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Music Performance Encounters;

Collaborations and Confrontations


John Koslovsky & Michiel Schuijer
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Music Performance Encounters

Why do most musical performers and musical researchers continue to inhabit


divergent epistemic spaces? To what extent is the act of musical performance
coextensive with the act of doing musical research, and vice versa? At what point
in the research process can a performative act transform into a scholarly one, and
a scholarly act into a performative one? These, and other related questions, form
the central focus of this book, with each chapter offering a fresh perspective on a
particular topic in music performance studies: improvisational traditions, historical
performance practices, analysis and performance, sports psychology, cross-cultural
musical interactions, and institutional challenges.
This book is aimed at music researchers, teachers, students, and practising
musicians interested in the intersection of academic and performance research;
as such, it seeks to bridge the divide between the research of university-trained
musicologists, scholars from other fields who focus on music, and the growing
community of musical artist-researchers. Material in this book is supported by
performance outcomes offered by the contributors on a separate YouTube channel
and on the Routledge online portal.

John Koslovsky is a professor of music history, theory, and analysis at KU Leuven


(since fall 2023). From 2010 to 2023, he was on the music theory and research
faculties at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam and was an affiliate researcher in the
humanities at Utrecht University. His research deals with the history of music theory,
Schenkerian analysis, music aesthetics, intertextuality, and performance studies.

Michiel Schuijer is a musicologist and music theorist, and currently head of


the research division at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. In his research, he
explores historical, sociological, and cultural perspectives on music theory. His
book Analyzing Atonal Music: Pitch-Class Set Theory and Its Contexts (2008) was
awarded the American Society for Music Theory Emerging Scholar Award in 2010.
Recent research interests include evolving notions of professionalism in music and
the role of heritage in musical culture. From 2020 through 2023, Schuijer was
project leader of the Academy for Musicology and Musicianship (Amsterdam,
Utrecht), a study programme combining the strengths of conservatory and university
education.
Routledge Research in Music

The Routledge Research in Music series is home to cutting-edge, upper-level


scholarly studies and edited collections. Considering music performance, theory,
and culture alongside topics such as gender, race, ecology, film, religion, politics,
and science, titles are characterized by dynamic interventions into established sub-
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Music, Place, and Identity in Italian Urban Soundscapes circa 1550-1860


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Shaping Sound and Society


The Cultural Study of Musical Instruments
Edited by Stephen Cottrell

Contemporary Musical Virtuosities


Edited by Louise Devenish and Cat Hope

Music and Identity in Twenty-First-Century Monasticism


Amanda J. Haste

Music Performance Encounters


Collaborations and Confrontations
Edited by John Koslovsky and Michiel Schuijer

For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge.com/


Routledge-Research-in-Music/book-series/RRM
Music Performance Encounters
Collaborations and Confrontations

Edited by John Koslovsky


and Michiel Schuijer
First published 2024
by Routledge
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and by Routledge
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© 2024 selection and editorial matter, John Koslovsky and Michiel Schuijer; individual
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Koslovsky, John, editor. | Schuijer, Michiel, editor.
Title: Music performance encounters: collaborations and confrontations /
edited by John Koslovsky and Michiel Schuijer.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon; New York: Routledge, 2023. |
Series: Routledge research in music series |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2023025504 (print) | LCCN 2023025505 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781032282169 (hardback) | ISBN 9781032282176 (paperback) |
ISBN 9781003295785 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Music—Performance. | Historically informed performance
(Music) | Musical analysis. | Music—Performance—Psychological aspects.
Classification: LCC ML457 .M8614 2023 (print) |
LCC ML457 (ebook) | DDC 780.78—dc23/eng/20230711
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023025504
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023025505

ISBN: 978-1-032-28216-9 (hbk)


ISBN: 978-1-032-28217-6 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-29578-5 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003295785
Typeset in Times New Roman
by codeMantra
The extra audio-visual material can be accessed via the online Routledge Music Research
Portal: www.routledgemusicresearch.co.uk.
Please enter the activation word RRMusic and your email address when prompted. You will
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The separate, public YouTube channel dedicated to this volume can be found at:
https://www.youtube.com/@musicperformanceencounters.
When it comes to the designation of musical pitches in a specific register, we have opted for
the “Helmholtz” system of notation: i.e., C‚, C, c, c′, c′′, c′′′, c′′′′. Pitch classes (irrespective of
register) have generally been indicated with capital letters.
Contents

List of Examples and Tables vii


List of Contributors xi
Preface xv
Acknowledgements xix

Introduction: “Who Are You?”: On Performers,


Scholars, Masters, and Pupils 1
MICHIEL SCHUIJER AND JOHN KOSLOVSKY

Critical Interlude 115


JOHN KOSLOVSKY

PART I
Tools of (Historical) Performance Practice17

1 “Che hanno contrapunto”: Counterpoint Training and


the Performance of Diminution in the Sixteenth and
Seventeenth Centuries 19
CATHERINE MOTUZ AND JOSUÉ MELÉNDEZ PELÁEZ

2 The Italian Imitative and Interdisciplinary Musical Ethos


of the Sixteenth Century: Ganassi’s Fontegara45
NUNO ATALAIA (PART I) AND TÍMEA NAGY (PART II)

3 Echos of Cor Alto and Cor Basse:


In Search of an Ideal Horn Sound 65
KATHRYN ZEVENBERGEN AND TEUNIS VAN DER ZWART
vi Contents

Critical Interlude 281


JOHN KOSLOVSKY

PART II
Scholars and Performers in Dialogue83

4 Analysing and Playing Chopin’s Nocturne op. 27, no. 1:


An Empirical Study of the Interaction between
an Analyst and a Performer 85
LUCA MARCONI AND STEFANO MALFERRARI

5 Resonant Openings: Collaborating on Crumb’s Nocturnes 106


MICHIKO THEURER AND DAPHNE LEONG

Critical Interlude 3127


MICHIEL SCHUIJER

PART III
Institutional Endeavours131

6 The Absent Teacher Approach 133


JOB TER HAAR, MICHALIS CHOLEVAS, AND JULIANO ABRAMOVAY

7 Preparing Music Students for a Public Recital: Applying


Principles of Practice from Sport Sciences and Other Disciplines 164
FRANK C. BAKKER, JAN KOUWENHOVEN, VALLE GONZÁLEZ MARTÍN,
AND RAÔUL R.D. OUDEJANS

Critical Interlude 4179


MICHIEL SCHUIJER

PART IV
Cultural Barriers and Embodied Knowledge181

8 Knowing the World through Music 183


BARBARA TITUS, SHISHANI VRANCKX, AND BART FERMIE

9 Performing Jennifer Walshe’s SELF-CARE205


ANDREAS BORREGAARD

Index217
Examples and Tables

Examples
1.1 L  uca Conforto, Breve et facile maniera d’essercitarsi a far
passaggi (1593), 3v, with extrapolated outcomes 20
1.2 Luca Conforto, Breve et facile maniera, 3v, with extrapolated
outcomes22
1.3 Diego Ortiz, Trattado de Glosas (1553) 23
1.4 Giovanni Maria Artusi, L’arte del contraponto (1598), 33 25
1.5 Gio. Maria e Bernardino Nanino, Regole di Contrappunto, Ms.
in fol., di carte 78, fol. 22v 25
1.6 Gio. Maria e Bernardino Nanino, Regole di Contrappunto, fol. 22v 26
1.7 Giovanni Battista Chiodino, Arte pratica, 38 27
1.8 Giovanni Battista Chiodino, Arte pratica, 16 27
1.9 Chiodino, Arte pratica, 45 27
1.10 Francesco Rognoni, Selva di varii Passaggi (1620), Part 1, 26 28
1.11 F  rancesco Rognoni, Selva di varii Passaggi, Part 1, 30, with
realisation29
1.12 Francesco Rognoni, Selva di varii Passaggi, Part 2, 43, with
transcription29
1.13 Riccardo Rognoni, Il vero modo di Diminuire, (1592), Part 2, 10 30
1.14 G.B. Bovicelli, Regole… (ed. Glenton, 2018), 10 31
1.15 Bovicelli, diminutions on Io son ferito, bars 140–end 31
1.16 Adrianus Petit Coclico, Compendium musices (Nürnberg, 1552),
gathering H-4v 33
2.1 Table of diminution in Ganassi’s Fontegara (1535, fol. 10v) 46
2.2 Matteo Pagano (1515–1588), Doge’s procession in Piazza San
Marco on Palm Sunday (detail) 47
2.3 Fontegara, Table of finger positions 53
3.1 The harmonic series showing the ranges of cor basse and cor alto66
3.2 Telemann, Concerto in D for Horn, TWV 51:D8 (1708–14),
Vivace, bars 11–20 68
3.3 Concerto ex Dis-dur, Lund no. 11, Allegro, bars 21–24 70
3.4 Concerto ex D-dur, Lund no. 13, Adagio bars 30–36 71
viii Examples and Tables

3.5 
Concerto ex D-dur del Sig. Gehra, Lund no. 17b, Allegro Molto,
pickup to bar 48–69 72
3.6 
Beethoven, Piano Concerto no. 5, op. 73 (1809–1811) first
movement, bars 393–402 73
3.7 
Beethoven, Symphony no. 7 (1811–1812), op. 92, second
movement, bars 114–122, wind parts only 74
3.8 
Beethoven, Symphony no. 8, op. 93 (1812–1813) third
movement, bars 52–56 74
3.9 
Beethoven, Overture to Fidelio, op. 72, (1814), bars 49–59,
clarinet and horn parts only 75
3.10 
Beethoven, Leonore Overture no. 1, op. 138, (1807),
bars 181–190; horn three and four and clarinet parts only 75
3.11 
Beethoven, Symphony no. 9, (1823–1824); third movement:
fourth horn in E, bars 82–98 76
3.12 
Beethoven, Sonata op. 17 in F major, 1st movement, bars 160–162 77
4.1 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 1–11 87
4.2 
Debussy, “La Cathédrale Engloutie,” bars 16–19 88
4.3 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 84–85 89
4.4 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 17–22 92
4.5 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 26–32 92
4.6 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 45–52 93
4.7 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 91–95 93
4.8 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 29–40 96
4.9 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 45–52 97
4.10 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 61–83 99
4.11 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, first unit of the cadenza 100
4.12 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, second unit of the cadenza 100
4.13 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, third unit of the cadenza 100
4.14 
Chopin, Nocturne, op. 27, no. 1, bars 84–101 101
5.1 
Nocturne I, system 1 109
5.2 
Nocturne I, system 2, beginning 111
5.3 
Nocturne III 112
5.4 
Violin calls 114
5.5 
Scrape gesture in piano (Nocturne I, system 4) 115
Lorca, Nocturno del hueco, Part II
5.6  116
5.7 
Nocturne IV, systems 3–4 117
5.8 
Nocturne IV, systems 1–2 118
5.9 
Ligeti, Étude Book 1 No. 1 “Désordre,” ending.  121
6.1 
Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 1–16 137
6.2 
Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 17–18 137
6.3 
Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement, bar 17 138
6.4 
Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 23–32 138
Examples and Tables ix

6.5  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 43–45 138
6.6  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 57–64 139
6.7 Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 60–61 (based on a sketch). After Gajewski 1988 139
6.8  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 57–67 (Paris: Brandus, [post 1858]). Reproduced from
Franchomme’s personal copy 140
6.9  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 78–80 140
6.10  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 94–107 141
6.11  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 110–111 141
6.12  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 110-112. Friedrich Grützmacher (ed.), Fr. Chopins
Sämtliche Violoncell-Werke. ­Leipzig: Peters, [ante 1918] 142
6.13  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 168–178 142
6.14  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement, bar 223 142
6.15  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 219–223. (Paris: Brandus, [post 1858]). Reproduced from
Franchomme’s personal copy 143
6.16  Chopin, Sonata for Piano and Cello, op. 65, first movement,
bars 224–228 143
6.17 Representation of cadential and passing tones in taksim
transcriptions according to Aydemir 144
6.18  Rast Perde on the G staff 146
6.19 Phrase without and with Çarpma 147
6.20 Notating glissandi147
6.21 Phrases notated according to their rhythmic groupings 147
6.22 Groupings annotated on metric phrases 148
6.23 A pitch contour as represented in Sonic Visualizer 148
6.24a A makam scale map 149
6.24b The contour of Example 6.23 projected on the makam scale map 149
6.25 Double melodic curve 150
6.26 Complementary staff score and melodic contour 151
6.27  Transcription of the phrases from 0ʹ20ʺ to 0ʹ28ʺ of Ercüment
Batanay’s taksim improvisation on makam Hüseynî156
6.28 Transcription of the phrases from 5ʹ21ʺ to 5ʹ25ʺ of Ercüment
Batanay’s ­taksim improvisation on makam Hüseynî156
6.29 Transcription of the phrases from 3ʹ19ʺ to 3ʹ24ʺ, and from 5ʹ21ʺ
to 5ʹ25ʺ of Ercüment Batanay’s taksim improvisation
on makam Hüseynî156
x Examples and Tables

6.30 T ranscription of the phrases from 3ʹ02ʺ to 3ʹ07ʺ of Ercüment


Batanay’s ­taksim improvisation on makam Hüseynî156
6.31 Transcription of the phrases from 0ʹ34ʺ to 0ʹ40ʺ of Ercüment
Batanay’s taksim improvisation on makam Hüseynî156
6.32 Transcription of the phrases from 2ʹ21ʺ to 2ʹ28ʺ of Ercüment
Batanay’s ­taksim improvisation on makam Hüseynî156
8.1 The cycle of encounter, transformation, and creation 184
8.2 Marvin Gaye’s riff for “Sexual Healing” (1982) and Shwi
noMtekhala’s riff for “Ngafa” (2003) 189

Tables
4.1 Communicative/expressive effects in Chopin’s Nocturne,
op. 27, no. 1 91
7.1 Time table of the study lab 171
7.2 Scores for use of reflection and the 20 + 5 schedule immediately
and one year after finishing the SL 172
7.3 Scores for the assignments stimulating the use of an external
focus of attention immediately and one year after finishing the SL 173
7.4 Imagery assignment scores, immediately and one year after the
SL (2016: n = 5) 173
7.5 Scores for the general questions about the SL, both immediately
and one year after finishing the SL. (n = 12) 173
7.6 Performance assessment by the main teachers (only in 2016: n = 6) 173
Contributors

Juliano Abramovay is a Brazilian music researcher, educator, and guitar player


based in the Netherlands. Juliano works at Codarts (NL) as an artistic research
coach and as a tutor for the RASL Minor, which is a collaboration between
Codarts, Erasmus University College, and Willem de Kooning. He is a PhD
candidate in Ethnomusicology at Durham University.
Nuno Atalaia is a Portuguese researcher and musician based in the Netherlands.
His work explores the intersections between new media, performance, and the
history of the voice. He is Co-director and Founding Member of the musical
ensemble Seconda Prat!ca. He is currently completing a doctoral degree within
the ERC-funded project “Platform Discourses: A Critical Humanities Approach
to the Texts, Images, and Moving Images Produced by Tech Companies.”
Frank C. Bakker (1948), until his retirement in 2013, was Associate Professor
at the Faculty of Human Movement Sciences (HMS) of the Vrije Universiteit
Amsterdam (VUA), and responsible for the Sport Psychology Program of the
Faculty. After his retirement, he was appointed at the Conservatorium van Am-
sterdam (CvA). In close collaboration with Jan Kouwenhoven and Jaap Kooi,
he developed the so-called Study Lab.
Andreas Borregaard (Denmark, 1981) communicates the accordion’s fascinating
qualities and palette of expressions to a wide audience as a soloist and chamber
musician. He is actively influencing the development of this young instrument’s
use and repertoire. Andreas Borregaard is Accordion Professor at the Hannover
University of Music, Drama and Media.
Michalis Cholevas was born in Athens, Greece, in 1977. His musical education
started at the age of 5, with classical piano, jazz piano, and eastern Mediterra-
nean music studies until his early 20s. He followed MSc studies and completed
MA studies in music performance, the latter, for which he holds a PhD title in
makam music analysis.
Bart Fermie (percussionist and educator) studied Cuban and Brazilian percus-
sion in New York, Havana, and Amsterdam. Apart from teaching at the Amster-
dam and Rotterdam Universities of the Arts, he invented instruments for Pearl
xii Contributors

Percussion. Fermie has collaborated with international artists like Branford


Marsalis, Randy Crawford, and Maria Schneider.
Dr. Job ter Haar studied at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. He is one of
the founding members of the Ives Ensemble, has toured major concert halls in
Europe and the USA, and has recorded a large number of prize-winning CDs.
He has performed with groups such as the Van Swieten Society, the Hortus
Ensemble, and the Archduke Ensemble. Next to his performing career, Job ter
Haar works at Codarts Rotterdam as a research supervisor and at the HKB in
Bern as a cello teacher.
Jan Kouwenhoven was an oboist for the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra from
1973 to 2015 and taught at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam until 2022.
­During his time as a teacher, he began to investigate the applicability of sport
sciences to music performance. To this end, he developed a course with Frank
Bakker and Jaap Kooi called the “Study Lab,” which was intended to help stu-
dents deliver peak musical performances under pressure.
Daphne Leong’s work, which focuses on rhythm, analysis and performance, and
music since 1900, appears in her book Performing Knowledge: Twentieth-­
Century Music in Analysis and Performance; in journals such as Journal of
Music Theory, Perspectives of New Music, and Music Theory Online; and in
edited collections. Leong is an active pianist and chamber musician, whose per-
formances and recordings include premieres of current music.
Stefano Malferrari received his diploma with honours from the conserva-
toire “G. Rossini” of Pesaro under the guide of Franco Scala. After that,
he continued his studies with the pianists Jörg Demus and György Sándor.
Classified among the winners of a few international competitions, he gave
concerts in ­Europe, central and south America, and Asia. Besides teach-
ing at the conservatoire “G. B. Martini” of Bologna, he held courses and
conference-concerts for several Italian musical institutions. Moreover, he
is Director of the book series “Chiavi d’ascolto” [Listening Keys] (Albisani
Editions).
Luca Marconi (1960–2019) taught “Music Pedagogy” and “History of Popular
Music” in the “Luisa D’Annunzio” Conservatory of music in Pescara (Italy).
He has published on the relationship between musical communication and the
analysis of music; in addition, he has published the volume Musica Espressione
Emozione (CLUEB, Bologna, 2001) and, with Gino Stefani, the book La melo-
dia (Bompiani, Milano, 1992).
Valle González Martín obtained the Oboe Bachelor’s Degree in 2014 from
the Real Conservatorio Superior de Música de Madrid. Later on, she moved
to the Netherlands, where she completed the Oboe Master’s Degree and the
Bachelor’s program in Baroque Oboe at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam,
complementing these studies at the Hochschule für Künste in Bremen. She cur-
rently combines music teaching and oboe playing with modern and historicist
groups.
Contributors xiii

Josué Meléndez Peláez (cornetto and recorder) studied music at institutions in


Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. He founded
the Festival Santo Domingo de Música Antigua and is Founder and Co-director
of the group I Fedeli. Meléndez Peláez is a specialist in the improvisation of
Renaissance and Baroque music and teaches cornett, diminution, and improvi-
sation at the universities of music in Frankfurt (HfMDK), Trossingen (HFM),
and Bremen (HFK).
Catherine Motuz pursues an active career as a performer, teacher, and scholar. She
is a co-artistic director of Ensemble I Fedeli and has performed and recorded
with numerous ensembles including the Freiburger and Amsterdam Baroque
Orchestras, Bach Collegium Japan, Concerto Palatino, Abendmusiken Basel,
the English Cornetto and Sackbut Ensemble, and ¡Sacabuche! Since 2018, she
has taught at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, where she studied historical
trombone with Charles Toet from 2004 to 2007.
Tímea Nagy (Hungarian poet, recorder, and cornetto player [1985]) obtained her
recorder diploma from ESMuC, Barcelona, and Master’s degrees in cornetto
from HEM, Geneva. She has collaborated with ensembles such as Cappella
Mediterranea, Concert Brisée, Collegium 1704, Lucidarium, and Sollazzo.
Grant holder of the Hans Wilsdorf Foundation (Geneva) and the Giorgio Cini
Foundation (Venice), she worked as Research Assistant at HEM, Geneva, for
the project “The Ganassi Enigma,” directed by William Dongois.
Raôul R.D. Oudejans is (Associate) Professor of Sport and Performance Psychology,
Department of Human Movement Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and
Centre of Expertise Urban Vitality, Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences,
the Netherlands. His main research and teaching areas are perceiving and moving
in sports and other high-pressure contexts such as police work and performing
arts, with an emphasis on the psychological factors involved in performing.
Michiko Theurer uses sound, visuals, words, and movement to cultivate spaces
for shared wonder and community. Recent musical collaborations include pre-
mieres of ensemble works by Meredith Monk, Tyshawn Sorey, and Susie Ibarra
and a ceremony for collective witnessing at the Boston Public Library. As a PhD
candidate in musicology at Stanford University, she is currently producing a
multimedia companion for liberatory practice.
Barbara Titus is Associate Professor of Cultural Musicology at the University
of Amsterdam (UvA). She is the author of two books, Hearing Maskanda
(Bloomsbury 2022) and Recognizing Music as an Art Form (Leuven UP 2016),
and she is the curator of the Jaap Kunst Collection at the UvA.
Shishani Vranckx is a multi award-winning and internationally touring artist
whose versatility in music transcends genres and cultures. Her work expresses
a strong sense of social consciousness and intersects between research and art
performance. Her academic writing focuses on Namibia’s cultural heritage. She
has founded various projects (such as Namibian Tales, Miss Catharsis & Sister-
hood) highlighting marginalised perspectives.
xiv Contributors

Kathryn Zevenbergen’s skills on both the historic and modern horn keep her in
high demand as an orchestral and chamber music player. She holds two master’s
degrees, one in Horn Pedagogy from the Zurich School of the Arts, and one in
Early Music Performance from the Amsterdam Conservatory. She studied with
Nigel Downing, Glen Borling, and Teunis van der Zwart. Kathryn performs
regularly with La Chapelle Ancienne (Switzerland) and Solomon’s Knot (UK)
while living and teaching in Germany.
Teunis van der Zwart is one of the leading historical horn players of his gen-
eration. He is an internationally renowned specialist in historically informed
performance practice and active as a soloist, chamber music player, teacher,
and speaker. Van der Zwart is a principal subject teacher and Head of the Early
Music Department at the Royal Conservatoire The Hague.
Preface

Today, research into musical performance seems like a self-evident undertaking.


And yet, the ascendancy of performance-related research has been rather late within
the larger discourse of musical research, having begun in earnest in the 1970s and
having established itself as a genuine field of study only in the 1990s. Because of
the relative lateness of this field, a number of crucial questions remain unaddressed.
Why, for instance, do most musical performers and musical researchers continue to
inhabit divergent epistemic spaces? How have some tried to overcome these imag-
ined spaces? To what extent is the act of musical performance coextensive with the
act of doing musical research, and vice versa? And, at what point in the research
process can a performative act transform into a scholarly one, and a scholarly act
into a performative one? These, and other related questions, form the central focus
of Music Performance Encounters: Collaborations and Confrontations.
Based on a symposium organised at the Muziekgebouw aan ‘t IJ in Amsterdam,
the Netherlands (Researching Performance, Performing Research, October 2017,
henceforth “RPPR”), this volume brings together twenty-one musicians and schol-
ars to reflect on the relationship between musical performance and musical research
today, as well as to highlight the manifold ways in which “performers” and “schol-
ars” interact. To this end, each multi-authored chapter offers a fresh perspective on
a particular topic in music performance studies: improvisational traditions, (his-
torical) performance practices, analysis and performance, sports psychology, cross-
cultural musical interactions, embodiment, interdisciplinarity, and institutional
challenges. The voices offer not only a polyphony of perspectives, but they also
foreground divergent strategies towards the very discursivity of musical thought.
In recent years, and most notably in places such as the UK, Australia, and the
Scandinavian countries, research into musical performance has gained momentum
through so-called “artistic” or “practice-based” approaches, but it has also become
an integral part of traditional disciplines such as historical musicology, ethnomusi-
cology, and music analysis. In addition, areas such as cognitive science and sports
psychology have sought to understand better the nature of musical performance
as an activity of the human mind and body. And given the greater “performative
turn” in music studies as a whole, musical-scholarly practice has itself undergone
vast transformations over the past thirty years, in which attention has been paid not
xvi Preface

just towards the objects of research but also towards the ways in which scholars
go about practising their métier—in other words, how they perform their research.
As indicated in this book’s subtitle, a central aim of this volume is to explore the
manifold collaborations, but also the possible confrontations, that such research en-
genders. In contrast to other studies in music performance research, this volume as
a whole will highlight the complex interactions and negotiations between scholarly
and performative modes of discourse, whether they are expressed through multiple
individuals or embodied within one and the same person. In doing this, it allows for a
kaleidoscope of perspectives and discursive voices: such “voices” can be heard and
seen not only through the diverse musical topics on offer but also through the many
divergent approaches to writing, performing, and “researching” more generally.
Music Performance Encounters consists of four main parts, with a total of nine
chapters: (I) Tools of (Historical) Performance Practice; (II) Scholars and Per-
formers in Dialogue; (III) Institutional Endeavours; and (IV) Cultural Barriers and
Embodied Knowledge. Each main chapter (with the exception of Chapter 9) is
multi-authored and involves the collaboration of a scholar, a performer, and/or a
performer-scholar.
In Part I, three contributions from the area of historically informed perfor-
mance practice will centre around both the physical and conceptual “tools” that
give rise to performance-related questions, such as musical instruments, histori-
cal treatises, diminution practices, or the interaction with other artforms. Part II
zooms in on scholars and performers collaborating at the individual level. Devoted
to the musical nocturne, each chapter involves two individuals grappling with per-
formance and a­ nalytical issues in a single piece of music: respectively, Frédéric
Chopin’s Nocturne op. 27, no. 1 in C minor, and George Crumb’s Four Nocturnes.
Also divided into two chapters, Part III takes a look at scholars and performers
undertaking research on behalf of supporting institutions in the Netherlands: in
one case, by bringing together musicians within a single institution (Codarts Rot-
terdam) to explore what it means to “learn from an absent teacher”; in the other, by
bringing the insights from sports psychology to bear on the study and performance
of music, in a collaboration involving multiple institutions (the Conservatorium
van Amsterdam, the VU University, and the Amsterdam University of Applied
Sciences). Finally, the two chapters of Part IV explore issues of power, prestige,
and embodiment between different cultures, and demonstrate techniques that ex-
pose musicians to new types of physicality in their performances of contemporary
composition.
Because this volume brings together such a wealth of musical traditions, cul-
tures, practices, and methodological perspectives, we felt it necessary to provide
the readership with more of the critical context surrounding each individual con-
tribution, and to elaborate on some of the underlying themes of the volume as
a whole—that is, beyond what a preface or introduction might offer. We there-
fore precede each of the four parts with a “Critical Interlude,” as a way of both
contextualising more deeply the contributions offered in each part and offering
a critical comparison of those chapters vis-à-vis the others. While other recent
Preface xvii

multi-authored volumes in musical performance studies have made similar use of


“interventions” and “insights” from experts in the field, in the case of Music Per-
formance Encounters the interludes are written solely by the editors—in this way,
our role goes beyond the editorial, as we guide the reader more actively through
the volume. With these critical interludes in place, along with our introductory
chapter, we thus seek to incorporate our own narrative voice into the main thread
of the book.
Another indispensable feature of this book, though one that has become part
and parcel of many performance studies volumes, is the audio and visual compo-
nent. Because the 2017 symposium was recorded professionally, each contribution
will include not just a written text but also audio-visual material, drawn either
directly from the symposium or (in the case of a revised or expanded version) from
a later recording. These musical contributions offer not only polished performance
products but also real-time processing of musical material: be it a performer en-
countering a score for the first time; performer-scholars in rehearsal mode; or a
scholar and performer in direct dialogue in front of an audience. All original video
material is offered on a public YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/@mu-
sicperformanceencounters). The full URL to the playlist for each chapter is offered
in the first endnote to each respective chapter, and hyperlinks are given at the first
mention of each MPE video (e-book only). Supplementary text and other materials
are provided through the online portal hosted by Routledge, and will be indicated
at the appropriate place in the text (www.routledgemusicresearch.co.uk). Links to
external sites will be provided in the endnotes within the text (without hyperlink).
These online resources are construed as an integral part of this volume.
Since the publication of this volume comes roughly six years after the initial
symposium, the question may arise as to whether the recorded material is still rel-
evant, and whether it will remain relevant in the future. Like all published “texts,”
some of the contributions will maintain a certain time-stamp, as they either were
produced at the 2017 symposium or were recorded on a separate occasion. This is
the case for Chapters 3, 4, 5, 7, and 9. However, some of the contributions are still
in the process of development or will invite continual interactivity and updating.
While Chapters 1, 2, and 6 will all include media content that was made in 2021 or
later (in addition to incorporating content from the symposium), Chapter 8 blends
pre-recorded material (from various times and venues) and actively invites read-
ers to respond to their material. Because we have chosen to use a public YouTube
channel, the readership is encouraged to interact with this volume by providing
comments, links, and other forms of response through this channel.
As mentioned above, the selection of musical repertoire, cultures, and method-
ologies in this volume is highly diverse. It includes a variety of practices, theories,
and traditions from the sixteenth through twenty-first centuries, and from various
places on the globe. It is because of such variety that the kinds of “voices” that
are brought to bear on these practices are also multiplicitous, whether they be aca-
demic, anecdotal, performative, pedagogical, poetic, or scientific (with all of the
slippery connotations such designations bring). In this way, we did not privilege
xviii Preface

one kind of voice over another, but instead allowed for (and indeed encouraged)
a productive disparity between the various modes of expression and articulation
from the authors. We hope that the reader too will appreciate such a diversity of
approaches and voices.
This, we believe, is what will distinguish Music Performance Encounters from
many other volumes on musical performance—it is, in a word, a more “grassroots”
and eclectic approach to the topic. Thus, rather than attempting to streamline the
methodology between the contributions, or to create a volume in which individual
authors weigh in on a particular topic, we wish to confront readers with a more
diffuse and heterogeneous assortment of musical identities, backgrounds, and as-
pirations, with the aim of providing a space for practitioners, educators, and schol-
ars to express their voices in a multitude of ways: through words, images, bodily
movements, and of course sounds. We thus firmly believe that such a volume will
provide an important contribution to the ever-growing community of musicians
and scholars concerned with performance and artistic research. And while it was
not a deliberate choice of the volume, many, but not all, of the contributions are
from performers and scholars operating within the Netherlands. In this way, the
volume partially documents the variety of performance-related research practices
coming out of this country.
In the end, this book is intended for anyone interested in the intersection of
academic and performance research: scholars, teachers, students, and practising
musicians. Given the diversity of topics, repertoires, cultures, and strategies, we
hope that the book will be of use for a wide range of people and for both research
and educational purposes. If anything, it aims to offer a space in which the many
modes of music performance research can interact with one another.
John Koslovsky
Amsterdam, the Netherlands
31 August 2022
Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the anonymous reviewers of this book for their productive
critical remarks. Without these, the volume would not have taken the form it has.
We would also like to thank the senior editor of the music division at Routledge,
Heidi Bishop, for her interest and unwavering support for our project, as well as
Kaushikee Sharma and Tassia Watson for their logistical support. John Rink was
generous to provide advice to us at various stages of this project—we are grateful
for the many fruitful conversations we have had with him. Institutional support has
also proven vital to the completion of this work: first and foremost from the Con-
servatorium van Amsterdam, which helped us organise the 2017 symposium and
provided the necessary space and funding for the realisation of this book volume;
and the University of Amsterdam, Utrecht University, the VU University Amster-
dam, and the Amsterdam Orgelpark, all of which contributed to the organisation
of the symposium. Finally, we would like to thank all of the contributors to this
volume for their commitment to seeing this publication to completion and for the
talents and expertise they have brought to the world through this work.
Introduction
“Who Are You?”: On Performers,
Scholars, Masters, and Pupils

Michiel Schuijer and John Koslovsky

On Performers and Scholars (Michiel Schuijer)


No art has engendered so much written scholarship as music. And yet no art has
divided scholars and practitioners more. These seem like two contradictory ob-
servations, but they are not. In medieval times, the word “music” could refer to
different fields of endeavour. Apart from being a performing art, music was also
a science, an object of intellectual speculation presumed to offer a window on
the natural world. As such, it was an integral part of the medieval university cur-
riculum. Therefore, the music scholar (or musicus), authoring treatises on musical
sound, proportion, and tuning, was many steps higher on the societal ladder than
the practising musician (cantor). The former was on a par with lawyers and clerics.
The latter was ranked between sorcerers and gravediggers to judge from Tommaso
Garzoni’s Piazza universale di tutte professioni del mondo (1586).1
Has this early division of labour in the music field sealed the relationship be-
tween music scholars and practising musicians in Western society? Does it have a
bearing on the ways representatives of these groups look at each other’s occupa-
tions today? Higher education still offers separate pathways for both. And these
pathways may even run through different kinds of institutions: on the one hand,
conservatories, academies of music, and Musikhochschulen; on the other, liberal
arts colleges and universities.
However, beneath this institutional landscape, fault lines have been shifting.
Diverse occupational communities have successfully claimed a stake in producing
knowledge and developing advanced education. This is not a recent phenomenon.
In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the rise of such professionalism led to
a proliferation of practice-driven degree programs at universities and vocational
schools combining practical training with theoretical education.
An outstanding example is how primary and secondary school teachers attained
professional status. When in the late eighteenth century national states took control
of their training, this gave them greater autonomy towards the local communities in
which they were employed. And out of the efforts to regulate the practice, develop
a relevant knowledge base, and establish general teaching standards, has grown a
proficient and self-reliant community of pedagogues. However, what ultimately
defined pedagogy as a professional discipline was not the body of knowledge and

DOI: 10.4324/9781003295785-1
2 Michiel Schuijer and John Koslovsky

skills this community maintained, but the broader relevance of this body and its ca-
pacity to inform other fields, like psychology, sociology, and educational sciences.
António Novóa, an eminent Portuguese educational scholar and administrator, has
explained what paradox this created. When teaching elevated to the status of a pro-
fession, this led to a division between university-based educational scholars on the
one hand, and highly skilled practitioners in the classroom on the other, resulting
in a “de-legitimation of the latter as producers of knowledge.”2
In this respect, engineers fared better, especially in Germany, where technical
colleges (Technische Hochschulen) fought a long battle for their societal recogni-
tion. The rapidly growing industry in the German states from 1850 onwards and
the need for a robust infrastructure to support it made the supply of engineers emi-
nently important. Yet, in Germany’s rigidly stratified class system, graduates of the
technical colleges did not hold the same status as those of the university. Therefore,
in 1899, emperor Wilhelm II conferred the right on these colleges to award the doc-
toral degree for original research, which was until that time the prerogative of uni-
versities. There has been debate about whether the colleges have brought technical
education under the rule of science—to the detriment of the craftsmanship and tacit
knowledge of earlier generations of engineers—or instead succeeded in uniting
engineering practice and scientific theory.3 But this debate itself has become po-
larised between academic engineers and graduates from nonacademic engineering
schools, who often found themselves competing for the same positions.4
These two examples show how professionalism could arise in various occu-
pational fields and help raise their societal prestige. Meanwhile, institutional
structures continued to separate the “thinkers” from the “doers,” hampering their
conversation.
As for this rising professionalism, music, it must be said, was a slow starter. The
music conservatories mushrooming in nineteenth-century Europe did not make a
similar dent in professional society as the teacher institute or the technical col-
lege. In their founding acts and annual reports, some compared themselves to a
university, like the Royal College of Music in London (founded in 1883)5 and the
Amsterdam Conservatory (founded in 1884).6 Others mentioned the “scientific”
status of the music profession (Leipzig, 1843). Still, it was unclear what that meant
for the practice and study of music.
For example, in Leipzig, the conservatory founders (Felix Mendelssohn was
one of them) stated that “theoretically and practically, its instruction covers all
branches of music, considered a science and art.”7 Rebecca Grotjahn has argued
that it was not so much the university as the German gymnasium that served them
as a reference point. The new institution provided budding musicians a place for
their Bildung.8 Judging from the continuation of the proclamation, it offered a com-
prehensive program of general learning, including harmony and composition, in-
strumental and vocal performance, and “lectures on musical literature, aesthetics,
and other parts of the science of music [Musikwissenschaft].” Unfortunately, this
ambitious program didn’t fulfil its promise, partly because of an over-permissive
entrance policy of the conservatory, resulting in a highly uneven student-teacher
ratio and a total lack of supervision, and partly because of a rather exclusive and
Introduction 3

unyielding orientation on the Viennese classical repertoire.9 In its conservatism, the


institute equalled the old universities of England.
In 1895, the music scholar Hugo Riemann, an alumnus of the Leipzig conserva-
tory, uttered a scathing critique of the education offered at German conservatories.
He wrote that these schools took no responsibility for students’ general education
and did not enable them to grow as articulate artists, knowledgeable professionals,
and autonomous citizens. Instead, they gave them “exclusive training in applied
music.”10 Riemann was not as harsh as Anton Schindler, Beethoven’s dodgy first
biographer, who had scolded such schools for breeding a “musical proletariat.”11
But his critique was all the more relevant, coming from one aiming to establish a
meaningful corpus of professional knowledge in music.12
And it was to remain valid for a considerable time, too. Seventy-one years later,
Allen Sigel proved Riemann’s judgment to apply still to some European conserva-
tories. Sigel, an American clarinetist teaching at the State University of New York
at Stony Brook, had visited six leading institutions in Europe during the 1966–1967
academic year and reported his findings in an issue of the College Music Sym-
posium. Although impressed by the level of musical competency students were
exposed to, he marvelled at the limited range of the education most European con-
servatories offered. The only requirements common to all programs, Sigel noted,
were the study of an instrument and the training of sight-reading and aural skills.
“Other subjects, such as harmony, counterpoint, orchestration, conducting, music
history, secondary instrument, ensemble, and non-music subjects are not uniformly
required of, or available to, all students.”13
These conditions have not been conducive to the involvement of practising
musicians in the pursuit of knowledge and collective understanding. Indeed, they
helped the medieval opposition of music practice to scholarship survive, as no-
ticed by sociologists concerned with professional culture. “Success in music,” Jon
Frederickson and James F. Rooney wrote in 1990, “is measured through readily
observable skill, not through certification of knowledge. Doing is more important
than knowing.”14
But is it really? Experienced musicians generally know what they do. Moreover,
there is a vast body of reference to prove it. Alongside speculative music theory—
whose revered traditions of canonics and the harmony of the spheres started to
wane in the seventeenth century (but at the same time veered towards the study of
acoustics and later tone psychology in the nineteenth century)—other discourses
have evolved. First-hand musical knowledge and experience have been gathered
in treatises on composition, orchestration, keyboard improvisation, and accompa-
niment; in guides to control musical affect and expression; in taxonomies of mu-
sical genre and style; and in instrumental and vocal methods. In addition, more
informal written documentation survived that sheds light on music performance
considerations: private correspondences, compositional sketches, and annotated
performance materials.
Not all music performance traditions have left such a legacy of writing. And ex-
tant written legacies, such as those engendered by the practices of notated music in
Europe and the Americas, continue to raise questions, mainly, and not surprisingly,
4 Michiel Schuijer and John Koslovsky

when it comes to performance. Curiously, however, their study became the


­province of a new form of music scholarship, musicology, which developed not as
a consequence of the professionalisation of musicians but modelled itself after aca-
demic disciplines such as history, philology, ethnography, and the natural sciences.
It looked at scores and relevant textual sources for a historically and theoretically
informed understanding of musical practices. It offered music publishers guidance
to supply reliable performance materials. And it helped articulate certain standards
of musical artistry and excellence.
The person to whom musicology owes its birth certificate, Guido Adler, wrote
that this new academic discipline distinguished itself from other, more established
ones not by its approach but solely by its object.15 With this remark, he implic-
itly granted music scholars a superior discursive position compared to performers,
whose practice was different from that of traditional scholars altogether—that is
to say, in both its object and approach. It is important to note that Adler and other
pioneering musicologists had received a great deal of musical education (Adler
studied with Anton Bruckner at the Vienna Conservatory) but had earned their aca-
demic credentials in disciplines such as law, history, theology, or philosophy.16 In
that respect, they served as role models for many future scholar-performers. Com-
bining a diploma in music performance or composition with a related university
degree would become a particularly successful inroad to music scholarship.
At the same time, the conjunction “scholar-performer” suggests that, in the
words of Frederickson and Rooney, the music occupation indeed had “failed to
become a profession.” It offered no rewards for performers advancing new knowl-
edge, skills, and technologies and exploring music’s broader relevance. Instead,
self-motivated individuals pursued such aspirations on their own initiative. The
extent to which educational institutions facilitated this differed from country to
country. Schools of music accommodated by universities, or conservatories col-
laborating with them, offered resources that could nurture young musicians’ pro-
fessionalism. Such institutional relationships had been common in the United
States, which explains Allen Sigel’s surprise at the curricular insularity of most of
the European conservatories he visited in the 1960s. Only a single institution, the
Detmold Musikhochschule, had struck Sigel positively. It offered students “a good
general education, a broad musical education,” and they developed “true expertise”
in a specific musical area.17
This was no coincidence. In the preceding decades, many German conservato-
ries, music schools, and music academies had been transformed into Musikhochs-
chulen. As such, they held a status equal to universities before the law. The German
Länder ministers of education and cultural affairs issued a proclamation to that
effect in September 1967.18 This status did not alter the primary allegiance of these
institutions, which still was to the teaching of talented young musicians. But it
mandated them to secure an appropriate level of general education in the earlier
phases of study. From the early 1980s on, they could also award doctoral degrees
in musicology and music pedagogy.19
In Britain, on the other hand, the path for practising musicians to contribute to
knowledge, scholarship, and professional development was circuitous, requiring
Introduction 5

them to combine two studies or accumulate them one after the other. Here, the 1992
Further and Higher Education Act brought change. It introduced a single funding
structure for universities, polytechnic schools, and a select number of independent
colleges.20 Under the terms of the Act, polytechnics could adopt the title of uni-
versity. Consequently, their music departments could apply for research funds and
award the full range of academic degrees to philosophiae doctor. The same held for
independent professional music schools, although offering a PhD required a liaison
with a university in most cases.
Today, similar arrangements have emerged throughout Europe and beyond:
art academies with university status, whether or not renamed “universities of the
arts” or “universities of music and performing arts,” like in Germany, Austria,
and Finland; conservatories amalgamated with universities, like in Australia and
New Zealand; music and other art academies that have created doctoral programs
in partnership with one or more universities (France, Belgium, the Netherlands);
and research universities offering artistic doctoral degrees beside scholarly ones
(Sweden). These arrangements reflect a trajectory of higher education in the past
decades towards greater accessibility and comparable levels of achievement across
domains. But they also speak to the role of research and experimentation in mod-
ern art practice itself, in its constant search for meaning and value.21 By furthering
“artistic research”—or “(artistic) practice as research,” as it is called in Britain—
they carved out a space for the creative and performing arts to contribute to pro-
fessional society as well as to artistic culture.22 Thus, like teachers and engineers
before them, artists could define, claim, and develop, within the academy, a domain
of knowledge hitherto deemed mainly “practical”—a domain, moreover, that had
been valued precisely because of its qualities resisting academisation.23
It would seem that multiple avenues for the professionalisation of musicians and
their involvement in scholarly practices are now available. Have they helped dis-
solve barriers between music scholars and musical performers at long last? Have
they led to more integration between their métiers? The answer is not an unequivo-
cal yes or no. Such barriers still exist, despite the avenues passing over them. They
involve not only institutional cultures and practices but also professional identi-
ties. And with the latter come special skills, research interests, modes of learning
and communication, and definitions of achievement. There are performing artists
whose work is explorative and breaking new ground but who are wary of having to
meet standards of academic accountability. And there is formal scientific research
that can be highly relevant for musical performers without requiring their exper-
tise. (Performance psychology is a case in point here.)
Moreover, music scholarship itself has been divided all along. Besides the study
and interpretation of documented legacies of music and musical thought, it has
spawned other methods of knowledge acquisition: methods that concern oral mu-
sic traditions (ethnographic field study and participant observation) and methods
tailored to the study of music perception and cognition (experimentation in labora-
tory settings). This division of labour and expertise has long prevented musicology
from discussing music as performance more generally. Ethnomusicologists were
better equipped for this than historical musicologists and music theorists, who, as
6 Michiel Schuijer and John Koslovsky

a result of their longtime involvement with questions concerning notated music,


tended to view performance as a mere act of delivery. Those thoroughly trained
to read and interpret scores, lead sheets, tablatures, etc., often lacked the means
(or the interest) to come to terms with something as ephemeral as a performance
event—let alone bring performance knowledge to bear on other fields of inquiry.
However, in the last thirty years or so, performance has become an area of inter-
est for music scholars of all stripes. In fact, it has evolved into a distinct branch of
music scholarship, cutting across divisions of genre and culture. With performers
of early music addressing issues of performance style, historical recordings creat-
ing diversity in the music supply market, and pop, jazz, and improvised music
sparking musicological interest, new avenues for music research opened besides
those concerned with the agency of the composer and the score. While such re-
search was facilitated by technology to extract relevant data from recorded per-
formances, it had to develop a critical apparatus to deal with the mediating effects
of audio recording and studio production. In other words, it had to take multiple
agencies into account, which was unusual in studies of western art music. It is no
coincidence that those who made a name for pioneering such research, like Dorot-
tya Fabian, Nicholas Cook, Robert Philip, and John Rink, came from precisely this
background.
Cook has traced the impetus for studying performance in other areas than music,
even beyond the performing arts. He situated this practice as part of a performative
turn in all humanities and social sciences, which had already led to such divergent
outcomes as John Austin’s speech act theory, developed in the 1950s, and Judith
Butler’s book Gender Trouble from 1990.24 Following these two authors and oth-
ers who have applied the concept in their fields of study, like literary theorists and
cultural anthropologists, we can see performance as a constituent of all social and
language behaviour and as the expression of a specific functional knowledge. It is
how one projects one’s identity in the public space, as a representative of a culture
or social class; as a member of a gender or age group; or as an artist, scholar, or
other professional.
Seen thus, performance may constitute the common ground between a number
of disciplinary domains, and it may even form the locus of knowledge for all as-
pects of musical activity—playing, writing, thinking, and moving. It now remains
to be discussed how such musical knowledge is imparted by its various practition-
ers; or better, to expose the roles we often play when in the process of creating such
knowledge. Who, in fact, is entitled to impart musical knowledge?

On Masters and Pupils (John Koslovsky)


For all the adulation they typically invite, masters sometimes get a bad rap. In
the most radical of interpretations, the very word “master” (and related terms like
“mastery,” “masterwork,” and so forth) runs the risk of carrying connotations of
unequal power relations, class distinction, suppression, social inequity, cultural su-
periority, hegemonic signification, and domination along sexual and racial lines.
Friedrich Nietzsche, whose ideas on master and slave morality would go on to
Introduction 7

inspire generations of critical cultural and social theory, described the matter in a
brutishly straightforward fashion:

My idea is that every specific body strives to become master over all space
and to extend its force (—its will to power:) and thrust back all that resists
its extension. But it continually encounters similar efforts on the part of other
bodies and ends by coming to an arrangement (“union”) with those of them
that are sufficiently related to it: thus they then conspire together for power.
And the process goes on—25

Better avoid the word “master” altogether, one might think.


And yet, the master concept engenders a wholly different set of connotations
when transposed into the context of the “master-pupil” relation. As a tradition
that can be traced back to just about any culture, the master-pupil relation carries
in its ideal form the imparting of knowledge or skill from one human being to
another. It is in one sense a rite of passage, involving trials and tribulations of
all sorts; in another sense, it is an act of sharing that brings the master and pupil
into an ever closer bond. And while connotations of “will to power” are lurk-
ing even here, the master-pupil relation can involve moments of collaboration
and even productive confrontation, whereby both the “pupil” and the “master”
walk away with something of mutual benefit, and even alternate roles with one
another. In fact, we all act out roles as “masters” and “pupils” at every moment
of our lives—even the most experienced practitioner or knowledgeable scholar
can still take on the role of pupil, and often in the most unexpected of ways. So,
whether we play the role of master or pupil at any given moment, the process
is by any calculation one of the most human and indeed humane endeavours we
can ever undertake.
In some sense, this book is a testament to the master-pupil relation and the ways
in which such a relation can manifest itself in the study of music performance (in the
broadest sense, as described in the previous section). As in other traditional trades
and skills (those of merchants, craftsmen, martial artists, and the like), the acquisi-
tion of musical skills and knowledge has functioned largely by way of individual
transmission. Professional music conservatories continue to thrive on a model in
which an expert imparts a knowledge to which only a chosen few are privy, be it
from an instrumental or vocal tutor, a composition or conducting teacher, or even a
teacher of music theory. Even in academic settings such as universities, the master-
pupil system plays a vital role in the formation of a young mind, for instance, in
the form of thesis advisors and individual academic tutors. And these are just in-
stitutionalised examples: far from being an antiquated form of knowledge transfer,
one could argue that the master-pupil system is still alive and well, even within the
more democratically oriented structures of present-day institutes of higher educa-
tion. And for us, this is an aspect of human endeavour that need not be shunned or
expunged—in its right form, it can provide a source of nourishment and betterment
for both the pupil and master.26 It is thus with an eye towards masters and pupils
that we can begin to engage the contributions to this volume.
8 Michiel Schuijer and John Koslovsky

To begin with, there are tangible forms in which the master-pupil relation plays
out in this volume. Many of the authors, for instance, once shared some form of
direct teacher-student relationship, which has now evolved into a collaboration on
genuinely collegial grounds. These include the chapters by Zevenbergen and van
der Zwart (Chapter 3), by Theurer and Leong (Chapter 5), by Cholevas and Abra-
movay (Chapter 6), and by Titus and Vranckx (Chapter 9). This was an unexpected
bonus to the volume, as it highlights how a relationship between a former teacher
and a pupil can develop over time, whereby the original roles played by each pro-
tagonist can shift seamlessly. These relationships offer a prime example of how
research ideas can emerge from “the ground up.”
But even for those co-authors who never shared a formal relationship as teacher
and student, there is still a sense in which each contributor in one moment plays
the role of master, but in the next moment becomes the pupil of the other. A good
example includes the contribution by Marconi and Malferrari (Chapter 4): both are
professionals in their own right, and had different professional paths before their
collaborative project. But, when coming together, they had to negotiate a space in
which each played both master and pupil with one another. As we describe in more
detail below (Critical Interlude 2), the manner by which each of these protagonists
plays out his respective role is indicative of the ways in which a traditional binary
between scholar and performer can still lead to new insights, even if those insights
(and their consequences) need to be teased out (i.e., performed) by the reader.
And then there are the more intangible (but no less pertinent) forms of the
master-­pupil relation, in which the interlocutor (the “author” of the essay) searches
for a place within a vast, discursive matrix that brings together both textual and
non-textual forms of knowledge: on the one hand, playing the role of pupil to those
who have come before and absorbing the knowledge imparted by them; on the
other, seeking to become the master of the material studied in order to impart a new
form of knowledge (oftentimes, but not always, with the aim of superseding one’s
predecessors). Motuz and Meléndez Peláez (Chapter 1), for instance, take their cue
from the contrapuntal masters of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in order to
gain new mastery over the improvisation of historical diminutions. As pupils of an
impressive assortment of theorists from centuries past, Motuz and Meléndez Peláez
consolidate their knowledge not only through detailed reasoning, but in fact show
the consequences of their deliberations through improvised performative acts.
Another example comes from Atalai and Nagy (Chapter 2), each of whom ab-
sorbs various ideas from Silvestro Ganassi’s La Fontegara in order to highlight the
emergence of an interdisciplinary ethos in sixteenth-century Venice: Atalai through
the medium of voice; and Nagy through that of painting. As committed pupils to
Ganassi’s treatise, Atalai and Nagy (each in their own way) master the material of
La Fontegara in order reveal some of its underlying premises: not just as an exercise
in critical exegesis, but as a means of making audible (through performance) the
consequences of their textual mastery. So it is that Atalai and Nagy can each reflect a
new aspect of the master-pupil relation, in both learning from Ganassi’s text but then
refocusing it in order to impart a broader, audible, and interdisciplinary knowledge.
Introduction 9

As mentioned above, the contributions of Zevenbergen/van der Zwart and of


Theurer/Leong share a common origin in a teacher and student relationship, which
transformed over time into the collegial collaboration as witnessed in this volume.
But the commonalities between these essays go beyond the coincidence of a former
teacher-student relationship, when taken from the point of view of the master-pupil
relation. On the one hand, both essays exemplify a form of collaboration in which
the binary of “scholar” and “performer” fuses “organically” (in the unpretentious
sense of the word) into the “performer-scholar.” All four of these contributors, in
other words, have gained a mastery of both scholarly and musical-performative
acts. On the other hand, these authors all immerse themselves as “pupils” of the
very material they seek to master: Zevenbergen/van der Zwart of the Cor Alto
and Cor Basse; and Theurer/Leong of George Crumb’s Four Nocturnes for violin
and piano. So whether technical, physical, or musical, the demands of the mate-
rial itself challenge these authors to hone their skills and knowledge as performer-
scholars, to embody the personae of pupil and master simultaneously vis-à-vis the
material, and to collaborate in a way that begins to deconstruct their own master-
pupil relation.
But the discursive matrix in which this last form of the master-pupil relation
plays out can involve not just “texts” and “materials” but also the sounding world
of performance, whether of a historical or of a more recent vintage, and whether
real or imagined. The contribution of ter Haar (Chapter 6), for instance, takes its
cue not just from historical documentation and recent performance practice schol-
arship, but indeed attempts to draw on a past master of cello performance, Alfredo
Piatti. In what he calls a “dialogue with a dead performer,” ter Haar assumes the
role of pupil under the tutelage of a great master, one whom he has never met but
with whom he engages in an imagined dialogue in order to understand nineteenth-
century performance practice. The case becomes even more complicated when the
voices of other great cello masters begin to ring in ter Haar’s ears. Who plays the
master and who plays the pupil becomes the locus of tension in ter Haar’s account
of performing Chopin’s cello sonata.
A similar case is made by ter Haar’s direct colleague Cholevas (also Chapter 6),
who also finds himself in the midst of a dialogue with masters of taksim perfor-
mance past and present. But unlike ter Haar, who hears a cacophony of masterly
voices around him, Cholevas controls his masters and consolidates their knowl-
edge through the implementation of computer software, with the aim of informing
pupils of taksim improvisation on the workings of past masters. One of Cholevas’s
own former pupils, Abramovay (Chapter 6), then takes up the charge to gain his
own mastery of the material of one particular taksim master, Ercüment Batanay.
Abramovay does this in part by drawing on the technologies and methodologies
developed by Cholevas, and partly by taking inspiration from the world of modern
music analysis (among other things, the idea of structural layers as found in Schen-
kerian analysis). In the end, Abramovay’s contribution takes the form of praxis, as
he creates new taksim improvisations and hence becomes master of the material in
his own right.
10 Michiel Schuijer and John Koslovsky

Sometimes the role of master and pupil is deliberately reversed, whereby the
ones we would initially perceive to act as masters in fact take on the role of pu-
pils in order to learn from the pupils themselves. Such is the case in the chapter
by ­Bakker, Kouwenhoven, Martín, and Oudejans (Chapter 7). Described in more
detail below (Critical Interlude 3), their collaborative contribution is aimed at iden-
tifying the learned expertise of musicians and in sharpening the ways in which such
expertise can be honed under live performance situations. Such an example shows
how the master-pupil relation can begin to break down when experts from various
domains begin to collaborate, regardless whether one is a student at a conservatory
or a professor emeritus at a research university.
In Part IV, “Cultural Barriers and Embodied Knowledge,” the intertwinement
of the master-pupil relation takes on a new focus (and perhaps finally begins to
deconstruct the distinction altogether). In “Knowing the World through Music”
(Chapter 8), Titus, Vranckx, and Fermie take part in a dialogue with music-making
in a globalised economy: Titus in her research into South African Maskanda prac-
tices; Vranckx in her encounters with the San community of Namibia; and Fermie
through his “Practical Approach To Enhancing Musical Performance Abilities”
(Patempa), an embodied view towards musical knowledge production. Indeed, all
three of these contributions implicitly aim to leave behind any distinction of “mas-
ter” and “pupil,” though we believe that such a distinction remains inherent in their
multilayered engagements with various cultures and their own, complicated role
as scholars and musicians operating within a European context (a role they fully
acknowledge).
The final core contribution to the volume, by Andreas Borregaard (“Performing
Jennifer Walshe’s SELF-CARE,” Chapter 9), is similarly engaged with issues of
embodiment in musical performance: not only that, but given his musical material,
Borregaard’s performative commitments extend to the limits of the physical realm
(described in more detail in Critical Interlude 4). And even though he is a “sole”
author, his contribution also invokes the metaphor of master and pupil. In his case,
however, he is both master and pupil of his performative capacities, and in this
way he engages in deep self-reflection in order to uncover the limits to which his
embodied musicianship can be taken.

Notes
1 Bianchi (2017, 73).
2 Novóa (2000, 52).
3 Wengenroth (1997, 148–50).
4 For more detail, see Gispen (1990, 160–86).
5 See Brightwell (2007, I: 93ff).
6 Conservatorium der Afdeling Amsterdam van de Maatschappij tot Bevordering der
Toonkunst, “Bericht van het vierde schooljaar 1887–1888” (November 1888, 15).
This and other annual reports from between 1884 and 1970 have been collected
and bound in seven volumes, which are kept in the library of Conservatorium van
Amsterdam.
Introduction 11

7 Anonymous (1843, 201).


8 Grotjahn (2005).
9 Wasserloos (2004).
10 Riemann (1994, transl. E. Douglas Bomberger).
11 See Kunkel (1855, passim).
12 Riemann published numerous books—for scholars, performers, and music students—
as well as for the general concert-going public. His Musik-Lexikon (1882) became a
household possession for music lovers and specialists. Handbuch der Musikgeschichte
(1903–13) set a professional standard for music history teachers. And Riemann’s har-
monic theories served as a benchmark (if not a bone of contention) for subsequent gen-
erations of German music theorists before their American counterparts remixed it to
“neo-Riemannian theory” a century later.
13 Sigel (1968, 29). The conservatories Sigel visited were those in Amsterdam, Brussels,
Detmold, London (Royal Academy of Music), Paris, and Rome.
14 Frederickson and Rooney (1990, 198).
15 Adler (1885, 20).
16 Ludwig Holtmeier (2012) has made a similar point concerning nineteenth-century mu-
sic theorists like Gottfried Weber and Adolf Bernhard Marx. They had also studied law,
which they combined with a somewhat sketchy musical education. Holtmeier confronts
their inventorying and systematising approaches to harmony and musical form with the
simultaneously declining interest among famed composers in theoretical instruction.
17 Sigel (1968, 34–5).
18 Winter (2019, 162).
19 Mrenes (2011, 168).
20 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1992/13. See also Department of Music Educa-
tion and Science (1991).
21 Pas (2016).
22 For a discussion of the influence of funding schemes on practice-based orientations in
British music research, see Cook (2015).
23 Borgdorff (2012, 5).
24 Cook (2013, 25).
25 Nietzsche (1968, 340). Another important thinker in Western philosophy to reflect on the
“master-slave dialectic” (which is more properly rendered as “Mastery” and “Servitude”
from the German Herrschaft and Knechtschaft) was Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel in
his Phenomenology of Spirit. Hegel’s famous discussion of the matter, however, has
more to do with the emergence of self-consciousness in the individual. See Hegel (2018,
108–116). In more recent years, and building on the work of Jacques Lacan, Slavoj
Žižek has also theorised about the concept of the “Master-signifier,” which indicates the
“performative” role that particular words can play in “closing the loop” of linguistic sig-
nification. In this way, the master-signifier acts as an “empty” place holder intended to
consolidate thought and assert control over other, deferred means of signification (often
with violent social-political consequences, such as the use of the word “Jew” by anti-
Semites). See e.g. Gunkel (2014). Though they are of a more benign nature, expressions
like “artistic research,” “music analysis,” “historically informed performance practice,”
and other disciplinary designations have a similar function as master-signifiers. Hence
the multiplicitous ways in which concepts of “master,” “mastery,” “masterwork,” and
related terms can manifest themselves in language, thought, and deed.
26 In his chapter on Fuxian counterpoint in The Cambridge History of Western Music The-
ory, Ian Bent describes three basic ways in which dialogue can play out in a treatise: (1)
as catechismic (questioning from master to pupil); (2) as erotematic (questioning from
pupil to master); and (3) as conversational (genuine dialogue and questioning between
two parties, usually among equals). See Bent (2002, 570–574).
12 Michiel Schuijer and John Koslovsky

References
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———. 2015. “Performing Research: Some Institutional Perspectives”. In Artistic Practice
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mengestellt und durch kritische Beleuchtung und historische Nachweisungen zu widerle-
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Introduction 13

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Anziehungs- und Ausstrahlungskraft eines musikpädagogisches Modells auf das interna-
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sonderen Hochschultyps.” Das Hochschulwesen 67/6: 160–70.
Critical Interlude 1
John Koslovsky

The first three essays to this volume all draw their inspiration from what has by
now become a veritable tradition, namely “historically informed performance”
practice (or HIP, for short). The title to Part I suggests that historical performers,
as researchers, draw upon various “tools” in order to conduct their work. But the
tools they use do not only have to be of the physical sort, they can also derive from
a more conceptual need. So it is that Motuz and Meléndez Peláez, a trombonist
and cornetist respectively, make use not only of their instruments for which they
conduct their research—they also explore the ways in which counterpoint training
of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries can supply performers with the neces-
sary tools for the execution of diminutions. To this end, their chapter, titled “Che
hanno contrapunto,” offers a detailed investigation of the ways in which Italian
and Spanish treatises from that time assumed a thoroughgoing knowledge of strict,
improvised counterpoint as the basis for performing diminutions. They then adapt
the knowledge they acquired to their own performing practices (rendered in a re-
cording session).
In the second chapter, by Atalai and Nagy (“The Italian Imitative and Interdis-
ciplinary Musical Ethos of the Sixteenth Century”), the performance of historical
diminutions remains an underlying concern. However, in this case the tool is not
of many but of a single sixteenth-century author, Silvestro Ganassi, whose 1535
treatise Opera Intitulata Fontegara provides the starting point for an “interdiscipli-
nary” approach to historical performance practice. For Atalai, Ganassi is the quin-
tessential “Renaissance man” who helped elevate the status of instrumental music
to the level of a liberal art by drawing links between the recorder and the human
voice; for Nagy, Ganassi’s emergent interdisciplinary attitude is evoked through his
painterly sensibilities and even through his choice of specific vocabulary, notably
the word “prontezza.” Their renditions of select sixteenth-century music, which ac-
company this volume, bring together various colleagues of the ensemble Seconda
Prat!ca and thereby bring the interdisciplinary ethos of Ganassi’s ideas to life.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003295785-2
16 John Koslovsky

Finally, Zevenbergen and van der Zwart pick up on the performance of another
historical instrument, the Cor Alto and Cor Basse. Unlike the first two chapters, their
focus here is not on creating improvisations or diminutions, but rather on locating
an “ideal sound” of the historical horn. And, instead of drawing their knowledge
from a treatise or from another artform, the tool that becomes most readily apparent
in their knowledge acquisition involves the length of just a couple of millimetres
or so, the horn’s mouthpiece. But the almost microscopic difference of mouthpiece
size proves to take on macroscope proportions in the various colours and timbres
that result from cor alto and cor basse. Zevenbergen and van der Zwart’s chapter
is similarly informed by their historical research into one of the most renowned
hornists of the late eighteenth century, Giovanni Punto ­(1746–1843). To be sure,
their engagement with Punto, alongside their technical concerns, leads them to
consider their own historically informed performance of Beethoven’s music, both
in his orchestral music and specifically in his Horn Sonata, op. 17. Their rendition
from the 2017 RPPR symposium, performed with their fortepiano colleague Olga
Pashchenko, demonstrates the sounding result of such a technical and historical
research project.
Part I

Tools of (Historical)
Performance Practice
1 “Che hanno contrapunto”
Counterpoint Training and the
Performance of Diminution in the
Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries1

Catherine Motuz and Josué Meléndez Peláez

One might have complained twenty years ago that, since most of the ornamentation
treatises of the Renaissance and Early Baroque had already been rediscovered and
studied, it would be difficult to add substantially to our knowledge about the art of
making passaggi.2 But while scholarly editions and close and comparative readings
of the treatises of Diego Ortiz, Girolamo Dalla Casa, Giovanni Bassano, Riccardo
Rognoni, Giovanni Battista Bovicelli, Francesco Rognoni, and others have been
invaluable to reviving the art,3 the work of performers in the last two decades in
putting treatise material to active, performative, and regular use has been a driving
force in pushing our understanding of historical ornamentation to a higher level.
Among the developments during this time has been the revival of the skill of coun-
terpoint as a practical art. Counterpoint has been transformed from a written-out
practice to a performance practice, to be parsed or even created in real time. Barto-
lomeo Barbarino is one of many who writes of the necessity for virtuoso musicians
to be skilled in counterpoint, writing that those who “have counterpoint” (che hanno
contrapunto) are able to improvise diminutions rather than just execute them.
But what does it mean to “have counterpoint”? What does it change in how we
go about performing music from the Renaissance and Early Baroque? While it can
be demonstrated in writing why musicians need some understanding of counter-
point in order to ornament well, these and other practical questions must be ad-
dressed through practical experience and performance.
The present authors attempt to answer these questions from the perspective of
performance research. We understand “performance” not only as what happens on
stage, but also in the context of music making in practice rooms and teaching stu-
dios. Because we are discussing historically informed performance practice (HIP),
we also draw on treatises from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Ultimately
it is our practical experience working with these sources on a regular basis and
bringing them into performance that leads us to our conclusions.
While close reading of diminution treatises can give a scholar an overview of the
practice of making diminutions in various styles, using a pedagogical treatise for
regular practice and teaching provides a much more comprehensive understanding.
For example, multiple authors have described what we call the “copy-and-paste”
approach to making diminutions.4 The simplest approach to this method relies on
tables of ornaments organised by melodic motion and rhythmic value, such as those

DOI: 10.4324/9781003295785-4
20 Catherine Motuz and Josué Meléndez Peláez

found in nearly every diminution treatise. The player, ornamenting a single line of
a polyphonic piece, chooses a melodic interval on which to add an ornament, picks
an ornament from the table based on the melodic interval and rhythmic values, then
replaces the simple version with the ornamented one. Luca Conforto provides the
clearest indication that this approach is a historical one and indeed the purpose of
providing such extensive tables: “And if you wish to embellish any musical piece,
it will be enough only to consider the quality of the note, and the proper place to be
embellished, and then according to their values, from those take a copy.”5 He goes
on to explain how to adjust ornaments to different rhythms by doubling or halving
the note values of the ornament.
We have found the “copy-and-paste” method indispensable, not only for learn-
ing to ornament ourselves, but also for teaching diminution technique: by copying
ornaments from treatises into real pieces, the student slowly builds a repertoire of
ornaments. However, is it not long before it is clear that just matching melodic
intervals and rhythmic values is not always enough to make a satisfying and cor-
rect ornament.6 In some cases, knowledge of counterpoint is also required. For
example, on the very first line of his treatise, Conforto offers a rising step (in seven
different clefs and with a “C” time signature) followed immediately by a choice of
ways to ornament it: the reader must choose a path through the crotchets he gives
(Example 1.1a). If we imagine this example in a polyphonic context (in this case
by adding a lower counterpoint), we note that the unornamented step might be ac-
companied by any number of intervals with the bass, such as from a third to a fifth
(Example 1.1b) or a sixth to an octave (Example 1.1c), but if we choose a path
through all of the topmost crotchets, then it works well over the first bass (Example
1.1d), but not the second (Example 1.1e), which contains a harsh contrapuntal er-
ror: a leap to a ninth on the second crotchet.

Example 1.1 Luca Conforto, Breve et facile maniera d’essercitarsi a far passaggi (1593),
3v, with extrapolated outcomes.

This example brings up two questions: is Example 1.1e actually wrong, in the
context of improvising diminutions?; and if so, how could it be avoided in im-
provisation? As we will show, while sixteenth-century writers normally allowed
certain contrapuntal errors to be introduced in making diminutions, nevertheless
they condemned those that caused acoustic harshness or that obscured the clarity
Counterpoint Training and the Performance of Diminution 21

of the counterpoint. As to how to avoid errors, some treatise authors offer foolproof
strategies or even specific ornaments that work in any polyphonic context, but they
make it clear that these do not always provide the most elegant divisions. To im-
provise passaggi as a virtuoso, or as Francesco Rognoni put it, con arte e maestria
(with art and mastery),7 professional singers and instrumentalists relied on a strong
grounding in counterpoint, which allowed them to hear the other voices and avoid
errors accordingly.
This brings us back to the question, what does it mean to “have counterpoint,”
i.e., what does a strong grounding in counterpoint mean to a historical performer?
In order to understand this, we must understand the background or education in
counterpoint that expert improvisers possessed. Close readings and analyses of
treatise examples present the reader with partial answers to this question but, like
many aspects of historical performance, the remaining gaps can only be solved by
practising and performing, putting treatise material to use in improvised contexts.

...Che hanno/non hanno contrapunto


The institutional study of diminution and counterpoint in the twenty-first century is
divided between performers and music theorists. Learning how to ornament takes
place in lessons, performance practice classes, or workshops, usually taught by
performers. Counterpoint, though now occasionally being taught through improvi-
sation, is still normally studied as part of a theory curriculum and taught by music
theorists. The divide between those who teach counterpoint and those who teach
ornamentation is a historical one, reflected in the sixteenth century by treatises
that normally discuss either counterpoint or diminution techniques, but rarely both.
Books that teach the fundamentals of music provide a solid grounding in counter-
point but only occasionally offer advice about diminution (see Coclico, Finck, and
Zacconi).8 The diminutions they provide are among the simplest, usually involving
only crotchets and quavers. Treatises that specialise in diminution, with extensive
ornamentation tables and often entire pieces with diminutions, demand counter-
point skills but never endeavour to teach them. Those who were advanced enough
to make use of diminutions in semiquavers, “twenty-fourth notes” (treplicate), and
demisemiquavers were assumed to already be proficient in counterpoint.
Luigi Zenobi’s letter “On the Perfect Musician” makes a distinction between
the skill set of the mediocre and the excellent musician.9 Zenobi mentions coun-
terpoint on multiple occasions, writing that knowledge of counterpoint is the first
requirement for singing securely, for directing an ensemble, for composers, instru-
mentalists, and finally for the singer, especially the soprano, who sings the most
embellishments and therefore “must be expert in counterpoint, for without that he
sings haphazardly and commits a thousand blunders.”10
Bartolomeo Barbarino takes a more accommodating approach in his second
book of motets, presumably at least in part because he was aiming to appeal to a
wider audience. He printed two versions of each monody:

The simple version is for those who don’t have the ability to sing diminutions,
and for those who have the ability to sing diminutions and know counterpoint
22 Catherine Motuz and Josué Meléndez Peláez

(che hanno contrapunto), who can do themselves diminutions and all other
ornaments that are required for the proper way of singing. The diminished
version then, for those who, having the ability to sing diminutions, but not
knowing counterpoint (che havendo dispositione, non hanno contrapunto),
don’t have the capacity to make diminutions according to the rules.11

Conforto is also less demanding than Zenobi. He introduces his treatise as an ex-
pedient for those who, growing up far from cities and courts, had to learn their
art painstakingly through imitation rather than instruction.12 Conforto understands
that these singers, although they eventually became professionals, may have had
varying levels of training in counterpoint. He goes on with an example of why this
is important: the restrictions on a melodic leap of a fourth or a fifth in a passaggio
are not worth trying to explain to “those who have no understanding of the conso-
nances” (che non hanno cognizione delle consonanze), but those who do will know
that leaping up a fourth from a fifth over the bass will make an octave.13
Understanding that melodic leaps are the most risky for producing errors such
as those discussed in Example 1.1, Conforto helpfully writes a little cross (una
crocetta) next to passaggi that work with an octave, tenth, or twelfth from the bass,
and instructs that these be learned first. We can find this cross in his first example
after the first crotchet, showing that the singer who follows the path (again in so-
prano clef) through G–A–F–G–A or G–A–B–G–A will be safe from creating harsh
dissonances against any normal bass in whole notes, beginning on an octave, tenth,
or twelfth (and also a sixth, though Conforto does not recognise this). Example 1.2
demonstrates the possibilities.

Example 1.2 Luca Conforto, Breve et facile maniera, 3v, with extrapolated outcomes.

The resulting vertical intervals for the first possible path (Examples 1.2b–e)
include leaps to and from dissonances, but this figure is a recognised idiom, called
a double-neighbour.14 While Peter Schubert specifies that the figure is to be used in
Counterpoint Training and the Performance of Diminution 23

cadences, he notes that evaded cadences allow a variety of bass motions.15 The sec-
ond possible path is unproblematic except for the version that begins on the twelfth
and ascends to the fourteenth (i.e., from the fifth to the seventh, plus an octave,
Example 1.2h), but examples from fully ornamented pieces by Maffei, Dalla Casa,
and others show that this interval pattern is common in diminution repertoire.16
Like Conforto, Diego Ortiz writes failsafe examples of diminutions, explaining
that by returning to the original note at the end of each ornament, it is impossible to
introduce contrapuntal errors.17 One example is offered in Example 1.3.

Example 1.3 Diego Ortiz, Trattado de Glosas (1553).

Girolamo Diruta and Aurelio Virgiliano also recommend returning to the origi-
nal note at the end of an ornament, but the latter adds that one should also play it in
the middle if it is convenient.18 Ortiz and Diruta specify that this way of ornament-
ing is the simplest approach, although Ortiz concedes that following this rule will
not produce the most beautiful flourishes. Clearly, Virgiliano does not expect this
rule to be followed every time either—if so, he would not need his next rule, which
states that one should maintain the same direction of travel from one note to the
next as in the unornamented version (soggetto).
Like many authors, Ortiz considered counterpoint a fundamental skill, at least
for professional musicians,19 but distinguished it from composition, a more ad-
vanced skill. Most of the exercises he provides in the second book of his Trattado,
making ornamentations of polyphonic models or improvising on a ground, require
his readers to be fluent in counterpoint, but to add a fifth voice to a four-voice
piece “presupposes ability in composition on the part of the player to do it.”20 Ortiz
differentiates between the basic skill of counterpoint and grasping the multiple
contrapuntal relationships of a four-part piece. But by introducing a compositional
skill into a manual about improvisation he is blurring the line between written and
oral practices.

Counterpoint as Oral Practice


This brings us back to our central question: What does it mean to “have” counter-
point? To be more specific, what did it mean from the point of view of a Renais-
sance performer? Among recent scholars, Rob Wegman has addressed this issue,
arguing that “counterpoint” was understood since the Middle Ages as basic note-
against-note structures, distinguished from the elaborate ornamentation to which
it provided a foundation and from parallel structures such as organum.21 Wegman
highlights the oral nature of counterpoint in his distinction between music “makers”
and “composers.”22 Julie Cumming gives a brief history of how twenty-first century
scholars came to revise their understanding of Renaissance “counterpoint” from a
primarily written to a primarily mental and oral task. This includes a discussion
24 Catherine Motuz and Josué Meléndez Peláez

and extension of Jesse Anne Owens’s ground-breaking study of composing without


a score. Peter Schubert re-claimed the term “counterpoint” to mean “improvised
polyphony for singers.”23 Anna Maria Busse Berger has exerted a deep influence
on the twenty-first century revival of improvised counterpoint with her observa-
tion that medieval and Renaissance counterpoint pedagogy was centred around
the memorisation of two-voice interval progressions, with very little emphasis on
abstract rules.24 Catherine Motuz has learned and taught basic counterpoint im-
provisation based on memorisation, and has compared this pedagogical approach
to studies of jazz improvisation pedagogy.25
Both Schubert and Lynette Bowring have shown that Renaissance counterpoint
was oral in nature, whether it led to performance or composition, and both provide
surveys that examine the oral foundations either taught by or required as prereq-
uisites to Renaissance compositional treatises.26 Schubert’s reconstruction of the
mental processes of the composer reflects the memorisation practices proposed by
Busse Berger:

The improviser is actively engaged, responding on the spot, and coming up


with little (mostly 2- and 3-voice) combinations, or inventioni, that can be
used in a composition. The composer has a thesaurus of these at the back of
his mind, inculcated with his earliest training as a singer.27

Turning back to historical authors, the need for constant practice in order to train
this “thesaurus” is summed up elegantly by the Master in Morley’s A Plaine and
Easie Introduction to Practicall Musick (1597):

Phi: What is the meane to sing upon a playne song.


Ma. To know the distances both of Concords and Discords.
[…]
Phi: I praie you shew me how they [i.e., parallel fifth and octaves] bee per-
ceived among other cordes.
Ma. There is no waie to discerne them, but by diligent marking wherein
everie note standeth, which you cannot doe but by continuall practise,
and so by marking where the notes stand, and how farre everie one is
from the next before, you shall easilie know, both what cordes they be,
and also what corde commeth next.28

The role of practical contrapuntal training as foundational to composition is con-


firmed by Pietro Pontio and Giovanni Maria Artusi, who describe the progression
from simple to florid counterpoint as a step towards composition. Pontio gives
careful explanations and examples of the approach to and from each vertical inter-
val, while Artusi presents tables showing two-voice note-against-note progressions
similar to Tinctoris’s progressions from the Liber de Arte Contrapuncti (c1477),29
but in an easily memorisable format (see Example 1.4).
Artusi’s focus was on counterpoint for training composers, but other authors
wrote out similar tables explicitly to help improvising singers, extending the
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Title: The crime at Vanderlynden's

Author: R. H. Mottram

Release date: December 17, 2023 [eBook #72444]

Language: English

Original publication: London: Chatto & Windus, 1926

Credits: Tim Lindell, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed


Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book
was produced from images made available by the
HathiTrust Digital Library.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIME


AT VANDERLYNDEN'S ***
The Crime
at Vanderlynden’s
‘Oh, my, I don’t want to die,
I want to go home!’

Song of Kitchener’s Army.


THE SPANISH FARM was
awarded the Hawthornden Prize
for 1924
THE CRIME
AT VANDERLYNDEN’S

By
R. H. MOTTRAM
Author ofTHE SPANISH FARM
and
SIXTY-FOUR, NINETY-FOUR!

LONDON
CHATTO AND WINDUS
1926
Printed in Great Britain

All rights reserved


THE CRIME
AT VANDERLYNDEN’S
*
HIGH up in the pale Flemish sky aeroplanes were wheeling and
darting like bright-coloured insects, catching from one moment to
another the glint of sun on metallic body or translucent wing. To any
pilot or observer who had opportunity or gift for mere speculation, the
sight that lay spread out below might have appeared wonderful.
From far away on the seaboard with its coming and going of ships,
there led rail, road, and wire, and by these three came material,
human material, and human thought, up to that point just behind the
battle-line where in dumps, camps (dumps of men) and Head-
quarters (dumps of brains) they eddied a little, before streaming
forward again, more slowly and covertly, by night, or below ground,
up to the battle itself. There they were lost in that gap in life—that
barren lane where the Irresistible Force dashing against the
Immovable Post ground such a fine powder, that of material, very
little, of men, very few, and of thought, nothing came splashing back.
But pilots and observers were too busy, adding to the Black Carnival,
or saving their own skins from those puffs of Death that kept
following them up and down the sky, to take any such a remote view;
and even had they been interested in it, they could not have lifted the
roof off the Mairie of the village—almost town—of Haagedoorne, and
have seen, sitting in the Mayor’s parlour, a man of middle size and
middle class, a phenomenon in that place, that had been shocked in
its village dignity so many times in those few months. For first it had
been turned from one of those haunts of Peace, of small slow-
moving officialdom, into the “Q.” office of Divisional Head-quarters. It
had become inhabited by two or three English Staff Officers, their
maps and papers, their orderlies and clerks, policemen and
servants; and now, last of all, there was added to them this quiet,
absorbed young man—whose face and hair, figure and clothes had
all those half-tones of moderate appropriateness of men who work
indoors and do not expect too much. A young man who had neither
red tabs nor long boots about him—and who seemed to have so
much to do.
The old walls stared. The Mairie of Haagedoorne, half wine-shop,
half beadle’s office, had seen soldiers in its four hundred years, had
been built for Spanish ones, and had seen them replaced by French
and Dutch, English and Hessians, in bright uniforms and with a
certain soldierly idleness and noise. This fellow had none of it. Sat
there with his nose well down, applying himself to maps and papers,
occasionally speaking deferentially to Colonel Birchin, who, a proper
soldier, his left breast bright with medals, his face blank and slightly
bored with breeding, would nod or shake his head. This was all part
of the fact that this War was not as other wars. It was too wide and
deep, as if the foundations of life had come adrift on some
subterranean sea, and the whole fabric were swaying; it had none of
the decent intervals, and proper limits, allowing men to shut up for
the winter and to carry on their trade all the time.
The dun-coloured person attached to Divisional Staff, whose name
was Stephen Doughty Dormer, indulged in none of these reflections.
He just got on with it. He was deep in his job when an exclamation
from his temporary Chief made him look up. The Colonel was sitting
back in his chair (iron-bottomed, officers, for the use of), his beautiful
legs in their faultless casings stretched out beneath his army table.
He was holding at arm’s-length a blue printed form, filled up in pen
and ink.
Dormer knew it well. It was the official form on which Belgian or
French civilians were instructed to make their claim for damages
caused by the troops billeted on them.
The Colonel’s mouth hung open, his eyeglass had dropped down.
“You speak this—er—language?”
“Yessah!” (with a prayer it might not be Portuguese). “What
language, sir?”
“This is—er—French.”
Yes, he could speak French, and hastened to look. Dormer was a
clerk in a bank. Like so many of that species, he had had a
grandmother with views as to the improvement of his position in the
world, and she had insisted that he should learn the French
language. Why she desired this was never discovered, unless it was
that she considered it a genteel accomplishment, for she dated from
the days when society was composed of two sorts of people, gentle
and simple. She belonged to the former category and was in no
danger of allowing any of her descendants to lapse. As she paid for
the extra tuition involved, her arguments were irrefutable, and the
boy intended for no more romantic a career than is afforded by a
branch office in a market town, had, in 1900, a fair knowledge of the
tongue of Voltaire and Hugo.
He hardly reflected upon the matter again until, in the midst of a
European War, he found that that War was being conducted in a
country where French was the chief language, and that familiar-
sounding words and phrases assailed his ear on every side. This
was of considerable service to him, enabled him to add to his own
and his brother officers’ comfort; but he never boasted of it, having a
profound uncertainty, after years of clerkdom, about anything so
foreign and out of office hours. The legend of his peculiar ability
persisted, however; and when after more than a year of incredible
fatigues and nastiness, his neat methods and perfect amenity to
orders were rewarded by the unofficial job of helping in the A. and Q.
office of a division, he found his legend there before him. It was
therefore with a sigh, and a mental ejaculation equivalent to “Spare
me these useless laurels,” that he got up and went over to his
Chief’s table, to be confronted by the sentence:
“Esquinté une vierge chez moi!”
“What’s Esquinté? It’s not in Cassells’ Dictionary!”
“I should say—knocked asquint, sir! Spoiled, ruined; they often say
it, if the troops go into the crops.”
“Well, how does it read, then? Knock asquint; no, that won’t do;
ruined, you say. Ruined a Virgin in my house. This sounds like a nice
business, with the French in their present mood!”
Dormer simply could not believe it and asked:
“May I see the claim?”
“Certainly. Come here. Stop me wherever I go wrong.”
He knew more French than Dormer gave him credit for. He read the
blue form, printed question and pen-and-ink reply to the end. It went
like this:
Q. When was the damage committed?
A. Last Thursday.
Q. What troops were responsible? Give the number and name of the
English detachment.
A. A soldier of the 469 Trench Mortar Battery (T.M.B.).
Q. Were you present and did you see the damage done?
A. No, but my daughter knows all about it.
Q. In what conditions was the damage done?
A. He broke the window (vitrage). She called out to him, but he
replied with oaths.
Q. Can you prove responsibility (a) by witness?
A. My daughter.
Q. (b) By procès-verbal.
A. They insulted the Mayor when he came to do it!
Q. (c) By admission of the culprits.
A. Not necessary. It is visible.
Q. Did you complain to the officer commanding troops?
A. He would not listen.
And so on.
Deposed and sealed at the Mairie of Hondebecq, Nord, as the claim
for compensation of Mr. Vanderlynden, cultivator, 64 years old, by us
Swingadow, Achille, Mayor.
“What do you say to that?” asked the Chief.
Dormer had a good deal to say, but kept it down. “I can’t believe it,
sir. I know the billet. I remember Miss Vanderlynden. She’s as strong
as a man and much more determined than most. It’s a mistake of
some sort!”
“Pretty circumstantial mistake, isn’t it? Look at this covering letter
received with it.”
He held out a memorandum headed: “Grand Quartier General,” in
French, to the effect that one desired it might be given appropriate
attention. And another from a department of English General Head-
quarters with “Passed to you, please.”
“The French have had their knife into us for some time. This’ll be a
nice case for them to take up. We must make an arrest at once.
Sergeant!”
That Sergeant was a famous London Architect. He came to the door
of the ante-room in which he worked.
“In what Corps Area is Hondebecq?”
The Sergeant spotted it in a moment, on the big map pinned up on
the wall.
“Very well, wire them to take this up, and make an arrest.”
“There is just one point I should like to put, sir!”
As Dormer said it, he felt it to be “cheek.” His Chief turned upon him
the eyeglass of a regular officer who found it rather difficult to
imagine how a junior temporary officer could put a point. But Dormer
had seen two Courts-Martial, and the thought of some poor brute
hauled out of a trench, and marched about for no better purpose
than that, kept him firm.
“If an arrest is made, you will have to go on with the proceedings.”
“Naturally.”
“Then you will need a statement from the victim. If we had that first,
we should know the truth!”
“Well, you’d better go and get it, as you know the people. You can
see Corps and insist on an arrest. But, most important of all, try what
a little money can do. He says a thousand francs. Well, you must
see what he will come down to.”
Outside Divisional Head-quarters, Dormer turned to the right, to go
to his billet, but a military policeman, stepping out from the shelter of
the buildings, saluted.
“They’re shelling that way, sir!”
It gave Dormer a queer familiar feeling in the pit of the stomach.
Shelling, the daily routine of that War. But being a very punctilious
temporary officer, and taking his almost non-existent position in
Divisional Staff very seriously, he pulled himself together.
“Oh, well, they’d have hit me long ago, if they could!” He passed on,
followed by a smile. He said those things because he felt them to be
good for the morale of the troops. Sure enough, he had not gone
many yards before the air was rent by a familiar tearing sound,
followed by the usual bump and roar. It was well in front of him, and
to the left, and he went on reassured. A few yards farther on, close
to the side street where he was billeted over a pork-butcher’s shop,
he noticed people coming out of their houses and shops to stare,
while one elderly woman, rounder than any artist would dare to
portray, asked him:
“O Monsieur, is the bombard finished?” in the Anglo-Flemish which
years of billeting were beginning to teach the inhabitants of the town.
But the centre of excitement was farther on, where the little street of
houses petered out between small, highly cultivated fields. Here the
first shell had fallen right upon one of those limbers that were to be
found being driven up some obscure street at any hour of the day or
night. Two dazed drivers had succeeded in cutting loose and
quieting the mules. A horse lay dead in the gutter. Against the bank
leaned the Corporal, his face out of sight, as if in the midst of a
hearty laugh. It needed only a glance, however, to see that there was
no head upon the shoulders. It was just one of those daily
disagreeable scenes which to Dormer had been so utterly strange all
his life, and so familiar for the last year. Dormer made no fuss, but
took charge. He knew well enough that the drivers would stand and
look at each other. He sent one of them for a burial party from the
nearest Field Ambulance, saw that the other tied up the mules and
made a bundle of the dead man’s effects—paybook, knife, money,
letters—the pitiful little handkerchief-ful of all that remains for a
soldier’s loved ones—while he himself pushed his way into the
orderly room of the nearest formation, that showed any signs of
telephone wires. He had not many yards to go, for the camps lay
along each side of that Flemish lane, as close as houses in a street.
He was soon inside an Armstrong hut, with the field telephone at his
disposal, and while waiting to be given the orderly room of the
Brigade Transport to which the casualty belonged, he happened to
close his eyes. The effect was so striking that he immediately
opened them again. There, on the underside of his eyelids, was the
headless body he had just left. Curiously enough, it did not lie
against the bank, as he had seen it, but seemed to swim towards
him, arms above his head, gesticulating. Once his eyes were open
again, of course it disappeared.
About him was nothing more wonderful than the interior of an
Armstrong hut Orderly Room, an army table, an army chair. Some
one’s bed and bath shoved in a corner. Outside, trampled mud,
mule-lines, cinder tracks, Holland elms, flat, stodgy Flanders all
desecrated with War. He got the number he wanted, told the Brigade
to fetch their broken limber, gave his rank and job, and put up the
telephone. The impression he had had was so strong, however, that
walking back along the cinder path, he closed his eyes again. Yes, it
was still there, quite plain, the details of the khaki uniform all correct
and clear cut, spurred boots and bandolier, but no head, and the
arms raised aloft, exhorting or threatening.
If he went on like this he would have to see a Medical Officer, and
they would send him down to the Base, and he would find his job
filled up, and have to go elsewhere and start all over fresh, trying to
do something that was not desperately boring or wholly useless. He
had been doing too much, going up at night for “stunts,” and working
in Q. office all day. He would have to slack off a bit.
By the time he got back to Divisional H.Q. the car stood ready. The
feelings of one who, having been hauled out of the infantry, had then
to return to the Forward Areas, were curiously mixed. Of course no
one wanted to be shelled or bombed, to live where the comforts of
life were unpurchasable, and the ordinary means of locomotion out
of use. And yet—and yet—there was a curious feeling of going
home. That great rowdy wood and canvas and corrugated iron town,
miles deep and nearly a hundred miles long, was where one
belonged. That atmosphere of obvious jokes and equally obvious
death, disinfectant, tobacco, mules, and wood smoke had become
one’s life, one’s right and natural environment.
His companion on this joyless ride was Major Stevenage, the A.P.M.
of the Division, an ex-cavalry officer of the regular army, in
appearance and mentality a darker and grimmer edition of Colonel
Birchin.
Dormer showed him the Vanderlynden dossier as they bowled along.
He surveyed it with the weariness of a professional to whom an
amateur exhibits a “masterpiece.”
“Colonel Birchin thinks it’s rape, does he?”
“Yes!”
“He’s wrong, of course. Q. office always are! What do you think it is
yourself?”
“A nasty snag. What happened doesn’t matter. You and I could settle
it for forty francs. But the French have got hold of it. It’s become
official.”
“What do you suggest?” Major Stevenage put in his monocle.
“We must go and see the Maire, and get it withdrawn. Let’s see.
Hondebecq? It’s the Communal Secretary Blanquart we must see.
Shrewd fellow and all on our side. These schoolmasters hate the
peasants.”
Dormer knew the area well. Hondebecq was the typical village of
French Flanders. That is to say, it was a cluster of cottages in which
rentiers—peasants who had scraped a few savings out of the
surrounding fields—lived on about forty pounds a year English; in its
centre, a paved grand’ place held a few modest shops, a huge high-
shouldered church, carefully refaced with red brick, and a big,
rambling “Estaminet de la Mairie,” next to the village school.
It was here that they found Blanquart, Communal Secretary,
schoolmaster, land surveyor, poor man’s lawyer, Heaven only knows
what other functions he used to combine. He was the only man in
the Commune handy with pen and paper, and this fact must have
substantially added to his income. But, like all his kind, he could not
forget that he came from Dunkirk or Lille; he had moments when his
loneliness got the better of his pride and he would complain bitterly
of the “sacred peasants.”
They found him seated in his little front parlour—he only functioned
in the official room at the Estaminet on State occasions—busy with
those innumerable forms by which the food of France was rationed,
her Army conscripted, her prices kept in check and her civil
administration facilitated. In the corner between the window and the
clock sat an old peasant who said only, “Bonjour.”
Blanquart greeted them effusively, as who should say: “We others,
we are men of the world.” He made polite inquiries about the officers’
health and the weather and the War, leading up to the introduction:
“Allow me to present you to Mister our Mayor! And now what can I
do for you?”
Major Stevenage, a little lost in the mixed stream of good French and
bad English, left it to Dormer.
“It is with reference to the claim of Vanderlynden! Can one arrange
it?”
Blanquart had only time to put in: “Everything arranges itself,” before
the Mayor cut him short.
“You have some nice ideas, you others. Arrange it, I believe you. You
will arrange it with our Deputy.”
Blanquart put in: “Mister the Mayor was insulted by the troops. We
wrote to our Deputy!”
Major Stevenage fidgeted. He had found it most difficult to go
through this sort of thing, day after day, for years. He had been
trained to deal with Asiatics. He turned on Blanquart:
“Why didn’t you write to me first?” but the Mayor cut in again. His
general outlook on life was about that of an English agricultural
labourer plus the dignity of Beadledom. This latter had been injured,
and the man, who seldom spoke a dozen sentences a day, now was
voluble. He understood more English than one gave him credit for.
“Why write to you, officer, you are all of the same colour!” (By this
time not a German attack could have stopped him.) “My Garde
Champêtre comes to tell me that there is a crime of violence at
Vanderlynden’s. They demand that I go to make procès-verbal. I put
on my tricolour sash. I take my official notebook. I arrive. I demand
the officer. Il s’est foutu de moi! (Untranslatable.) He says he has
orders to march to the trenches. His troops hold me in derision. They
sing laughable songs of me in my official capacity——”
“It is very well, Monsieur the Maire,” Dormer broke in. “We go to
make an arrestation. Can you indicate the culpable?”
“But I believe you, I can indicate him,” cried the old man.
Dormer waited breathlessly for some fatal name or number which
would drag a poor wretch through the slow exasperation of Court-
Martial proceedings.
“It was a small brown man!”
“That does not lead us very far!” said Dormer icily.
“Wait!” The old man raised his voice. “Achille!” The door opened, and
Achille Quaghebeur, the Garde Champêtre, in attendance on the
Maire, stepped in and closed it behind him. He had, in his dark green
and sulphur-coloured uniform, with his assumption of importance,
the air of a comic soldier out of “Madame Angot.” “Produce the
corroborative article!”
Achille found in his tail pocket surely the oldest and most faded of
leather pocket-books. From this in turn he produced a piece of
A.S.C. sacking, on which the word OATS was plainly printed in
black.
“Voila!” said the Maire.
“Totally useless!” growled the Major, turning red.
This made the Maire furious; he grasped the intonation and
expression if not the words.
“You others, you are enough to send one to sleep standing up. One
produces the corroborative pieces and you treat them as useless.”
And there followed a tirade during which Dormer drew the Major
outside, with profuse Bonjours! He thought that Blanquart was trying
to sign to him that he wanted to say something to him privately. But
the Major was upset, his dignity was hurt. A soldier by profession, he
had reduced the settlement of claims to a fine art. He was said to
have settled three thousand between the time he was made A.P.M.
to the division on the Aisne to the day of his death at Bailleul. He told
the chauffeur to drive to Vanderlynden’s. The man seemed to know
the way, and had probably been to the place many times. As the car
jolted and ground over the cobbles into the yard, Dormer said:
“I shall ask for the daughter, Madeleine.”
“Just so!”
“I don’t believe——”
“Nor do I,” said the Major stoutly.
Neither of them could pronounce the word “rape.”
They got out, knocked at the door and knocked again. The place
seemed not so much empty and deserted as enveloped in one of
those encompassing noises that only sort themselves out on
investigation. Too deep for a separator, too near for an aeroplane,
Dormer diagnosed it: “They’ve got the Government thrasher in the
back pasture, next the rye!” (He had a good memory and could tell
pretty well how most of the people distributed crops and work.)
They recrossed the bridge of the moat and skirting the latter entered
the back pasture. There against the gate that gave on to the arable

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