature and especially their doubled bass parts. Taking them down imparts a heaviness and “muddiness” to both the voices and instruments that is not evident in performances at written pitch. This last consideration is clearly one of taste; one person's “muddy texture” may be another's “wonderfully thick and somber quality, appropriate to a portrayal of the Underworld.” The attempt in this short discussion is not to prove absolutely that transposition was not expected in Orfeo, but it is to urge skepticism regarding the idea that such transposition was “commanded” by the notation, as well as to suggest one take into account all the ramifications if one does choose to transpose.
A fourth is probably the only practical interval for transposition of the Magnificat à 7, given the virtuoso nature of some of the obbligati; however, transposition by other intervals was still commonly expected of instrumentalists in the early seventeenth century. Aurelio Virgiliano,58 for example, provides charts for both viols and cornett–sackbut ensemble detailing transpositions over the range of an octave, from a second above written pitch to a seventh below. In both charts, playing a tone up, at pitch, a tone down, and a third down is associated with music in the low clefs, while playing down a fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh is associated with the high clefs. The exact interval might depend on various factors: the particular ranges of the parts (determined primarily by mode), the skill of instrumentalists in coping with additional sharps or fats occasioned by the transposition, and the temperament of keyboard instruments (which may demand retuning or leaving out certain notes in more remote keys). Praetorius, as we have seen, mentions transposing down by both a second and a minor third; the latter may turn out to be the more propitious interval for certain modes when one is dealing with the restrictions of a normal meantone tempered keyboard. For instance, his examples of downward transposition by minor third (ionian on F transposed to D; dorian on G transposed to E) are clearly preferable to transpositions down a tone; the latter would require 
—notes usually unavailable on a keyboard without split keys. (Dorian transposed to E would require 
—similarly unavailable—as ficta, but the lack of a leading tone can be better dealt with than the lack of a basic scale degree.) Non-keyboard instruments are, of course, less restricted in this regard; nevertheless, it is interesting to note Virgiliano's annotation of the transposition down a tone for viols as scommodissimo—“most uncomfortable” (and that up a tone as commodissimo—“most comfortable”).
In Syntagma II, Praetorius speaks of various transpositions associated specifically with woodwinds. The members of woodwind families were separated by fifths (except at the “outer edges” of some sets). He mentions one advantage of this arrangement: a quartet may be made up of any three adjacent sizes, doubling the middle member for alto and tenor parts; just by sliding down a size, as it were, a group could effect a transposition and produce a completely different timbre at the lower pitch. When a fourth size is mixed in, however, he suggests transposing either up a tone or down a fourth, as appropriate, in order to accommodate the bias of the higher instruments toward sharps. The real disadvantage of the system, however, comes when one combines instruments of five sizes, since the tonalities of the outer instruments are then separated by a major third, causing severe tuning difficulties. Thus, he suggests, makers should produce alternate versions of the upper members, built a tone lower; we see the beginnings of this practice in the discant recorder in c” he lists as an alternative to the one in d”, but it was later carried out in full in the “C and F” alignment of Baroque woodwind families. In Syntagma III, among suggestions for instrumentation of motets and other concerted pieces,59 Praetorius offers further recommendations for instrumental transposition. Many of these involve shifting the pitch down a fourth or fifth, making full use of the largest sizes of sackbuts, curtals, shawms, crumhorns, and viols then available. However, he reiterates his warning from Syntagma II60 against going too far in this quest for deep sonorities: some of the newly developed sub-bass instruments would allow transposition down a whole octave, but he has found that this produces an unpleasant throbbing sound from close intervals at such a low pitch. Better, he says, to stick with transpositions of only a fourth or fifth (or, in the case of the viols, to play the upper parts at pitch and put only the bass line down an octave).
PRACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS
Doubtless many readers will find all this information daunting in its implications for modern performance of seventeenth-century music, especially considering that the two pitches now most in vogue—a' = 440 for Renaissance-style instruments, a' = 415 for Baroque—appear to have been rare or, in some countries, nonexistent at the time. We need, however, to keep the question of pitch standard in perspective: important as it is, it is not the only—and certainly not the primary—consideration of a good performance. To be sure, the appropriate use of instruments at the now unusual pitches of A↑1, A↓2, and A↓1½ should be encouraged, particularly among specialist performers. But many of the latter may find overriding practical reasons (as outlined at the outset of this discussion) for sticking with their accustomed equipment, at least for some performances. As in the past, the final performance pitch may be the result of a compromise among various conflicting needs. The most important lesson we may learn from consulting early writers may not always be the exact solutions they found, but instead the process by which these solutions were arrived at; we need to carry the same intelligence to finding our own answers. Above all, we must understand that no pitch standard is an end in itself, but rather the means to an end. It is silly, for instance, to try to replicate a particular historical pitch in the absence of the right equipment. For wind players, this would seem to go without saying, but it is an idea often not understood by string players. Among many modern players of the viol, for instance, playing at a' = 415 has become de rigueur; few are aware that the sizes of modern viols have been chosen with modern pitch in mind, and even fewer are using instruments of the dimensions of typical seventeenth-century consort viols.61 Playing at low pitch on the smaller instruments demands the use of anachronistic methods of stringing. By the same token, it is a misplaced priority to affect historical levels of vocal pitch without making use of historical types of voices. If we are really interested in getting it right, we have to go all the way!
NOTES
1. In this country, at least; it was instituted in Europe a few years earlier.
2. Haynes, Pitch Standards.
3. Haynes, History. This book represents a thorough reworking of the material in the dissertation, its organization now reflecting major chronological rather than geographical divisions. It also incorporates a few changes in Haynes's thinking, the most significant of which concern the level of pre-Restoration English organs and English “quire pitch” (discussed below).
4. This A-based system replaces the C-based system used by Haynes in his dissertation (as well as in the 1997 version of this article).
5. Praetorius, Syntagma II: 14–18; Praetorius/Crookes: 30–33.
6. Praetorius, Syntagma II: 14; for a different translation see Praetorius/Crookes: 31.
7. Praetorius, Syntagma II: 231–232; not available in Crookes or Blumenfeld.
8. See Myers, “Praetorius's Pitch: Some Revelations”; see also Myers, “Observations”: 370, and Praetorius, Syntagma II: 232.
9. For a review of the evidence and the controversy over its interpretations, see Haynes, History, 76–82. Continuing the discussion of Praetorius's pitch standard are the following letters to the editor of the Galpin Society Journal (published after the appearance of Haynes's book): from Herbert W. Myers (55 [2002]: 392–403); from Denzil Wraight (55[2002]: 403–405); from Haynes (55 [2002]: 405–407); from Ephraim Segerman (56 [2003]: 241–246); and from John Koster (57 [2004]: 252).
10. See Koster, “Pfeifflin.”
11. One researcher, Ephraim Segerman, has, however, remained unconvinced of Koster's findings and thus committed to the earlier estimate of Praetorius's reference pitch (a' = 430 ± 5 Hz) in spite of its disagreement with the preponderance of other evidence. Segerman has maintained that the discrepancy between the pipe data and the pitch of surviving sackbuts is to be resolved by assuming that Praetorius's trombonists employed a different technique from the modern one and that his players constantly lipped down a semitone from the resonances of the instrument—something that practicing sackbut players, however, have found to be neither feasible nor sensible.
12. One writer, Nicholas Mitchell, has challenged Praetorius's assertions regarding the pitch of his day; see Mitchell, “Choral and Instrumental Pitch.” Mitchell is content to dismiss Praetorius in part because he finds him confusing, assuming that he is therefore confused as well. He has found the implications of Praetorius's statements, particularly those regarding low pitch standards for voices, inconvenient for a modern mixed choir; however, it is clear that Praetorius had a very different type of choir in mind, in which the alto parts were sung by high tenors singing in “real voice” (that is to say, they were not falsettists, let alone female altos). In rebuttal to Mitchell's article is Myers, “Praetorius's Pitch Standard”: 259–267; continuing the discussion are Mitchell, “Pitch in Viols and Harpsichords,” and Myers, “To the Editor.”
13. It is presumably unawareness of the differing northern and southern meanings of the term Chorton that has misled some scholars into placing Cornettenton a whole tone too high (i.e., A↑3 instead of A↑1), since south German and Austrian sources place Cornettenton a whole tone above Chorton; for example, see Stradner, “Cornetts and Trombones.”
14. Praetorius, Syntagma II: 41; Praetorius/Crookes: 50.
15. He specifically refers to buying sets of recorders (like those he illustrates) from Venice; the majority of surviving examples are at A↑1, though not always at the nominal pitches he specifies. (Among them, for example, are numerous c-basses, g-bassets, and d'-tenors, sizes he does not mention. However, Adrian Brown accounts for these sizes as members of sets built to a standard a tone higher, or A↑3; see Brown, “Overview.”) A much smaller number are compatible with A↑0. Reed instruments, though somewhat less reliable witnesses, generally reflect pitches of A↑1 or higher, with few (or none) at A↑0.
16. See (in addition to Haynes, Pitch Standards, and Haynes, History) Haynes, “Cornetts.”
17. See Haynes, “Cornetts”: 90–91, as well as Cesari and Pannain, La musica: xvi–xvii.
18. See Dixon, “Vespers”: 386–389. However, Roger Bowers has recently shown that Monteverdi's duties as composer and performer would not have involved his participation in the services at Santa Barbara, whose liturgy and administration were separate and exclusive; see Bowers, “Claudio”: 346–350.
19. The organ (built by Graziadio Antegnati in 1565) has recently been restored to its original pitch, A↑1 (or mezzo punto); see Haynes, History: 73. Fenlon, “Mantua”: 104, 188, cites archival evidence that appeared to link the instrument to the pitch of tutto punto; however, it seems that the critical phrase ha fornito l'organo di tutto punto means merely “has furnished the complete organ” (since the expression di tutto punto is still used in modern Italian to mean “completely, thoroughly” and presumably carried that meaning at the time). But the evidence regarding the Cremona organ refers unequivocally to pitch.
20. Only one source mentions a still lower pitch: Doni (Annotazioni, 180–182) claims that the pitch of Naples was yet a semitone below that of Rome, an assertion not supported by surviving Neapolitan organs of Doni's era.
21. Ibid.
22. Haynes, Pitch Standards: 73.
23. Barcotto, Regola; trans. and comm. in Picerno, Organ Yearbook 16: 47–70 (specifically chapter 16, p. 65 of trans.).
24. See R. Weber, “Some Researches”: 8, and A. Smith, “Renaissancequerflöte”: 26. Having noticed the low pitch of several of the surviving examples, some authors and cataloguers have taken to stating their playing pitches in terms of lower nominal pitches (i.e., “mute cornett in [six fingers] g at a' = 466,” instead of “…in a at a' = 415”). However, there is little evidence that the treble cornett, ordinary or mute, was ever conceptually in anything but a during the period, or that the tenor flute was conceptually other than in d' (afer the early sixteenth century). Compounding the confusion, some have decided to give nominal pitches in terms of a putative seven-fingered note, even though that note is lacking on flutes and most cornetts! One has to be careful in interpreting such reports; see Myers, “Consort”: 45.
25. Praetorius's gedact Chorist-Fagott (plate 10, no. 4) is significantly longer in bore than his offen Chorist-Fagott (no. 3), suggesting that there may be the difference of a tone between them. Of surviving examples, only two (both often and both in Vienna, nos. C200 and A194 in the Kunsthistorisches Museum) would appear from their dimensions to be at low pitch. (See Myers, “Praetorius's Pitch”: n. 38.)
26. Surviving examples range from A↓2 to A↑2, with well over half of them falling between a' = 430 and 450. (This analysis differs just slightly from that of Haynes, who bases his on Tarr, “Katalog”; missing from Tarr's list are cornetts in Leipzig, which include four mute cornetts, two at A↑0 and two at A↓2, that were once in the sixteenth-century instrumentarium of the Hofkapelle at Kassel. See Heyde, “Hörner”: 51–55, who curiously ascribes them to Bavarian workmanship despite brand marks generally accepted as belonging to members of the Bassano family of Venice.) These statistics thus do not support Weber's claim (Weber, “Some Researches”) that “with few exceptions, [mute cornetts] stand a whole-tone lower than the ‘normal’ curved cornetts.”
27. They range from A↓3 to A↑1, with the largest cluster at a' = 410 (on the low side of A↓1) and a somewhat smaller one at a' = 430 (on the low side of A↑0). This assessment, by Haynes, is based on Puglisi, “Survey”; Haynes, however, has attempted to compensate for wood shrinkage, making his frequencies just a little lower than Puglisi's. See also Berney, “Re-examination”; Myers/Berney/Brown, “Case Study”; Allain-Dupré, “Renaissance”; Myers, “Renaissance”; Allain-Dupré, “Proportions”; and Berney, “Renaissance Flute,” for further discussion of the pitches of Renaissance flutes and their relationship to other winds of the period.
28. See Myers, “Renaissance and Early Baroque Flutes”: 238–239, and Berney, “Renaissance Flute,” concerning this point.
29. As pointed out by Bruce Dickey in private correspondence with Bruce Haynes, there are compositions calling for both mute and ordinary cornetts together (and thus suggesting an equality of pitch standard). See Haynes, “Cornetts”: n. 55 (p. 100).
30. Buxtehude's organs at St. Mary's in Lübeck, for instance, were at about a' = 487 (Haynes, History: 142); it was described in the eighteenth century as being in hoch Chorton. That its pitch was exceptional is suggested by Buxtehude's purchases of various winds (and a special bocal for the great-bass shawm) “adjusted to the pitch of this organ.” (See Snyder, “Buxtehude”: 373–375, 1st ed., and 377–378, 2nd ed.; 466 and 468 are not in 1st ed. Snyder mistranslates “Es oder Rohr” as “reed” [375, 1st ed; 378, 2nd ed.]) Despite its high level, everyone seems to have been playing at the same pitch; there are no indications of transposition.
31. Barcotto, Regola; Haynes, History: 61.
32. Barcotto, Regola; Haynes, History: 67.
33. Note that this system of notation (as used in Haynes, History) differs from that used in Haynes, Pitch Standards, which was also employed in the 1997 version of this article.
34. See Parrott, “Grett and Solompne” for a number of records documenting the participation of cornetts and sackbuts with voices and organs in English liturgical services.
35. For the organist playing the traditional “transposing” organ at Q↓0, simple transpositions of a fourth or fifth were involved (down a fourth when using the five-foot register; up a fifth when using the ten-foot). Playing at Q↓1, however, would involve transposition at the tritone, unthinkable, certainly, on an organ in meantone temperament. Equally unthinkable, it would seem, would be for the winds to transpose up a semitone. An interesting example of a solution to a problem of this kind concerns the famous pair of cornetts preserved in the Library of Christ Church, Oxford. These instruments were purchased for the choir of Christ Church in anticipation of a visit of James I in 1605. They are furnished with removable silver mounts at the top end; without the mounts they play at just above modern pitch, and with the mounts, just below. If we ignore the transposing keyboard, the pitch of the Christ Church organ at that period seems to have been about a' = 484 (on the low side of A↑2, but still significantly higher than Q↓0); the cornetts (tuned on the low side of A↑1) could thus have transposed by a tone to meet the organ and choir. (See Haynes, History: 91.) However, to bring cornetts built to play at Q↓1 all the way down to Q↓2 (so that they could make a whole-tone transposition in matching the pitch of a choir at Q↓0) would not be practical; perhaps some of the organs known to have played with the Q↓1 winds were, like the Christ Church organ, built to higher pitches than normal. (See the following note.)
36. A significant case in point is the organ of the Chapel Royal at Whitehall. Built in about 1662, it was employed in the performance of “symphony anthems” in the 1670s and 1680s. These at first involved the older-style instruments (cornetts, sackbuts, and violins, probably at Q↓1) but later used the newer, French-style woodwinds (almost certainly at Q↓3). At some point before 1676, the organ was lowered a semitone; while direct evidence of the exact pitches is lacking (the instrument having been destroyed in 1698), it seems logical to assume the change was to Q↓0 (a pitch compatible with the new winds), and that the original pitch had been Q↑1 (a pitch compatible with the older winds but incompatible with the new ones). It is of interest to note that Purcell's notation of vocal ranges went through a transformation about 1690, rising “on paper” significantly at that point; it would seem that the earlier, lower notation reflected the high pitch of the organs involved, and, conversely, that the later, higher notation reflected the low pitch of the new French-style winds. (See Haynes, History: 130–132.) This change in notational practice thus parallels that of J. S. Bach a few years later, as he went from notating his vocal parts in terms of Chorton (A↑1) in his early works to notating them in terms of Kammerton (A↓1) once he moved to Leipzig.
37. By James Talbot, writing ca. 1695.
38. There is little evidence if any to support the use of A↓2 (the French ton d'opéra, about a quartertone below Q↓3) in England.
39. Haynes's main evidence for projecting Q↓3 backward as the level for earlier seventeenth-century “consort pitch” is the continuity of terminology and probable continuity of viol-playing practice. As he points out, Q↓3 is only a quartertone above a' = 392, the upper limit of Ephraim Segerman's estimate (based on the putative breaking tension of gut) of English viol pitch. (See Haynes, Pitch Standards: 340–342; Segerman, English Viol: 57; and Segerman, English Pitch: 14.)
40. Mersenne's confusion (or at least inconsistency) about pitch can be seen in his conflicting information regarding the level of ton de chapelle. In his discussion of organs (Harmonie universelle, vol. 3, book 6: 325; 409 of trans.), he equates ton de chapelle with the pitch of an eight-foot open pipe; it is clear from the rest of his discussion that such a pipe was normally connected with the bottom C-key of the manual, just as we would expect. However, elsewhere (vol. 1, book 3: 169) he speaks of a four-foot open pipe, which would, of course, sound at the octave of the eight-foot pipe, faisant le G re sol (“producing G” [not c!]) at ton de chapelle. In yet another place (vol. 3, book 3: 143; 195 of trans.) he says that “those who sing the bass in a chamber” do not ordinarily go lower than a four-foot open pipe, making this the effective sounding pitch of a written F (the lowest note of the piece he is discussing). Taken at face value, these last two statements imply a ton de chapelle about a minor third above modern pitch and possibly a chamber pitch a tone above that (although he does not go so far as to call it ton de chambre); they have been so interpreted by some, even though the implied pitch levels make little sense given what we know about voices, not to mention what we know from other sources.
41. He says (Harmonie universelle, vol. 3, book 5: 243; 312 of trans.) that flutes are placed at ton de chapelle for playing concerts; however, his exemplary flute was apparently at A↑0 rather than A↓2; see “Woodwinds,” this guide, for a discussion of Mersenne's woodwind pitches.
42. Harmonie universelle: 274; 343 of trans.
43. Ibid.: 273; 344 of trans.
44. Ibid.: 277; 347 of trans.
45. In transmitting the musical example, the translation omits the references to fingering.
46. See Myers, “Pitch and Transposition”: 296–298 (2nd ed.). Although Praetorius was apparently the first to make organ pitch his explicit point of reference for all instrument pitches, almost a decade earlier Adriano Banchieri had given the tunings of gut-strung instruments in terms of keyboard (“organ or harpsichord”) pitches in his Conclusioni: 52–55). Banchieri's repetitious insistence about his point of reference should perhaps serve as a reminder that it was not yet universal and that there were still other ways of reckoning pitches. A case in point is the set of viol tunings given in Cerreto, Prattica musica; these so-called high tunings, like those of the previous century, probably represent nominal pitches at a very low pitch standard (rather than what we, or Praetorius, would consider actual sounding pitches). See Myers, “Sizes”: 6–17, and Myers, “Renaissance Viol Tunings,” for a discussion of nominal vs. actual pitches of early viols.
47. See A. Smith, “Modus,” for an examination of this issue as discussed by early theorists. Although the article is in German, the detailed charts at the end (p. 28ff.) are perfectly understandable by anyone willing to look up a few key words.
48. See Johnstone, “High,” for an examination of the origins of the use of these clef combinations. Some have objected to the term “low clefs” for the C1, C3, C4, and F4 set, fearing confusion with the far more rare “low chiavette” (combinations involving clefs from mezzo-soprano through sub-bass, C2 through F5). They have preferred the term “normal clefs,” using “normal” not in the statistical sense but rather in the sense that these clefs correspond to the natural, “normal” ranges of SATB voices. However, the terms “high clefs” and “low clefs” for the two sets most commonly encountered are the ones now used by most writers on the subject.
49. Parrott, “Transposition.”
50. Bonta, “Clef.”
51. Parrott's answer to this and other objections to his performance solutions is to be found in Parrott, “Getting It Right.” R. Bowers, “Aberration,” questions the interval of downward transposition, suggesting a tone rather than a fourth; Parrott, “Monteverdi,” defends once more the interval of a fourth as the only plausible and practical one.
52. What is often forgotten in such discussions is the derivative aspect of some of Monteverdi's writing in the Vespers. It is accepted by most scholars, for instance, that the Magnificat à 7 is based on the one à 6, in which the only instrumental complement is the continuo organ. According to time-honored tradition, a parody remains at the notated pitch of the original; thus the notated pitch of the additional obbligato instruments of the Magnificat à 7 results from a decision made long before their conception. (See Parrott, “Transposition”: 510–511, concerning this point.) By the same token, the few lowest notes of the cornett III part, sounding below the normal range of the treble cornett in the transposed version and thus regarded by some as a stumbling block for the whole transposition theory, are found in a colla parte doubling of a vocal line (in the final Amen). The instrument was probably assigned to the part as an aferthought, so that a few stray ill-ftting notes are not really all that relevant to the question of transposition. More significantly, the (transposed) obbligato parts written for cornett are well within the range of the treble in a.
53. Besides Bonta, “Clef,” see Bonta, “Use.”
54. The aggregate range of the bass parts for the Choro di Ninfe e Pastore (choir of nymphs and shepherds) in Acts 1 and 2 is F to d' (with one lone E); the aggregate range of the bass parts of “Nulla impresa” and “È la virtute” is A to d', with one G and two e's. Putting the latter parts down a fifth, the usual choice of those seeing the need to transpose, produces low Ds and one C. Transposition thus subtracts a tone at the top but adds a third at the bottom. This analysis ignores tessitura, of course, as well as the ranges of inner parts; paying attention to these aspects might admittedly change the picture somewhat.
55. See note 52.
56. There are, however, two mentions of transposition in the score of Orfeo, both involving performing the written notes up a step: the opening Toccata is to be performed up a tone because of the transposing effect of mutes on trumpet pitch, and one short comment assigned to Un spirito del cor (one of the spirits of the [Infernal] choir, p. 76 of the original score) is marked Un tono più alto (one tone higher). (The latter, somewhat mysterious directive may have been occasioned by some pitch discrepancy in the accompanying continuo instruments.) Given that Monteverdi went to the trouble to specify these two transpositions, it would seem strange that he failed to mention the need for transposition of the Infernal choruses and sinfonias (let alone the interval intended) if indeed such transposition is what he had in mind.
57. See Chafe, Monteverdi's: ch. 7 (“The Tonal Plan of Orfeo”).
58. Virgiliano, Il Dolcimelo.
59. Praetorius, Syntagma III: ch. 7, 152–168; Praetorius/Kite-Powell, Syntagma III: 156–171.
60. Praetorius, Syntagma II: 46; Praetorius/Crookes, Syntagma II: 54, concerning viols.
61. See Segerman, “English Viols,” and Myers, “Sizes”: 6–17.