Full and Short Scores in The Accompaniment of Italian Church Music in The Early Baroque PDF

Full and Short Scores in the Accompaniment of Italian Church Music in the Early Baroque
Author(s): Imogene Horsley

Source: Journal of the American Musicological Society, Vol. 30, No. 3 (Autumn, 1977), pp.
466-499
Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the American Musicological
Society
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Full and Short Scores in the Accompaniment of
Italian Church Music in the Early Baroque
By IMOGENE HORSLEY
AMONG THE FIRST "pre-continuo" organ parts printed in the la

the sixteenth century, the full and short scores outnumbere
single-line bassi seguenti. In contrast to the basso seguente, whi
lowest notes in the vocal texture, these partiture represented the
who felt that the proper accompaniment of vocal polyphony
doubling of all the parts. This ideal was soundly based upo
tradition, and such accompaniments in score were at first ap
which adhered to this tradition. Such scores, however, were stil
the second decade of the seventeenth century for accompanying
in the new Baroque style, and when the score finally gave w
continuo,' the transformation was not due solely to the change o
The emergence of a new concept of the function of accompanim
all, the development and acceptance of a thoroughly figured
were crucial factors in the final abandonment of the older prac
The main proponents of score accompaniment were the
posers, organists, and maestri di cappella in the cathedrals and m
of Bologna, Brescia, Mantua, Milan, Piacenza, Ravenna, and
northern Italy. That their preference for accompaniment of
from score was not based on stylistic conservatism is shown by
when the madrigals from Monteverdi's revolutionary Quinto lib
gahi2 were brought out as motets with sacred texts, they were g
organ part in place of the original Basso continuo. Furthermore
tolta da i madrigali di Claudio Monteverdi, e d'altri auto
spirituale da Aquilino Coppini, published by Agostino Trada
1607, was so successful as to warrant a second printing in 16
Because little detailed work has been done on the liturg
northern Italy of this period, not one of these organ scores has
1Basso continuo is used here as defined in Franck T. Arnold, The Art o

from a Thorough-Bass (Oxford, i931; repr. New York, I965), p. 9, as bein
composition and, at least in part, independent of the lowest part of the
seguente denotes an exact or simplified line made up of the lowest sounding
The term continuo alone is used in the general sense.
2 Originally published by R. Amadino (Venice, I605).
FULL AND SHORT SCORES IN THE EARLY BAROQUE 467
in facsimile edition, although as early as 191o a number of them were cited

and given brief descriptions by Otto Kinkeldey.3 The only one that is generally
known today is Monteverdi's collection of sacred music printed in I61o,"
which includes the Missa In illo tempore and the famous Vesper service. The
Basso generalis for this collection contains both full and short scores, as well as
bassi continui, but these scores have been often misunderstood because the
book has not been seen in its proper historical context.5
The types of organ scores found in these early liturgical prints fall into
three general categories. The first of these includes partiture that present, in
score, the lowest voices of each of the choirs in a polychoral work. The second
is the full score, in which all the parts are given in open score. The last
category is the short score, of which there are two basic types: the bass-soprano
score, which gives the highest and lowest voices of a composition, and the
three-voice short score, a reduction of six or more voices into three lines. All
three types of score are barred, with text cues under the lowest staves, where
rubrics on performance (such as a due cori) may also be found. Two different
types of score are rarely found in the partitura for a single piece or movement,
but occasionally a bass-soprano score may be used at the beginning of a two-
bass score when one of the choruses has not yet entered. Each of these types has
a separate history, but all of them, along with the single-line basso seguente,
first appeared in print between 1594 and I598.6
Kinkeldey has pointed out that it was on the initiative of two publishing
firms, Giacomo Vincenti of Venice and L'Erede di Simon Tini & Francesco
Besozzo of Milan, that organ partbooks were first added to the sets of vocal
partbooks of liturgical music,' and the context in which such books appear
makes it seem that the types published must have been derived from common
* Orgel und Klavier in der Musik des 16. Jahrhunderts (Leipzig, 1910o), pp. 196 ff.
Claudio Monteverdi, Sanctissimae Virgini, Missa senis vocibus ad ecclesiarum choros, ac
Vespere pluribus decantanda (Venice: R. Amadino, 161o); Tutte le opere di Claudio Mon-
teverdi, ed. G. Francesco Malipiero, Vol. XIV (Asola, 1932).
5 For example, Manfred F. Bukofzer (Music in the Baroque Era [New York, 1947], p. 66)
states that "Monteverdi's vespers contain several noteworthy specimens with a written-out
organ part giving us an authentic picture of the modest continuo practice of the early baroque
period." These, however, are full or short scores-the very opposite of continuo practice, which
avoids doubling the parts.
6 Kinkeldey (Orgel und Klavier, p. 194, fn. 2) suggests that Placidio Falconio, Introitus et
alleluia per omnes festivitates totius anni cum quinque vocibus (Venice, I575) is a full score,
and this work is also listed in Howard M. Brown, Instrumental Music Printed Before 16oo
(Cambridge, 1965), p. 439, as having a basso continuo. It is, in fact, a printed choirbook in folio
size. Scores such as Tutti madrigali di Cipriano de Rore a 4 voci spartite et accommodati per
sonar d'ogni sorte d'instrumento perfetto & per qualunque studioso di contrapunti (Venice,
1577) and those full-score versions of choruses and instrumental pieces found in published
scores of early seventeenth-century operas are not included in this study, which is concerned
only with those scores printed as one of a set of partbooks clearly intended for accompaniment.
' Kinkeldey, Orgel und Klavier, p. 196.
468 JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MUSICOLOGICAL SOCIETY
usage. The first such publication brought out in 1594 by Vincenti, was
Giovanni Croce's Motetti a otto voci, of which only the Spartidura is extant
today." This Spartidura belongs to the first category of score listed above: it
consists of two lines, barred in score, which are the bassi seguenti of the two
four-part choruses for which the motets were written. The second publication,
also from Vincenti, came out in 1 595: Adriano Banchieri, Concerti ecclesias-
tici a otto voci. The Spartitura per sonare nell'organo9 included in this edition
is a short score in bass-soprano format for the accompaniment of the first
chorus. Vincenti's third publication in this genre, Giovanni Croce's Messe a
otto voci (1596), is another example of the use of two basses in score.
It is clear that Vincenti brought out these organ scores not only to fill a
basic need of the organists, but also to provide for himself, in the process, a
commercial success. Vincenti annotates the table of contents of his first Spar-
tidura, advising the reader to look to him for publications designed to ease the
organist's labors by giving him ready-made passaggi, intavolature, and parti-
dure and adding that if these were accepted he would publish more of them."'
Vincenti was indeed one of the publishers most concerned about these
three areas of performance. In 1591, he brought out Giovanni Bassanno's
Motetti, madrigali et canzone francese di diversi eccell. autori ... diminuiti
per sonar con ogni sorte de stromenti et anco per cantar con semplici voci and
the Intermedii et concertifatti per la commedia rappresentata in Firenze nelle
nozze de Serenissimo Don Fernando Medici & Madama Christiana di
Loreno-both using the new styles of ornamentation. In 1594, the same
that he published the first two-bass partitura for Croce's Motetti a otto v
Vincenti also printed, at the request of the Milanese firm L'Erede di Franc
& Simon Tini," Giovanni Battista Bovicelli's Regole, passaggi di musi
madrigali et motetti passeggiati, which gave detailed instructions for the
of ornamented singing then in vogue in Milan.
Vincenti's interest in organ intavolature is evident in his publicatio
Bertolo Spirindio's Ricercari et canzone francese intavolate per s
8 Kinkeldey (loc. cit., fn. i) questions the date of publication, but it is correct. This sco
attached to a set of vocal partbooks from the second edition of 1599, which includes three
motets not found in the 1594 spartitura. Kinkeldey did not have access to the materials of
is today called) the Civico museo bibliografico musicale and took his information from G
Gaspari, Catalogo della Biblioteca del Liceo Musicale di Bologna, II (Bologna, 1892),
' This designation is unique in that the score is meant only for the accompaniment of
first chorus. Later scores of this type apply to the whole concentus. Vincenti, in a note on th
page of the spartitura, suggests that organists wanting an accompaniment for the whole s
add the highest and lowest notes of the second chorus to the printed score.
10 "Aspettate honorati Virtuosi da me continuamente nove inventioni per facilitar
strada alle fatiche con Intavolatura, Passaggi, & Partidura: delle quali gid ne h6 fatte al
sorte, & ne andr6 facendo, come vegga che voi ve ne serviate, & che vi siagrata l'opera mia
" This firm underwent a series of changes in ownership during the period under con
eration.
d'organo and Tocate [sic], ricercari et canzone francese intavolate per sonar
d'organo-both in 1591, and of Girolamo Diruta's treatise, Dialogo sopra il
vero modo di sonar organi, et istromenti da penna, in 1593. These pub-
lications, together with the works on ornamentation, certainly showed them-
selves to be practical works, making available materials and instructions
relative to established techniques, and it seems logical to assume that the two-
bass partitura to which Vincenti had appended his note, as well as the bass-
soprano score that followed it in I595, were similarly based upon established
practice.
If any organ scores were published in i597, none are extant today, but
early in 1598, L'Eredi di Francesco & Simon Tini brought out their first
organ score: Giuseppe Gallo, Sacri musici alterius modulis concinendi,'2 the
partitio of which contains full scores of works for up to eight voices as well as
two-bass scores for polychoral works. Giovanni Francesco Besozzo joined the
firm later that year, and, under the name of L'Herede di Simon Tini & Gio.
Francesco Besozzo, they published Lucretio Quintiani's Messe e motetti a otto
voci; the partitura of this book included an eight-voice Mass, Ego rogabam, in
full score as well as Masses and motets having the usual two-bass format. A
usage first found here, and one that is characteristic of later organ scores for
polychoral Masses, is the use of a single chorus for the Crucifixus and often for
another movement (in this work, the Benedictus). When this happens, the
four-voice movements are given in full score in the organ part.31
In the same year, the Milanese firm also brought out the Cantionum
tribus vocibus by Antonio Mortaro, the first collection of motets with an organ
part in full score. In addition to the motets for three voices, the book contains,
as its concluding piece, a setting for six voices of Viri sancti, and this is given a
three-voice short score in the partitio. With the publication of this work, all
the score formats used for accompaniment of sacred music in this period-
two-bass, bass-soprano, and three-voice short scores, plus the full score-had
appeared in print. The firm of Tini & Besozzo also anticipated Vincenti by
bringing out the first three printed bassi seguenti, all of which were added to
works composed by Orfeo Vecchi of Milan." The Basso principale da sonare
12 The Latin form of his name, Josepho Gallo, is used on the title page.
13 The four-voice Crucifixus of Monteverdi's six-voice Missa In illo tempore is also given in
full score in its Bassus generalis part, p. 4; it is reproduced in Malipiero, Tutte le opere, Vol.
XIV, pp. 90 ff.
"The earliest known organ bass is found in a manuscript of 1587: Alessandro Striggio,
Ecce beatam lucem a 40, which is reproduced in Max Schneider, Die Anfi'nge des Basso
Continuo (Leipzig, 1918; repr. Westmead, 1971), pp. 66 ff. John B. Trend ("Musikschaitze auf
spanischen Bibliotheken," Zeitschriftfiir Musikwissenschaft, VIII [1926], 500oo) lists Giovanni
P. Flaccomio's Vespere, Missa Sacraeque cantiones (I59I)-a source found in the Biblioteca
Medinaceli, Madrid-as printed music with basso continuo, but he names no publisher; the
citation is also made in Brown, Instrumental Music, p. 439. However, Marie Thirese Bouquet
delli salmi intieri a cinque voci came out as an addition to the set o
partbooks containing Vecchi's Psalmi integri in totius anni solemnitatis
was published in I596.'~ The two new collections of Vecchi's works pu
in 1598, which included the Basso principale as one of the regular set of
were the Motectorum quinque vocibus, liber secundus and Missarum
vocibus, liber secundus. These three organ basses have a unique format i
they are unbarred and fully texted with the words carefully underlaid; a
glance they look like simple offprints of the vocal bass parts. They diffe
the vocal parts in that they always include the lowest sounding voice wh
bass drops out, and they are genuine bassi seguenti, but the visual resem
to the voice part is so strong that it is hard to avoid the conclusion that
organists may have accompanied a choir by reading from the vocal bass
By this time, it must have appeared that the future lay with the scor
accompaniments, since they were predominant in the organ parts a
published. In I599, however, Vincenti printed two bassi seguenti for wor
Giovanni Bassano, the Motetti per concerti ecclesiastici (for which
published the vocal parts in Iy98)1 and the Concerti ecclesiastici . .
secondo. Evidently, he had not found the short-score partiture as succes
he had hoped, for from this time on, with very few exceptions, he conce
on the single-line bass. In I602, he published the Cento concerti ecclesias
Lodovico Grossi da Viadana, which, by introducing the independent
continuo into church music, began the breaking away from the tra
concept of doubling the vocal parts on the organ."7 After 16oo, t
("Flaccomio," MGG, Vol. XVI, col. 301) identifies this work as a manuscript, and she
no date for it. Flaccomio's work, therefore, is, at best, an unlikely contender for status as
example of a printed organ score.
Similarly, Guglielmo Arnone's Magnificat a 4 e 8 voci con b.c. (Milan, 15 y9) is l
Mariangela Dona (La Stampa musicale a Milano fino all'anno 1700 [Florence,
I22), who cites, as the source of the entry, Carl Schmidl, Dizionario universale dei
(Milan, 1937). This reference, too, is repeated in Brown, op. cit., p. 439, but the title is
from Dona's article on Arnone himself (MGG, Vol. XV, cols. 296-97), leading one to
that she now regards its original inclusion as an error.
'6 Dona, La Stampa, p. 90, and Brown, Instrumental Music, p. 439, cite the I 596
suggesting that it includes a continuo part, while citing the Basso principale da so
Salmi intieri a cinque voci as a separate publication. As Oscar Mischiati points out, how
his article on Vecchi (MGG, Vol. XIII, col. 1355), this is the continuo part for the
integri. At this time, it was not unusual for the organ partitura to have a vernacular t
the partbooks had a title in Latin.
16 Gaspari (Catalogo, II, 378) and Kinkeldey (Orgel und Klavier, p. 200) assign in
dates to the Bassi per l'organo book. The date on the Bassi per l'organo de'
ecclesiastici, libro primo, however, is clearly I599.
17 Although the improvised accompaniment on lute or keyboard from an independ
line for secular music is known to have been practiced by Giulio Caccini at Florence a
1584 (see Anthony A. Newcomb, "The Musica secreta of Ferrara in the 158o's" [Ph.
Princeton Univ., 19701, pp. 380, 416), Viadana's claim to be an innovator in this pr
church music still holds true. This is especially clear in the solo concertos where
continui take an active part in stating the fugual themes.
monodic style, with its independent chordal accompaniment from a f

bass line, also entered the field. The communication of these styles a
however, moved at a slow pace, and their influence on church m
northern Italy was not felt until near the end of the first decade of
century. When it was felt, it transformed the organ scores before it m
obsolete, and this process provides an interesting, if minor, study in t
of Baroque music.
Although the peak in the publication of works with organ sco
between I598 and i6 Io, each type of score had a separate history as w
different musical function. The multiple-bass score for two or three b
the closest to the basso seguente in form and, perhaps for this reason
longest history. It was, in fact, the combination in score of the bassi s
the choruses involved, giving the organist a visual image of the entr
combinations of these choruses. In many cases, text cues were pro
further aid, but the texts were not underlaid as in the vocal par
crowded together under the bottom line at the point at which they w
sung. In most of these collections the style is very simple, and the cho
used much of the time as distinct units. The organist may have extra
own basso seguente from the bass lines in his score, or he may at tim
played the bass notes from more than one choir at the same time
case, he would have filled in the harmonies as if playing from a sing
seguente, and, by having all the bass lines before his eyes, he could c
of the choruses. Although some of these scores, including the first on
by Vincenti, had accidentals above the basses to aid the organist,
later prints had figures as well, most had neither accidentals nor fig
excerpt from the organ part to Cesario Gussaghi's Psalmi ad vesp
two choirs illustrates the simplicity of style found in these scores, par
in those giving antiphonal settings of the psalms (Ex. i).
These two- and three-bass scores were used only for polychoral w
which all the parts were specifically assigned to designated choirs
print of this type included eight-voice compositions that were not p
these were given a single basso seguente.20 Moreover, it should be em
that not all polychoral compositions of this time had multiple-b
With the exception of Croce's 1594 and 1596 prints, the Venetian pol
school adhered firmly to the single basso seguente or basso continuo,
18 Of thirty-five scores examined, I found four using figures: Domenico Lauro,

octonis vocibus (Venice: R. Amadino, I607); Giovanni Ghizzolo, Messe, motetti,
... a otto voci (Milan: F. Lomazzo, 1613); Francesco Bellazzi, Psalmi ad vesper
vocibus (Venice: B. Magni, I6 I8); and Santino Girelli, Salmi brevi (Venice: Garda
'9 Bassus ad organum (Venice: R. Amadino, i6 io), p. 3.
20 For example, in Lauro's Missae tres octonis vocibus, the polychoral Masses hav
scores, but the Missa Se'l pensier che mi strugge a 8 (a piece that is not polychoral)
seguente.
Example i
Cesario Gussaghi, Dixit primi toni, mm. 1-7
Sede donec ponam
IC O
Virgam
it is in
the ba
player.21
The full and short scores presented an entirely different approach to
accompaniment, since they were meant to reinforce the upper parts of a
composition as well as double the lowest part. This presented the organist with
more restrictions, or more help, depending on his point of view. The earliest
such scores were attached to works in which the style and form were an
extension of the sacred style of the late sixteenth century. Despite this con-
servative bias, these works are distinct from the later self-conscious prima
prattica style and were, rather, an indication of the slowness of communication
which delayed the spread of the new few-voiced concertato and sacred monody
from Rome.
In contrast to the organ parts in short score, which were published by a
wide variety of firms, the partiture, or full scores, were brought out by two
Milanese publishers: L'Herede di Simon Tini & Gio. Francesco Besozzo,
21 See, for example, Salvator noster from the Sacrae symphoniae (Venice, I615), pr. in
Giovanni Gabrieli, Collected Works, ed. Denis Arnold, Corpus mensurabilis musicae, I2, Vol.
V (N.p., i969), pp. 88 ff., mm. 17, 22, 35, 37.
which, in 1602, became L'Herede di Simon Tini & Filippo Loma

(hereafter to be called Tini & Lomazzo), and Agostino Tradate.22 Few of th
were published, the output averaging about two a year, and they cl
represented a great deal of labor and expense. Neither of these publis
moreover, limited himself to the printing of full scores, but brought out
using two-bass scores or single-line basses as well.
These full scores give the voice parts in the proper clefs, in open, bar
scores, with text cues beneath the bottom system. The only alterations m
from the original voice parts consist of the substitution of tied notes
ligature when a long note goes across a bar line or the substitution o
simple version in long notes for coloratura passages.
The full-score accompaniments reflected the ideals of certain organist
theorists, as well as of the composers of the works for which they were m
Viadana preferred the unison doubling of the voices, and even thoug
recognized the single bass as the more practical solution, he still insisted on
doubling of cadence formulas in their exact range by the continuo player.2
late as i609, Girolamo Diruta showed a clear preference for unison doublin
complaining that even with a figured bass one could not tell precisely wh
vocal parts the notes so indicated were doubling.25 Banchieri, who also ha
strong preference for full-score accompaniment, recognized that not all
read scores easily, and in his Conclusioni nel suono dell'organo (1609
recommended that the organist who did not read score well should pla
bass of the score and add above it the kind of accompaniment recommend
for the basso continuo or seguente.26
Although there is no overt evidence to support such a conclusion, it ma
that organists, at times, read selectively from a full score, doublin
important entries and maintaining the lowest voice-in just the manner, t
is, in which the three-voice short score was made. The four works for w
three-voice short score is known to have been made were composed f
voices or more, and, except in a very few cases,27 full-score accompanime
22 Occasionally, of course, full scores will appear in a partitura containing mainly

bassi seguenti and continui, or two-voice short scores. Such scores were printed by various
other than the two Milanese publishers cited above.
23 See comments by Domenico Rognioni and Orazio Nantermi, quoted in Kinkeldey, O
und Klavier, pp. 222-23.
24 Lodivico Grossi da Viadana, Cento concerti ecclesiastici ... Opera duodecima (Ve
Vincenti, 1602), A benigni lettori, Nos. 4, 6.
25 Girolamo Diruta, Seconda parte del Transilvano (Venice: Vincenti, I609; facsm.
Bologna, 1969), Bk. IV, p. 6.
2' Banchieri's Conclusioni was published by Heredi di Gio. Rossi in Bologna (facsm
Milan, I934). His recommendations appear on p. 24.
27 In addition to those mentioned in the text, full-score partiture are found in Gugl
Arnone, Partitura del Secondo libro degli motetti a cinque & otto voci (Milan: L'Er
Simon Tini & Gio. Francesco Besozzo, 1599) and Domenico Rognioni, Partito delli Can
quattro & otto voci (Milan: Tini & Lomazzo, I6o0).
were given only to compositions for five parts or less. These four works follow
a similar format, deploying a series of fugal or free entries in the scores in
precisely the manner one would expect an organist to play them-an organist,
that is, who finds more parts than can be played, but who continues to lead in
all the voices as they enter, while supporting the essential notes in the texture.
The works with this type of score are Antonio Mortaro, Viri sancti (a 6);28
Tiburzio Massaini, Hodie completi sunt (a 7);29 and two pieces from Mon-
teverdi's Vespers of i6io, Laudate pueri (a 8)30 and Laetatus sum (a 6).31
Since it is familiar and available in modern editions, the beginning of
Monteverdi's Laudate pueri is given here as an illustration of this type of
score. Example 2 shows the short score as found in the Bassus generalis. The
bars have been added in the vocal parts to correspond to those in the
accompaniment score.
This type of score is closer in effect to the full score than a bass-soprano
score would be and gives a practical reduction of the essentials of the composi-
tion, moving from voice to voice as the occasion demands. It is arranged to
double the entries while maintaining the lowest voice at all times. When there
are no entries to lead in, the bottom and top voices, with appropriate excerpts
from the inner voices, are given, and the score gives the impression of a skilled
and practical reading of the essential elements of the full vocal score.
By I61o, a change in the style of church music had brought about a
transformation of the full scores in the organ partbooks. The last publications
in the conservative style to be given full-score partiture were Orazio Nan-
termi's Primo libro delli motetti a cinque voci (16o6) and Antonio Cangiasi's
Sacrae cantiones tribus vocibus (1607), both brought out by Tradate in
Milan. By this time, the new church styles that were developing in Rome had
been felt in the north also, for, starting in I605, Tini & Lomazzo had begun to
publish works in the new few-voiced concerto style;32 Tradate yielded to the
new vogue in I6o8.33
The effect of the new styles on the full- and short-score accompaniments
was two-fold. First, the soloistic concertato style involved highly ornamented
lines which were often too fast and elaborate to be consistently doubled by the
organ, and so they were given in simplified versions in many partiture. The
relation between the vocal parts and the simplified keyboard version in this
28 This is the final motet in the Partitio Sacrarum cantionum tribus vocibus (Milan: Tini &
Lomazzo, 1598).
29 No. 6 in the Sacrarum cantionis (Venice: A. Raverio, I607). The other works in this
print are given a bass-soprano score.
30 Monteverdi, Vespere pluribus decantanda, bassus generalis, p. 12. Malipiero (Tutte le
opere, Vol. XIV, pp. 153 ff.) reproduces this exactly, but in modern piano score.
31 Monteverdi, op. cit., p. 20; Malipiero, op. cit., pp. 174 ff.
32 Dona, La Stampa, pp. 98 f.
33Ibid., pp. 112 f.
style resembles that seen in the Madrigali per cantare e sonare of Luz
Luzzaschi, which was published in I6o0 but is representative of the m
performed at the court in Ferrara in the i 58os.a" Although this style of
Example 2
Monteverdi, Laudate pueri, mm. 1-4
Cantus
Sextus
Altus o " o
Lau - da - te pu-
Septimus 71
Tenor - , - Lau - da - te pu -
Quintus ra , V
Lau - da - te pu - e -ri Do - mi-num,
Bassus ():_
Bassus 2ndl
Chori
Bassus
Generalis lA R
cis*'E
"' Luzzaschi's
been publishe
I965). On ear
Cantus
Lau -
Sextus
Altus _ __....
e- ri Do -mi- num
Septimus
Lau - da - te pu e - ri Do -mi -
Tenor
e -ri Do - mi-num, Lau -
Quintus
Lau -da - te pu - e - ri Do - mi
Bassus
Lau -
Bassus 2ndi
Chori
Bassus " :
Generalis I
was not entirely new, it was new

music published in partbooks
contrasted with the predominan
parts found in full-score acco
reduction in the number of vo
struck at the root of the con
complete in itself. Often, as in
bass, and a free instrumental
certainly the practice at Ferrara in the i 58os, although it was not made
until the appearance of the I6o0I print,35 and it was to become an impor
element in the accompaniment scores before they gave way to the
continuo. Similar changes also took place in the bass-soprano scores: virtu
lines were simplified and a free bass added when the vocal bass dropped
These changes can be observed in certain motets contained in a publicatio
I6o8, Girolamo Baglione's Sacrarum cantionum, published by Tini &
mazzo and edited by Lomazzo himself. The new styles predominate
well-known prints of 6 io0: Giovanni Paolo Cima's Concerti ecclesia
brought out by Tini & Lomazzo, and the Monteverdi collection cited
times above.
Despite obvious differences, the latter two publications have mu
common in their use of accompaniments. Both contain full scores, short s
bassi continui, and bassi seguenti. Both also use full scores for works of
three voices, and in most cases these involve an added free bass."8 For w
four or more voices, Cima generally gives a bass-soprano score, but work
four or five voices in the prima prattica style also appear, and these are
full-score accompaniments. Because of the variety of styles included
print, Monteverdi uses a variety of accompaniments for his large concer
movements. These include one bass-soprano score (which will be disc
later), the two three-voice short scores mentioned earlier, and numerous
continui and seguenti. His one prima prattica work, the Missa In illo tem
is provided with a basso seguente, while, as mentioned above, the Crucif
appears in full score.37
Of the two composers, only Cima includes independent instrum
works in his collections, and it is noteworthy that the two for four instru
are the only works in the entire collection given single-line basses. The S
a 4 has a basso seguente"' and the Capriccio a 4,39 a basso continuo.
Sonata a 3,4 has a full-score accompaniment, following the same for
the scores for vocal trios, but the Capriccio and two sonatas for t
struments have score accompaniments in which the keyboard takes p
stating thematic materials when one of the solo instruments drops out.4
In both collections, the works for one to three voices are for highly sk
virtuoso performers, often all in a high range. When there is no vocal b
5 Newcomb, op. cit., p. 416.

38 Church monodies are not treated separately in this article. Except for the Monte
collection, they are usually given with the voice part in simplified form in the tw
partitura, implying doubling of the voice by the organ.
7 Monteverdi, Sanctissimae Virgini, Missa Senis vocibus, pp. 3-8.
38 Partitura delli Concerti ecclesiastici, p. 158.
89 Ibid., p. 159.
4 Ibid., pp. 153-58.
1 Ibid., pp. 151-53.
free bass is added in the accompaniment score. In the Bassus generalis to the
Monteverdi collection, these parts are given exactly as they appear in the
partbooks, but without text. Most of these, like Duo seraphim,42 are so
elaborately ornamented that it would be inappropriate to double the voices
exactly on the keyboard; the ornamented version was given, no doubt, merely
for the information of the organist. The texture of these works is so similar to
to the accompanied madrigals of Luzzaschi, whose works Monteverdi had
undoubtedly heard performed many times, that we can safely assume that
Monteverdi intended the organist to play a simplified version of the score.
Cima's directions to the organist, printed on the last page of the partitura per
organo for his Concerti ecclesiastici, support this conclusion. He explains that
he has written in the ornaments in some places in the partitura to show the
style of embellishments wanted, and, although it may at times be a help to the
singer if the organist plays the ornaments with him, it is best to accompany
with the simple version.43 Cima's Gustate et videte (a 3),44 shown in Example
3, gives the simple form of the composition from the organ score along with
the ornamented version of the voices from the partbooks, and this may well
illustrate the manner in which the organist would have accompanied the
heavily ornamented Monteverdi work.
While the simple addition of a free bass to voices in a high range had
historical antecedents, fragmentary insertions of such a bass in a vocal score
was new and illustrates the change in style which was taking place at that
time. An interesting example of such insertions is found in the continuation of
the three-voice short score to Monteverdi's Laudate pueri, the opening of
which was quoted in Example 2. Example 4 shows the end of the opening
section of this work and the point of changeover to the section using fewer
voices in soloistic concertato style. Starting in measure I I, the bass of the short
score is made up of the lowest sounding notes of the chorus taken successively
from the tenor (T), Bass (B), and second Bass (B.2). Then, marked with an
arrow, comes a single low c, added in the accompaniment score, but not found
42 Monteverdi, Sanctissimae Virgini, Missa senis vocibus, pp. 26 ff.; Malipiero, Tutte le
opere, pp. 90o ff.
43 "Pregovi Gentilissimi Signori, che per vostro diletto vorrete cantare questi miei Con-
certini ... mi facciate gratia di cantarli come stanno, con quella maggiore affetto, che sia
possibile. Et se pure alli leggiadri cantanti piacesse d'accrescerli qualche cosa; per cortesia lo
faccino solo ne gli accenti, e trilli. Mi favoriranno anco li valenti Organisti quando sonarranno
questi miei (solo con Basso, & Soprano) accompagnarli con le parti di mezo con quella maggior
diligenza che sia possibile, perche gli accompagnamenti grati fan grato il Canto ... Et benche
nel Partito in molti luoghi ci siano le gratie, come stanno nelle parti; L'ho fatto accio si vegga lo
stile; oltreche anco e di molto agiuto al Cantore suonargli talvolta l'ornamento. Ma per lo piu
giudicarei essere bene, toccare solo il fermo, rimettendomi pero del tutto al perfettissimo
giudicio. ."
44 Partitura, pp. 40-45.
Example 3
Cima, Gustate et videte, mm. 26-30
e - - jus om - nes San -cti,
e - - - - - - - jus om - nes San -cti,
e - - - - - - - jus om - nes
Organ ____ _ __
[m. 261
e - - - - - lus
e - - - - - jus
San - cti, e - - - jus
U.__ __ _
0c
@: ,4,
Example 4
Monteverdi, Laudate pueri, mm. 1 1-17
CantusU
no - men Do - mi - ni, lau- da - te
Sextus
Lau - da - te no - men Do
Altus
ni, lau - da - te
Septimus
Lau - da - te
Tenor x - - -
ni, lau - da - te
Quintus
Lau - da - te
Bassus
no - men Do - - mi - ni, lau - da - te

Bassus2
Lau - da - te no - men, lau - da - te
Bassus I
Generalis
[T.B. - - - - - - - - -B.2 1
Cantus
no - men Do - mi - ni, Sit
Sextus o- mi - "
ni, Sit
Altus F
no - men Do - - mi - ni,
SeptimuW
no - men Do - mi ni,
Tenor
no - - - men Do - mi - ni,
Quintus 03
no - men Do - - mi - ni,
no men Do mi ni,
Bassus 03 I
GeneralisL
9: r r r ! I
'5
Cantus
no - men Do -
Sextus
no - men Do -
Quintus
Sit no
Bassus "
Generalis
- - mi- ni, Be
me. - ml - ni,
men Do - - - mi - ni, Be - ne - di -
I O I
in the vocal basses."4 Here, clearly, the organist must have played a full chord.
Later, in measure 16, a free bass line appears in the organ score. Again, one
certainly expects a fuller chord above each of these notes than would be
provided by a simplified version of the two upper voices.
A more complex combination of free bass with full score is shown in
Example 5, which shows the opening measures of the four-voice Cantate
Domino by Cima's brother, Giovanni Andrea, along with Cima's organ
accompaniment." Here the members of a series of short solo passages are
interspersed with short sections of chordal style in which all voices sing
together. The latter sections lend themselves well to the usual full-score format
in which all parts are played on the keyboard, but the solo sections have a free
bass in the manner of a basso continuo. For the soprano and alto solos, one
would expect the accompaniment to follow what Cima suggests for his bass-
soprano scores, playing the outer parts (normally with the ornaments re-
moved) and filling in with appropriate consonances. How the tenor and bass
would be accompanied is not discussed, and two questions, therefore, arise: (i)
Should the vocal lines be played along with the added instrumental bass (the
tenor in mm. 8-io is given in the organ part, but the vocal bass in mm.
io-i12 is not)? (2) How high above these low voices should the accom-
paniment go?
There is only one source from this period that even hints at the answers to
these questions: Domenico Brunetti's Unica voce, binis, ternis, quaternis, &
pluribus ad usam ecclesiae ... cum gravi, & acuti ad organum (Venice:
Raverio, 1609). This book differs from other similar scores in that the organ
part consists of the high and low parts, just as the title page suggests, but the
high and low parts are not necessarily always the high and low voices. In most
cases, the organ parts are also the highest and lowest parts of the concentus,
and for those compositions having three or more voices, the organ part is a
bass-soprano short score. For those pieces that are for alto or soprano solo,
these voice parts are given, in a simplified form without the ornaments, above
an added organ bass. The three solos for bass voice and the single tenor solo,
however, follow a unique pattern: all four have a high and low line in the
4" Similar additions of "strong-beat" continuo notes inserted during a rest in the vocal parts
can be found in a manuscript dated I613 found in the Civico museo bibliografico musicale,
Bologna: Johannes Amaganus, Spartitura generale, & particolare di diversi motetti et mad-
rigali. .... Amaganus gives bassi continui to a number of sixteenth-century works, and, in places
where all parts have a rest, he adds a note in the continuo bass, as can be seen, for example, in
his added bass for Luca Marenzio's "Tirsi morir volea" (Primo libro de madrigale a cinque
[Venice, I580], No. 5; p. 78 of Amaganus's manuscript). Similar insertions have been made in
ink in the full-score Partes infimae pro organo for Domenico Lauro's Missae tres octonis
vocibus (Venice: R. Amadino, I607)-notably in the Kyrie I and Christe of the Missa S'el
pensier che mi strugge.
46 Partitura, pp. 27-29.
Example 5
Cima, Cantate Domino, mm. i-io
Can - ta - te Do -mi
Can - ta - te Do - mi -no can -
Organ
no can - ti-cum no vum, can
ti-cum no - - vum, can -
T
Can -
B
Can -
= ily
- ti - cum no - - - vum.
- ti -cum no - - - vum.
- - ti - cum no - vum, Ca
- ti - cum no - - - vum,
I' _LI__ _
te Do - mi-no o - mnis ter - ra.
Can -
. , O
T
ta - - - - - te Do - mi-no o - mnis ter - ra.
organ accompaniment and the organ lines ar

These compositions provide at least a clue
accompanied the tenor or bass in a piece
The fact that both composers were chur
accompaniments were used-Brunetti a
Cima at Gloriosa Madonna preso S. Celso
to this assumption.
As to the question of doubling the voice p
only a qualified answer, since these four mo
which the voice changes function in the cou
tenor solo is the highest or lowest voice in t
score, but when it is the middle voice,
paniment. It is clear, then, that in this typ
alto will be doubled when it is the top v
doubled when it is the lowest voice. How
sounding above an added instrumental bass
5), will not be treated as the top voice but
by the organ. One aspect of the ideal of un
of the time, the voice makes the proper ca
it assumes."8 In Surrexit pastor (Ex. 6),49 th
in measures 3 and 6, and it uses the ten
however, when it resumes the bass range, i
'7 Oscar Mischiati comments on the importance of

netti," MGG, Vol. XV, cols. 1147-48.
48 In this, Brunetti follows the principles put fort
pp. II-14.
4' Gravis et acutus ad organum, p. 6.
Example 6
Domenico Brunetti, Surrexitpastor, mm. -6
Sur - re
- xit pa - stor bo - nus,
sur - re - - - - xit pa-stor bo - nus

Ir
Quemadmodum desiderat (Ex. 7),50 the tenor retains its normal cadence
function throughout the motet.
The question of the range of the accompanying high lines for the bass and
tenor solos can be answered more precisely by a close study of Brunetti's book.
Although the voice may move from one range of the texture to another in this
collection, the overall range of organ and voice remains low. The highest note
of the organ part is d", and the section of the bass solo, Lux perpetua,5' where
this is found is climactic; undoubtedly, there would be a full chord in the
accompaniment at this point (Ex. 8). The implied texture in the organ seems
to be homorhythmic here, and the texture in the realized organ part probably
ranged between two- and four-part counterpoint.
Although this Brunetti publication is unique for its peculiar disposition of
5o Ibid., p. 9.
51 Ibid., p. 8.
Example 7
Domenico Brunetti, Quemadmodum desiderat, mm. I-io
Que - ma-dmo-dum de - si - de - rat Cer -
- vus ad fon - - tes a-qua -
rum i - ta de - si- de-rat a - ni-ma me - a ad te De
us, i ta de-si -de-rat a - ni-ma me- a ad e De - us. Si -
ti - vit a - ni-ma me -a ad De-um fon-tem vi-vum, ve
I. ,o
Example 8
Domenico Brunetti, Lux perpetua, mm. I0-14
Al - le - lu - ia,
Al - le- lu - ia, lae- ti- ti a sem-pi
ter - na su-per ca - pi -ta e - o - rum, lae -ti - ti -a
high- and low-sounding lines in the organ part, the general category of bass
soprano short scores itself includes a wide variety of genres. It is a format th
was often used for instrumental music. Guiseppe Guami's Partidura pe
sonare (Vincenti, 60 I) for his Canzonettefrancese ... per concertare con pii,
sorte di stromenti52 gives a simplified version of the virtuoso parts. Giacomo
Moro da Viadana used this type of score for accompanying the Canzone a 4 in
his Concerti ecclesiastici (Venice: R. Amadino, I604)," although the vocal
bass-soprano score for the two instrumental canzone at the end of his Messe,
52 The instrumental parts are found today only in the 1612 edition by Pierre Phalkse of
Louvain.
5" Basso continuo per I'organo, pp. 27-28.
motetti (Milan: Filippo Lomazzo, 6 I 3),5" while the rest of the pieces in the
collection have the usual two-bass score for polychoral works. An unusual use
of the soprano-bass score is found in three instrumental sinfonie from Pietro
Lappi's Sacrae melodiae"5 and the instrumental ritornello from the last scene
of the Ballo dell'ingrate of Monteverdi."5 In these, the bass and soprano parts
are represented literally in the Basso continuo, even though the Quinto often
takes its melody above the soprano line. Monteverdi also used the top
instrumental line, rather than the vocal one, in his bass-soprano score for the
Domine ad adjuvandum from the I6io Vespers.57
One of the most interesting of these scores is the Basso principale co'l
soprano del Quarto libro delle messe a quattro, e cinque voci dell'eccellentiss.
Gio. Pietro A lvigi Palestina [sic], brought out in 16 I1 by Filippo Lomazzo. A
Milanese organist and composer, Alessandro Nuvaloni, was hired to make the
organ part, which has the unique distinction of using figures above both the
soprano and bass.5" A comparison with the vocal parts shows that the
numbers over the top staff refer to intervals below that voice, and the numbers
above the bottom staff, to intervals above the bass. These are clearly added to
give the organist some idea of the inner voices of the works he accompanies.
Example 9 shows two excerpts from the Palestrina Masses lined up with
Nuvaloni's partiture; the pitches indicated by the figures are given in stemless
black notes. Although the essential vertical structure and movement of the
inner parts are thus indicated, these scores, which Lomazzo hoped would
bring the Palestrina Masses back into the liturgical repertory,"5 simply show
that, for a style as subtle and sophisticated as Palestrina's, the unison doubling
provided by a full score is the only viable accompaniment. The excerpt shown
in Example 9ae0 is the more successful of the two because of the steady outer
lines, but, although the figures give a key to the basic triadic structure, the
voice leading and pattern of entries are obscured. The misleading nature of
such a score is even more obvious in the selection shown in Example 9b,"'
" Partitura de bassi, pp. 25-26.
* Spartitura delli motetti ... con quelle delle sinfonie (Venice: R. Amadino, 16 I4), PP.
44-45-
"6 Madrigali guerrieri, et amorosi ... (Venice: A. Vincenti, 1638), Basso continuo, pp. 73
fE The soprano-bass score is not reproduced in the Malipiero edition.
S7 Monteverdi, Sanctissimae Virgini, Bassus ad organum, pp. 9 f., not reproduced in the
Malipiero edition.
"The bass-soprano spartitura for the first chorus of Banchieri's Concerti ecclesiastici of
1595 has accidentals above each staff (but no numbers), and I have found no further examples
of this practice.
5 Lomazzo states in the dedication that Palestrina's Masses were no longer sung because the
organists no longer wanted to perform works without a continuo part; his providing this organ
part was intended, he suggests, to remedy the situation.
60 The voice parts in Ex. 9a are taken from Le opere complete di Giovanni Pierluigi da
Palestrina, ed. Raffaele Casimiri, X (Rome, 1940), I 19; they have been transposed down a
fourth, and durations and barring have been adjusted to fit the Nuvaloni score.
61 Ibid., p. I 57.
Example 9a
Alessandro Nuvaloni's Bass-Soprano score for the Kyrie from Palestrina's Missa secunda a y*
son,
son IKy - - ri -e
Ky - ri - e
Ky - ri - e
Ile
if Oi
tjt
Ky - - ri -
- son
6 4
) o* 00
* Palestrina's polyph
Example 9b
Nuvaloni's Bass-Soprano score for the Gloria from Palestrina's Messa terza a 5 ("O magnum
mysterium")*
Ad o- -o - ra - mus te
Ad - - o - ra- mus te
o ra - - mus te
ra - mus te
3 4
1 8
4 3 8 3 3 5
* Palestrina's polyphony a
particularly in measures 75-78. The Palestrina style contrasts sharpl

that of the Baroque prima prattica which, by the I62os, had been adjust
suit a continuo accompaniment comfortably.
In addition to these unusual bass-soprano scores, a number of co
tional vocal works were published with this kind of organ partitura, sta
with the Banchieri Concerti ecclesiastici of I 595 and continuing into th
decade of the seventeenth century. Because a number of the bass-s
scores were provided for works in the new concertato style, they often i
hints to the organist as to the proper manner for accompanying v
singing. Pietro Lappi, maestro di cappella at Santa Maria delle Gra
Brescia, gave instructions on the last page of his Partitura per l'organo
Messe ad otto e nove voci, libro secundo (Venice: A. Raverio, 16o8)
agree with those by Cima cited earlier. He insisted that the top line
partitura (which is given in the simple form) must be played when the
answer one another with passaggi and other embellishments and th
organist should accompany them softly so that their ornamented singin
be clearly heard.62 Girolamo Giacobbi, maestro di cappella at San Petron
Bologna, was less concerned with the need for doubling the singers. Inst
tions on the verso of the title page of the organ score for his Prima pa
salmi concertati a due e pii8 chori (Venice: A. Gardano & Fratelli, I
explain that the top voice is included in the score so that, by having it
his eyes, the organist can help the soloists when necessary and acco
them discretely so that they can add passaggi and accenti, but that it is
necessary to play the top line at all times.63 Like Lappi, he also as
organist to play quietly when accompanying the soloist. Although
Lappi, and Giacobbi do not agree on the necessity for doubling the singer
all stress the practicality of playing the simple form while an orna
version is being sung.
It must have been the increased skill of the performers, as well
change in style, that made the score accompaniment unnecessary an
mately obsolete, but it was the development of a thoroughly figured co
62 "Ho giudicato espediente nel dar alle stampe queste mie nove Musiche, di accompa
con due righe di dichiaratione; perche parte di esse ove cantano spesse volte le parti
solo respondendosi hor con passaggi, & hor in altro modo sarA necessario, che si concer
l'organo, & non altramente che per ci6 li ho fatto la sua partitura ... avertendo anc
Organisti che dove canterrano le parti sole, debbano sonar voto al possibile, per non co
il rumor dell'organo li passaggi, accenti, & leggiadra del Cantore."
63" ,... con la Partitura poi per l'Organo, appresso il' Basso continuo, con gli accident
segnati, si e posti anche la Parte piu accuta; non perche l'organista l'habbi a rappre
continuatamente, ma si bene a fine, che havendola innanzi a gli occhi posso & a
discretamente accompagnare il cantante, massime quando resta solo, accio gli sia per
tal discretezza & accentare & con passaggi di suo gusto dar quella perfettione che g
esser conveniente a tal concerto."
bass that finally reconciled the northern church musicians to the single-line
continuo. Despite the use of numbers by the monodists at the beginning of the
century, their adoption in printed organ parts for polyphonic liturgical musi
came about slowly. Although as early as 1603 Agostino Agazzari recom-
mended their use, suggesting to the organist that he write in the figures himse
as his publisher was not able to put them into the organ part of his Sacra
laudes,64 the first print of his to include figures was the Psalmi sex qui i
vesperis ad concentus varietatem interponuntur (Venice: R. Amadino, 1609
Neither the 16o8 nor 1609 imprints of the Sacrarum cantionum ... Liber I
Op. V,65 had figures or accidentals in the Basso ad organum part; this w
somewhat ironic in that the Sacrarum cantionum was the print to which
Agazzari appended the famous Del sonare sopra'l basso con tutti il stromenti e
dell'use loro nel concerto,"6 the treatise in which he stressed the necessity of
using figures to indicate the correct harmonies.
Although the first publications brought out by Vincenti had accidentals to
indicate the character of the thirds and sixths, the earliest score having figure
(that I have found) is the two-bass Partes infimae pro organo continuato for
Domenico Lauro's Missae tres octonis vocibus (Venice: R. Amadino, I607)
which uses an occasional 5 or 6. The introduction of figures into church musi
in northern Italy, however, came by a different route and in a form in keepin
with the ideal of unison doubling of the parts. The Bolognese Banchieri, from
the time of his Concerti ecclesiastici of I595, had shown an active interest in
clarifying and improving the accuracy and practicability of continuo playing.
In the first edition of his L'Organo suonarino of I605,"7 he suggested a way o
differentiating thirds and sixths by the placement of accidentals on the staff i
the continuo part,68 but this was not generally adopted. In the Basso seguente
part to his Ecclesiastiche sinfonie, Banchieri announced that within a few day
Agazzari would be bringing out a treatise that would be both useful an
necessary for those playing upon a basso seguente.69 Apparently, Banchie
had not actually read the complete treatise, for even in his Conclusioni n
suono dell'organo of I609,70 he does not mention the possibility of figure
64 (Rome: A. Zanetti, 1603). The work was reprinted in i6o8 by Amadino in Venice, stil
without figures and with the same introduction. Yet, in 1607, Amadino had put figures in th
two-bass partitura to Lauro's Missae tres octonis vocibus.
66 The first edition of this work was brought out by Tini & Lomazzo in 1607.
66 This was first printed separately in 1607 by Falcini in Siena; facsm. ed. (Milan, I93 3). I
is frequently reprinted in modern treatises. See Kinkeldey, Orgel und Klavier, pp. 216 ff., fo
the Italian original, and Arnold, Thorogh-Bass, pp. 68-74, for excerpts in English translation.
67 (Venice: R. Amadino, I605); facsm. ed., Biblioteca organologica, 27 (Amsterdam
I969).
* Ibid., p. 2.
69 Adriano Banchieri, Ecclesiastiche sinfonie (Venice: R. Amadino, 1607), verso of title
page. This collection also includes Banchieri's only example of a two-bass score, which is given
for the eight-voice Memoramini on p. 20 of the Basso seguente part.
70(Bologna: L'Heredi di Gio. Rossi, 1609; facsm. ed., Milan, I934).
although he describes the bass-soprano scores and the use of accident

indicating raised and lowered thirds and sixths.7 Moreover, at the end of
book, he prints a letter by Agazzari dated April 25, i606, which includes
of the information on instruments given in his treatise of 1607 but does
touch upon the subject of continuo or figured bass.72 At any rate, the ty
figuring first used by Banchieri and his Bolognese colleagues did not
that recommended by Agazzari,; it was based, rather, on the exact interv
designations used by the Florentine monodists, a system more in keeping
the ideal of unison doubling favored by those who preferred accompanim
from score.
As far as we know, the introduction of the figured bass into Bologna was
signaled by the publication of a secular work in monodic style, the Drama-
todia, overo canti rappresentativi, composed by Giacobbi and published in
i6o8 by Vincenti. Although the use of figures in this print was mainly limited
to cadences, the Florentine model was followed, with the numbers going as
high as io in the score. Banchieri evidently saw the practicality of this system.
In 1609, his Gemelli armonici was published by Amadino in Venice with a
dedication dated August 14. This is a set of duos for equal voices that can be
sung in two different ranges, a duo for two sopranos being appropriate for two
tenors, and so forth. However, in order to avoid parallel octaves between a
voice and the realized continuo, he used the figures to and 17 in the continuo
part for the soprano version in the same places that 3 and to were used in the
continuo for the tenor version. These figures ensured the unison doubling of
the voices in the continuo.
A few months later, Giacobbi's Prima parte de i salmi concertati was
printed, bearing a dedication date of October 15, 1609. In the bass-soprano
score for this work, to which we have alluded earlier, Giacobbi used figures
above the bass. These were rare in this type of score, as the two outer voices
made it fairly easy to find the correct inner parts, but Giacobbi clearly used the
figures to provide unison doubling of certain inner lines, especially at cadences.
At times, he even gives (in musical notation) the incipit of a third voice in the
two-line score, such as that seen in Example Io, taken from the organ score for
Sede ad dextris meis (a 9), the first psalm in this print.
After 1609, neither Giacobbi nor Banchieri used scores in their organ
parts. Giacobbi turned to the basso continuo but continued to use exact, high
figures to ensure the doubling of important movements in the voices. Ban-
chieri stayed with the continuo, but the possibility of parallel octaves between
the voices and the realized continuo still troubled him, and in his Vezzo di
71 Ibid., p. 25. The Conclusioni, which open this book, and in which this reference is found,
were first published in Latin in Siena in i6o8 (a lost edition of I591, having the same title
could not have had the material on continuo playing yet), and the only work cited by Banchieri
in this section is Tiburtio Massaini, Musica a 1, 2, et 3 voci (Venice: Raverio, 1607).
72 Ibid., pp. 68-70.
Example io
Girolamo Giacobbi, Sede a dextris meis (a 9), mm. 36-40
Do - - mi - nus
doII
perle musicali (Venice: R. Amadino, 161o),

3, io, and 17. One year later, in 16 11, th
Adriano Banchieri Bolognese con un amico
mente sopra un basso continuo in tutte le
edition of Banchieri's L'organo suonarino.73
strongly in favor of the use of numbers ab
used numbers as high as I7 to indicate the p
the short section on continuo in his Cartella
use of figures because with them one cou
exact representation of the work being a
Cartella, however, he relinquished his one
tervallic designation by admitting that o
continuo were not objectionable because of t
when Alessandro Vincenti published his P
concertato con basso e due tenori nell'or
figures with the numbers limited to 9 or
remained in use throughout the history of
By this time, the number of single-line
greatly that the score-type organ parts, even
were clearly in the minority. They had all b
two-bass scores for polychoral works (wh
7 (Venice: R. Amadino, 16 1'), pp. 59-65. This sect

I6o5 edition cited in fn. 67, above.
74 (Venice: Vincenti, 1614), p. 214.
basses in practical usage) continuing to appear infrequently for a while

It was only in Germany that publishers brought out organ scores of th
published in Italy, and this was because the new Baroque style mo
Germany while these organ scores were still a major element in the per
ance of sacred music in northern Italy.
It was, however, the single-line bass that was first printed in Germ
and this appeared in a publication that was directly influenced by V
Cento concerti ecclesiastici of i602. Gregor Aichinger's Cantiones e
sticas trium et quatuor voc. cum basso generali et continuo ad usum
nistarum (Dilingen: Meltzer, i607).7 In 16 Io, the two-bass score w
by Johann Stadlmayr for his Missae 8 vocum cum duplici basso ad o
(Augsburg: Jo. Praetorius). Two- and three-bass scores were used, r
tively, for eight- and twelve-voice Magnificats in his Super magnae
divino carmine ... (Wittenberg: Agricola, 1614), and this same pri
cluded a full score for a four-voice Fecit potentiam in the second Magn
following the Italian practice of giving full-scores to four-voice Mass m
ments in polychoral works. These open scores were new in German
publications, since the usual representation of organ music was the
traditional tablature, and the open-score organ part to Johann St
Harmoniae sacrae profestis (Nuremburg: Kauffmann, 16 16), which
full scores for as many as eight voices, was much more revolutionary i
context of German organ music than were the organ scores and basses
they were first introduced into the Italian musical scene. At any rate, th
continuo quickly established itself in Germany as the normal accompan
Although Praetorius, in his treatment of continuo in the third volume
Syntagma musicum, discussed the use of numbers over 9 in a figured b
concluded they were too complicated and unnecessary.76 It was characte
of Praetorius's approach to score accompaniment that when he gave
soprano score as the continuo part for his Puercinium (Frankfurt am
Emmels, 162 1), this was not done in order to support the top line
texture but to help the young organist to contain and order his realizatio
bass is figured, and the "soprano" line of the score does not always
highest note of the concentus but includes notes from lower lines a
Clearly, this is to indicate quickly to an inexperienced youth what the
" Kinkeldey, Orgel und Klavier, p. 212, fn. 3, suggests that this is a bass-soprano sc
he had not seen the work and drew his conclusion from a misprint in the listing for Aich
the Eitner Quellen-Lexikon (I, 68), where this work is listed as ". . cum Bg. et cant
organistorum."
76 Michael Praetorius, Syntagma musicum, Vol. III, Termini musici (Wolfenbiot
wein, 1618/19); facsm. ed., Documenta musicologica, Ser. I, Vol. 15 (Basel, I
131-32.
" For a modern edition, see Michael Praetorius, Gesamtausgabe der musikalischen Werk
(Wolfenbattel, 1938), Vol. XIX.
should be and to help him avoid inadvertent contrapuntal errors-a very

different function from that of the earlier Italian scores in this format.
Except for the fact that these scores were used to provide practical aid to
the organist accompanying church music, they have little in common with the
various usages related to single-line basses in the seventeenth century,7" and
they cannot, therefore, be considered antecedents of genuine continuo practice.
As far as performance practice is concerned, too, they must be considered as
strictly localized in time and locality, yet they represent a clearly defined
sound-ideal and should be recognized as an aspect of early Baroque style, even
though it is rooted in earlier practice.79 The one element of this ideal that
remains in continuo practice into the late Baroque is the doubling of opening
fugal entries. Despite Agazzari's statement in Del suonare sopra il basso in
I607 that score or tablature was no longer necessary in order to double fugues,
since that way of composing was out of style,80 fugal writing did remain in use
and the doubling of the opening entries became a conventional procedure.
Placing the composers and theorists of this time in their geographical areas
explains the rationale for some of their conflicting opinions. Agazzari, who
spent most of his professional life in Rome, followed the ideals for liturgical
music set forth at the Council of Trent and eschewed the polyphonic style.
Viadana, born near Mantua and spending most of his professional life in
northern Italy, would naturally prefer a score accompaniment, even while
accepting a single bass as the more pragmatic solution.81 Since he held the
position of maestro di cappella at the Mantuan cathedral from I593 to I597,
it is not surprising to find that the basso continuo lines Viadana added to his
Cento concerti of 1602 bear a strong resemblance to the bass lines of
Luzzaschi's keyboard accompaniments in his 16o0 Madrigali... per cantare
et sonare-both in general contour and in their occasional imitation of the
voice parts. In the case of Monteverdi, his friendships with Milanese musicians
and continuing contacts with the musical establishments in the Milan cathe-
dral, as well as the musical milieu at Mantua, may have influenced him to
provide score accompaniments in his first publication of sacred music in
16 10.82
78 See Tharald Borgir, "The Performance of the Basso Continuo in Seventeenth-Century

Italian Music" (Ph.D. diss., Univ. of California, Berkeley, 1971) for a detailed discussion of
continuo practice at that time.
7 The only organ scores in manuscript from this time are English, and it is interesting to
note that these fluctuate between short score and full score within single movements. It is,
therefore, possible that the strict use of one format throughout a work originated with the
publishers. Accompaniment intabulations, such as those found in the prints of the Roman
publisher Simon Verovio-Diletto spirituale (i586), Ghirlanda di fioretti musicali (1587),
etc.-cannot be considered antecedents of these score accompaniments because they often had
added passaggi, while the organ scores provided either exact doubling or a simplified version of
ornamented parts.
so Kinkeldey, Orgel und Klavier, p. 220; Eng. trans., Arnold, Thorough-Bass, p. 73.
81 Viadana, A benigni lettori, Rules 5, 6; see Arnold, op. cit., pp. 11, I4.
82 Claudio Sartori, "Monteverdiana," The Musical Quarterly, XXVIII (1952), 399-413.
Despite the fact that these score accompaniments had only a minor
the overall development of Baroque music, many of these works are
tive-even brilliant-and a good number of the accompaniment score
signs of active use. Corrections, alterations, insertions of cues, and the li
witness to the fact that they were not left to molder on the publishers'
They deserve to be better known not only for the information they giv
early Baroque accompaniment practice, but for their musical worth as
Stanford University
APPENDIX
A short list of full scores and multiple-bass scores not discussed in this article foll
soprano scores have not been listed separately, but the last five works on the list of orga
full score include bass-soprano scores and a few single-line basses, too. These scores h
chosen to illustrate a variety of styles, and only works for which all the parts are stil
at least one edition-are given. An asterisk applied to a date means that a comp
partbooks is not available for that particular edition.
WORKS WITH ORGAN PARTS IN FULL SCORE
Orfeo Vecchi. Motectorum quae in communi sanctorum quatuor vocibus c

primus. Milan: Tradate, I603-
(Orfeo Vecchi). Scielta de madrigali a cinque voci de diversi eccel. musici,
motetti da Orfeo Vecchi con la partitura d'essi motetti. Milan: Tini & Lo
(Francesco Lucino). Concerti de diversi eccell. autori a due, tre, & quattro v
Lomazzo, 1608*, I612*, I616.
Giovanni Ghizzolo, Concerti all'uso moderno a quattro voci. Milan: Tini & L
(Francesco Lucino and Filippo Lomazzo). Aggiunta nuova delli concerti d
autori. Milan: Tini & Lomazzo, 16 12*, I6I6.
(Filippo Lomazzo). Seconda aggiunta alli concerti raccolti dal Molto Reveren
Lucino.... Milan: F. Lomazzo, 1617.
Francesco Ballazzi. Liberprimus sacrarum concentuum. Venice: Sub signo G
Magni, 162o.
WORKS HAVING MULTIPLE-BASS SCORES
Giovanni Giacomo Gastoldi. Messe et motetti a otto voci. Venice: R. Amadi

Pietro Lappi. Missarum octonis vocibus, Liber primus. Venice: Raverio, 160
Antonio Mortaro. Messa, salmi, motetti, et magnificat a tre chori. Venice: R
Ist ed., I599*.
Giovanni Ghizzolo. Integra solemnitatum psalmodia vespertina, octonis voc
Milan: Tini & Lomazzo, I609.
Giovanni Ghizzolo. Messe, motetti, magnificat... Milan: Tini & Lomazzo
Francesco Bellazzi. Psalmi ad vesperas octonis vocibus. Venice: B. Magni,
Santino Girelli. Salmi brevi... a otto voci. Venice: B. Magni, 1620.
Francesco Bellazzi. Messe, magnificat e motetti concertati.... Venice: B. Mag

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Full and Short Scores in the Accompaniment of Italian Church Music in the Early Baroque

Author(s): Imogene Horsley

American Musicological Society, University of California Press are collaborating with

AMONG THE FIRST "pre-continuo" organ parts printed in the la

1Basso continuo is used here as defined in Franck T. Arnold, The Art o

in facsimile edition, although as early as 191o a number of them were cited

monodic style, with its independent chordal accompaniment from a f

18 Of thirty-five scores examined, I found four using figures: Domenico Lauro,

Sede donec ponam

which, in 1602, became L'Herede di Simon Tini & Filippo Loma

22 Occasionally, of course, full scores will appear in a partitura containing mainly

Monteverdi, Laudate pueri, mm. 1-4

e -ri Do - mi-num, Lau -

was not entirely new, it was new

5 Newcomb, op. cit., p. 416.

e - - jus om - nes San -cti,

e - - - - - - - jus om - nes San -cti,

San - cti, e - - - jus

Monteverdi, Laudate pueri, mm. 1 1-17

no - men Do - mi - ni, lau- da - te

no - men Do - - mi - ni, lau - da - te

Lau - da - te no - men, lau - da - te

no - men Do - mi - ni, Sit

Can - ta - te Do - mi -no can -

no can - ti-cum no vum, can

ti-cum no - - vum, can -

ta - - - - - te Do - mi-no o - mnis ter - ra.

organ accompaniment and the organ lines ar

'7 Oscar Mischiati comments on the importance of

Domenico Brunetti, Surrexitpastor, mm. -6

- xit pa - stor bo - nus,

sur - re - - - - xit pa-stor bo - nus

Que - ma-dmo-dum de - si - de - rat Cer -

- vus ad fon - - tes a-qua -

rum i - ta de - si- de-rat a - ni-ma me - a ad te De

us, i ta de-si -de-rat a - ni-ma me- a ad e De - us. Si -

ti - vit a - ni-ma me -a ad De-um fon-tem vi-vum, ve

Domenico Brunetti, Lux perpetua, mm. I0-14

Al - le- lu - ia, lae- ti- ti a sem-pi

ter - na su-per ca - pi -ta e - o - rum, lae -ti - ti -a

particularly in measures 75-78. The Palestrina style contrasts sharpl

although he describes the bass-soprano scores and the use of accident

perle musicali (Venice: R. Amadino, 161o),

7 (Venice: R. Amadino, 16 1'), pp. 59-65. This sect

basses in practical usage) continuing to appear infrequently for a while

should be and to help him avoid inadvertent contrapuntal errors-a very

78 See Tharald Borgir, "The Performance of the Basso Continuo in Seventeenth-Century

WORKS WITH ORGAN PARTS IN FULL SCORE

Orfeo Vecchi. Motectorum quae in communi sanctorum quatuor vocibus c

WORKS HAVING MULTIPLE-BASS SCORES

Giovanni Giacomo Gastoldi. Messe et motetti a otto voci. Venice: R. Amadi

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