This presentation is part 2 of our series on ornaments. Part 1 was an overview of the Essential Graces you can watch the video here. To read about part 1, click here. For this presentation on diminutions, you can read ahead. The video can be found here.
Diminutions: Adding More Wiggles
“Almost every person who applies himself to the art of music, especially outside France, is not content to play solely the essential grace notes; in the main they wish also to follow their own taste, and seek to perform the melody with different arbitrary variations or extempore embellishments.” (Quantz, pg. 136)
A Word of Caution…
Like the essential graces, this is an enormous topic. Today we are restricting ourselves to the late 17th through the mid-18th centuries. We are also looking at mostly Italian music. Many of the principles discussed today can be applied to dance/consort music of the 16th century (and earlier), and can be applied to German music and other national-styles.
What is Ornamentation?
The Harvard Music Dictionary defines ornamentation as: “the modification of music, usually but not always through the additions of notes, to make it more beautiful or effective, or to demonstrate the abilities of the interpreter.”
There are 3 types of ornamentation talked about by Hotteterre, Quantz and others:
1. Essential Graces
These include trills, mordents, turns, and rhythmic alterations.
2. Diminutions
This class involves taking a couple of notes and breaking them down into smaller note values and elaborating.
3. The elaborations of pauses such as cadenzas
This class is more improvisatory in nature.
Last time at the Chapter Meeting…
1. Last time we talked about the essential graces. These were ornaments that used a symbol to instruct the player in what to do and when.
2. When adding ornamentation to a slow movement beginning by adding a few essential graces, such as trills and appogiaturas, is a great place to start.
3. In the first half of the 18th century some composers/national styles (France) used essential graces more than others (Everybody else).
Some of the oldest rules on ornamenting…(from Jerome of Moravia, 13th century)
1. Ornaments should not be used on any note smaller than a semibreve, (aka whole note)!
In a more modern interpretation the 13th century semibreve is probably the equivalent of a quarter note in 4/4 time.
2. Ornaments are to be place on the unaltered notes of the mode. In modern terms, you ornament the notes that belong to the scale or harmony and not other ornamental notes!
3. “Long trills” are to be placed on the penultimate note before a cadence. (We already knew that.)
4. An appogiatura is permitted at the beginning of all ornaments.
What Ganassi (16th century) has to say about Diminutions/ornamenting…
1. “Having introduced you to the rudiments of the art of divisions, it now depends on your intelligence and your dexterity to apply and put in practice what you have learned.” (Ganassi, pg. 85)
2. “Each division must begin and end on the same note as the unornamented ground.” But there are exceptions.
2. His examples are based on melodic intervals.
3. The examples for each interval begin simply and progress to more florid creations.
4. Ganassi is dealing with different time signatures and notation practices from those of today. He suggests that any of his melodic divisions can be rhythmically altered to fit into whatever tempus your piece is in.
What Quantz (mid- 18th century) has to Say about Diminutions/ornamenting…
1. “Eager to be counted among the multitude of virtuosi, they too often begin the wrong way round, namely with solo playing, and martyr themselves with many elaborate ornaments and difficult feats for which they are not yet quite ready, obscuring their execution instead of learning to make it distinct.” (Quantz pg. 121) Translation: if you a just starting out, keep it simple.
2. Like Ganassi, Quantz is concerned with showing the student what to do with a given interval.
3. Like Ganassi, Quantz assumes the student knows his/her scales.
4. Unlike Ganassi, Quantz is also concerned with the harmony/bass line under a given set of melodic intervals and instructs the student to study harmony.
5. Like Ganassi, Quantz shows rhythmic variations, however, if you observe closely, his rhythmic variations do not contain many asymmetric figures. (ex. Figures with 7 or 11 notes in it.)
How I practice diminutions/ornamentation...
1. I select a piece/movement I on which I wish to work.
2. I study the key, scales, and harmony.
3. I study the plain melody. I feel very secure in its’ rhythm and I have a good idea of its’ character. Is it “sad”, “happy”, “dramatic”, “tense”, etc? Understanding the character of the melody tells me whether or not I’m going to use a lot of ornaments or just a few.
4. I add my essential graces first. I identify the cadences and put in my appogiatura-trill-resolution. I identify places for mordents, and turns.
5. Finally I grab my trusty examples and experiment to see what works and what doesn’t work.
6. I will make several versions of ornaments for a given movement.
7. I engage in this exercise often.
8. I WRITE EVERYTHING DOWN! Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t write things down or that you can’t spend time thinking about your ornaments. As you practice this skill you will develop a sense of your favorite ornaments and be able to identify where they can be placed on-sight.
9. Practice your decided upon ornaments until they are memorized.
Bibliography:
1. Ganassi, Sylvestro. Opera Intitulata Fontegara. Venice, Italy: 1535.
The English translation of this is now on IMSLP
2. Martharel, Philippe. L'art De Diminuer Aux XVIe Et XVIIe Siecles. Vol. 1, Billaudot.
3. McGee, Timothy J. Medieval Instrumental Dances. No Publisher, 2014.
4. Quantz, Johann Joachim, and Edward R. Reilly. On Playing the Flute. Faber and Faber, 1966.
5. Veilhan, Jean-Claude. The Rules of Musical Interpretation in the Baroque Era: (17th-18th Centuries), Common to All Instruments. A. Leduc, 1979.
Musical Examples for study:
1. Corelli, Arcangelo. 12 Sonatas Op. 5 for Alto Recorder and Basso Continuo. Vol. 2, Heinrichshofen Edition, 1982.
2. Telemann, Georg Philipp, and Max Seiffert. Methodical Sonatas: for Violin or Transverse Flute and Basso Continuo = Methodische Sonaten: für Violine Oder Querflöte Und Basso Continuo. Ba, 1955.
3. Quantz, Johann Joachim, and Edward R. Reilly. On Playing the Flute. Faber and Faber, 1966. CHAPTER 18
