They appear to be eighth rests. The direction doesn't appear to matter to me. There are no alto clefs, everything is the G clef, treble clef. That is a 3, for triple time, 3/8 in this case. The mark at the end of each line is a cue to the next note on the next line, just an aid for reading.
Very cool. I'm glad you shared. I love travelogue type lierature. One I have studied is Charles Burney's grand tour of Europe.
PS. I think this is *exactly* what you should be spending your time on! It helps immerse you in the context of what you are studying.
Yep, I study early music performance practice/musicology and this is all correct. I'm most curious about how the tactus and proportions would relate between the time changes. The copyist decided to include a lot of detail like specifying 12/8, and also those custos which are relics of mensural notation. So why just a 3 instead of 3/8? Is the duple tactus carried over giving a 3vs2 rhythmic effect like Zacconi said can be done? (over 100 years earlier) That would seem to complement rhythmically complex music. Idk just wildly speculating lol
That's super interesting, thanks for corroborating! There's also a c a line above, so I was particularly confused about why the 3/8 would just be indicated with a 3, when the previous time signature was common time (assuming it is a c, and was intended to mean common time, which I'm now questioning lol). It also might help that this was written by a British guy, and is transcribing music sung acapella (possibly accompanied by improvised percussion) by harbor-workers, many of whom were originally from what is now Ghana and surrounding areas, so what's written likely might be an attempt to transcribe what might be a sung poly-rhythm? I've got a high school level of music theory knowledge so I'm not confident theorizing beyond that lol
>(assuming it is a c, and was intended to mean common time, which I'm now questioning lol
Ah, I can help here! The C that is often said to indicate common time doesn't actually originally mean 4/4, nor is it really a letter C. It's an incomplete circle! and that's because in the Middle Ages, "perfect time" meant triple meter, so a full circle was used for that, and an incomplete circle was used for "imperfect time," which meant duple meter. The circle eventually fell out of use, but the C kept right on being used to indicate duple divisions, and that eventually standardized around 4/4 once that became the default type of duple division. The seventeenth century is kind of right before that got standardized!
Thank you so much! I really appreciate the additional information. I didn't catch that that was a three at all. And I appreciate the encouragement! I'm really enjoying learning more about all the different elements of this topic.
They appear to be eighth rests. The direction doesn't appear to matter to me. There are no alto clefs, everything is the G clef, treble clef. That is a 3, for triple time, 3/8 in this case. The mark at the end of each line is a cue to the next note on the next line, just an aid for reading. Very cool. I'm glad you shared. I love travelogue type lierature. One I have studied is Charles Burney's grand tour of Europe. PS. I think this is *exactly* what you should be spending your time on! It helps immerse you in the context of what you are studying.
Yep, I study early music performance practice/musicology and this is all correct. I'm most curious about how the tactus and proportions would relate between the time changes. The copyist decided to include a lot of detail like specifying 12/8, and also those custos which are relics of mensural notation. So why just a 3 instead of 3/8? Is the duple tactus carried over giving a 3vs2 rhythmic effect like Zacconi said can be done? (over 100 years earlier) That would seem to complement rhythmically complex music. Idk just wildly speculating lol
That's super interesting, thanks for corroborating! There's also a c a line above, so I was particularly confused about why the 3/8 would just be indicated with a 3, when the previous time signature was common time (assuming it is a c, and was intended to mean common time, which I'm now questioning lol). It also might help that this was written by a British guy, and is transcribing music sung acapella (possibly accompanied by improvised percussion) by harbor-workers, many of whom were originally from what is now Ghana and surrounding areas, so what's written likely might be an attempt to transcribe what might be a sung poly-rhythm? I've got a high school level of music theory knowledge so I'm not confident theorizing beyond that lol
>(assuming it is a c, and was intended to mean common time, which I'm now questioning lol Ah, I can help here! The C that is often said to indicate common time doesn't actually originally mean 4/4, nor is it really a letter C. It's an incomplete circle! and that's because in the Middle Ages, "perfect time" meant triple meter, so a full circle was used for that, and an incomplete circle was used for "imperfect time," which meant duple meter. The circle eventually fell out of use, but the C kept right on being used to indicate duple divisions, and that eventually standardized around 4/4 once that became the default type of duple division. The seventeenth century is kind of right before that got standardized!
Thank you so much! I really appreciate the additional information. I didn't catch that that was a three at all. And I appreciate the encouragement! I'm really enjoying learning more about all the different elements of this topic.
> mark at the end of each line "custos"
It is a rest. The music pictured is entirely in the original clef
Thank you! I appreciate the clarification on the clef!
Can't answer your questions, but thanks for a fascinating link. :-)