CJ Replay: Use of French Latin

Comments

1. Philip Barnes says

   October 11, 2012 at 1:59 pm

   The sound of Latin is inherently important to the appreciation of a composition, provided that the composer was fully aware of the language’s quantities. The alignment of ‘s’ and ‘ci’ is Byrd’s Gradualia is a case in point; different lines in the polyphonic texture may intersect on a consonant that is to be sounded as ‘s’ – to sing ‘chi’ (as in ‘civitas’) or ‘tsi’ (as in ‘salvatio’) against a simple ‘s’ (as in ‘salvator’) is to create a clash of consonants where, in Tudor Latin, one would not have existed.

    

   An excellent resource on such issues is to be found in “Singing in Latin” by Harold Copeman (ISBN 0.9515798.78), published in the UK. In “Performance Practice Review, Vol. 5 [1992], No. 1, Art. 3” Douglas Leedy wrote a thorough and informative review of the work, and I recommend reading it before tracking down a copy of Copeman’s work. Here is the URL:

   http://scholarship.claremont.edu/ppr/vol5/iss1/3

    

   Being informed about the various pronunciations of Latin extends far beyond the Renaissance. I am currently rehearsing Darius Milhaud’s “Cantate de la Guerre,” and thanks to Copeman’s work (and corroborating recorded performances by French choirs) I have been able to avoid a vowel clash between the French noun ‘peuple’ and the Latin adverb ‘Nunc’, which the composer has different voices in the choir sing simultaneously. This, in turn, helps avoid issues of poor intonation, which are often caused by dissonant vowels.

   Had I relied on my own understanding – as a Latin teacher – of the pronunciation of ‘Nunc’, I would have been wrong.

    

   In short, it’s worth knowing something about the various pronunciations of Latin, and Copeman’s book is an excellent resource.

    

   Philip Barnes

   (St. Louis (MO)

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2. Ronald Richard Duquette says

   October 11, 2012 at 6:28 am

   Very interesting article, especially for someone such as myself of French descent, speaking French (admittedly heavily French-Canadian-influenced pronunciation) who was raised in New England with an admittedly Americanized-faithful-to-Rome pronunciation of Latin.  (The latter part of that sentence is ironic, given that in so many other ways the American branch of the Roman Church is so idiosyncratic – and there’s no room for theological or doctrinal or cultural issues here).  The article is useful if:  authentic presentation of a choral work in Latin in a concert setting – which is entirely defensible as an approach – and one has sufficient time to “unsnarl” standardized (Italianate) Latin pronunciation matters out of a choir’s head AND one is sufficiently proficient to correctly lead those changes.  Those are, however, formidable challenges – I’m a native French speaker, and in going over the text of the “Gloria” from the Mass, I could make some changes relatively easily (it would take repetition to make them semi-permanent and “automatic”), but there were others, especially syllabization, which just didn’t come easily and frankly didn’t make a great deal of sense.  There are, in my view, two other challenges, not unrelated to each other.

    

   The first of these is consistency in a performance of several pieces of French music in Latin, AND, if one is presenting music from the Franco-Flemish as opposed to the French traditions, making sure your choir makes a sufficient AND consistent distinction between the two.  (The author’s article suggests even further gradations, which would, in my view, massively complicate the matter – if one is sufficiently scholarly to identify the composer as being from Normandy, or Provence – yet a whole ‘nuther issue for differences of pronunciation historically between the langue d’oc and the langue d’oil – southern v. northern pronunciations of French – does one then make adjustments to replicate the particularly regionalisms which would have differentiated a composition in Latin by a composer living in Rouen as opposed to one who lived in Marseilles?  That also begs the question that in France from roughly 1600 – the reign of Henry IV – through the end of the reign of Louis XIV – 1715 – the centralizing tendency, administratively and culturally, in French history towards Paris and its way of doing things, accelerated in that 115-year period.  Which makes the question of which variant of French Latin of the XVIIth century one chooses to sing – the regional (if the composer lived well outside Paris) or the “standard” (AHA!) French Latin pronunciation germane – or does it really?)

    

   The second consideration is for the church choir director who has in front of him, say, a short motet by Michel-Richard deLalande (a contemporary of Lully) for his (mostly) volunteer choir.  This is a piece of music that will be used WITHIN THE CONTEXT of the Sunday Mass.  Most of these good folks, not at all scholarly in their approach to the music, have become accustomed (mostly!) to modern “standardized” Latin pronunciation – and you still need to tighten the matter up periodically.  Does one then attempt to be “faithful” to an historic 17th-century pronunciation which would require, optimistically, several if not many hours to replicate accurately and consistently, or does one simply swallow one’s cultural pride and do it as Rome would approve?  I have tended to follow Rome here, and from a practical viewpoint I think most church choir directors (of anything other than a school-driven choral group serving at sacred liturgies of the Roman Rite) will tend to the same.  This also has to do with my admittedly personal view that at Mass, we are “presenting” the music, as opposed to “performing” it.  There are some within the ChoralNet community who disagree with that distinction or would argue that both occur.  Perhaps; but again it’s a question of emphasis and approach.  If we see the singing of a particular piece of music as “performance,” then an argument could be legitimately made to spend the time and effort to accommodate regional distinctions in a “universal” language of the Universal Church – which raises some interesting theological-cultural issues of itself.  On the other hand, if “presentation” is the basis of the approach, then one is not so much concerned with historical accuracy as in accurate presentation (!) of the theology and/or doctrine that the text provides – yes, even in a language which is not generally understood by most modern Americans (or French or Germans, for that matter).  Now, I don’t say that as an excuse to “slop over” pronunciation – one must be artistically faithful to textual as well as to notational issues.

    

   And so, how do others see this?  I’d like, for one, to hear what the community’s reactions are to both article and practical considerations.

    

   Ron

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