GREGORIAN CDANT By WILL Apelxii GRECORIAN CHANT take illustrations from their publications. For reasons which will become apparent to the reader, I have not reproduced the rhythmic signs which distinguish their books. I am very glad to include in this book two chapters that are closely re- lated to its main topic, and which put many of its aspects and problems into a new perspective: the chapter on Ambrosian chant contributed by Professor Roy H. Jesson, and that on Old-Roman chant written by Mr. Robert J. Snow, both of whom have studied at Indiana University. I hope that the results of their research will be as interesting to the readers as they were to me. No true admirer of Gregorian chant can help looking with dismay at present trends toward providing organ accompaniments for the liturgical melodies. This practice, although ostensibly meant to promote the chant, is actually bound to destroy it. To what extent it has dulled the minds of “those that should hear” became clear to me during a conversation with a group of young seminarists, whom I met in a train several years ago. When I mentioned my interest in Gregorian chant, one of them said, his face radiant with delight, “Oh, Gregorian chant is so wonderful in our church; we have an organist who makes it sound like Debussy.” I know that it does not always sound like that. In another church it may sound more like Vaughan Williams, and elsewhere like parallel organum. Invariably it will sound like “something” other than what it really is and what it should be. Moreover, the very variety of possibilities inherent in this practice is bound to weaken the catholicity of one of the most precious possessions of the Catholic Church. I have no right to voice an opinion in matters pertaining to the Church, but I am saddened to see a venerable tradition, which has been restored to new life after centuries of neglect and indifference, sub- jected once more to destructive practices. WILLI APEL Indiana University January 1958 Bibliography ABBREVIATION A ACI AM AMM Anal. hymn. cs G Gs HAM HDM Ky LR LYM MD MGG Nombre TITLE Antiphonale Sacrosanctae Romanae Ecclesiae ... , Tour nai, 1949 (Desclée, No. 820). Actes du Congrés International de Musique Sacrée, Rome, 1950 (also Atti del Congresso . . .), Tournai, 1952. Antiphonale monasticum pro diurnis horis . .., Tournai, 1934 (Desclée, No. 818). Antiphonale missarum juxta ritum Sanctae Ecclesiae Mediolanensis, Rome, 1935. Analecta hymnica medii aevi, ed. by G. M. Dreves and Clemens Blume, 55 vols., Leipzig, 1886-1922. Coussemaker, Charles Edmond Henri. Scriptorum de musica medii aevi nova series, 4 vols., Paris, 1864-76. Graduale Sacrosanctae Romanae Ecclesiae . .. , Tournai, 1945 (Desclée, No. 696). Gerbert, Martin. Scriptores ecclesiastici de musica, 3 vols., St. Blasien, 1784. Facsimile edition, Milan, 1931. Davison, A. T., and Willi Apel. Historical Anthology of Music, vol. I, Cambridge, 1946. Apel, Willi, Harvard Dictionary of Music, Cambridge, 1945- Kirchenmusikalisches Jahrbuch, Regensburg, 1885-1932; Cologne, 1950- Liber usualis with Introduction and Rubrics in English, Tournai, 1950 (Desclée, No. 801). Liber responsorialis ... juxta ritum monasticum,Solesmes, 1895. Liber vesperalis juxta ritum Sanctae Ecclesiae Mediolan- ensis, Rome, 1939. Musica Disciplina, Rome, 1948- Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, ed. by F. Blume, Kassel, 1949- Mocquereau, Dom André. Le Nombre musical grégorien, 2 vols, Tournai, 1908, 1927. xiiiGREGORIAN CHANT B wilt ApeL INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS BLOOMINGTON & INDIANAPOLIS