Introduction

I am indebted to Dr. M. Alfred Bichsel, head of the Department of Church Music at the Eastman School of Music, for the idea of tracing the Kyrie fons bonitatis through eight centuries of organ composition. Interestingly enough, this chant appears as a cantus firmus at least once in each period, except in the 19th century. It has been, for me, a fascinating study, as well as a new idea for the teaching of the history of music. Western music begins with Gregorian Chant; it is evident that the influence of this chant is still a potent force in contemporary music.  L.P.

Kyrie fons bonitatis

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The first chant of the Ordinary of the Mass, the Kyrie Eleison, has been an official part of the Roman liturgy at least since 529, when the third canon of the Synod of Vaison in Provençe directed that, “Since both in the Apostolic See and in all the provinces of the East and of Italy a sweet and most salutary custom has been introduced that Kyrie Eleison should often be said with great devotion and compunction, we too ordain that in all our churches this pious custom be introduced at matins and masses and vespers.”

Its recorded place in ecclesiastical history begins somewhat earlier, about the end of the fourth century, when the Gallic pilgrim lady, Aetheria, relates how, about 390 in Jerusalem, at the end of Vespers, one of the deacons read petitions which were interspersed by the answering shouts of a crowd of boys singing “Kyrie Eleison.” Describing what was in all probability a litany, she said, “Their cry is without end.”

The exact date for the inclusion of the Kyrie in the Roman rite is uncertain It may have become set in the liturgy at the time of the reforms carried on by Pope Gelasius (492–496). At any rate, by the time of Pope Gregory the Great (590–604) it was definitely a part of the service. In a letter to Bishop John of Syracuse, Gregory defends himself against accusations of introducing new, Greed-emulating practices to Rome. He stresses the differences between Greek and Roman practices: how the Greeks all answer Kyrie Eleison together, both clergy and people, whereas in Rome the clergy sing and the people respond; how the Greeks simply use Kyrie Eleison, while the Roman practice includes Christe Eleison as well.

The first Roman Ordo (said to date from the eighth century, contained in a ninth-century manuscript owned by the Abbey of St. Gall) directs, “The choir, having finished the antiphon, begins the Kyrie.” Thus we see already the change from the directive of the time of Gregory, which had read, “To be sung by the priest and response made by the people.” With the assumption by the Schola Cantorum of the responsorial functions once possessed by the congregation, the Kyrie as an art form was given freedom for expansion. In the reflowering of Gregorian composition that resulted, many of the Kyrie melodies were created. From this period, in all probability, dates the melody known as “Fons bonitatis.”

This is also the period of the trope, the full literature of which developed from the ninth century onward. Blume, in Tropes of the Missal (Leipzig, 1905), states, “The melody of ‘Fons bonitatis’ is already in the manuscripts of the tenth century. The text appears first in the 11th century. The 10th-century manuscripts hold many tropes—texts—as well as the melody of ‘Fons bonitatis,’ but not its particular text, so it is clearly a trope composed to a preexisting tune.”

It was inevitable that the tropes themselves should also be troped. Having expanded the chants textually, the inventive minds of the time turned quite naturally to the embellishment of the music. Adding another line of music above or below the chant itself marked the beginning of polyphony, the birth of organum. Willi Apel states that organum originated from the playing of organs. Certainly the similarity of the terms would seem to indicate a close connection between the two in the minds of the writers of the period. Two-part playing on the organ seems to have been known to the Greeks and Romans and to have been preserved by the Byzantines, who probably retransmitted the art to the Western world. Leo Schrade has found a reference to organa being played on the organ in the 14th century.

The first example of a composition based on Kyrie fons bonitatis is from this early polyphonic period; it comes from the 12th-century Spanish Codex de las Huelgas. It is a free organum composed above the original chant melody.

Example 1

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For the 13th century, the ars antiqua, the distinction between the liturgical motet and its secular counterpart may not always have been a hard and fast one. Eminent churchmen, confronted with the gaily descanting musicians, were often disgruntled, as this quotation from John of Salisbury will show:

Could you but hear one of these enervating performances executed with all the devices of the art, you might think it a chorus of Sirens, not of men; and you would be astounded by the singers’ facility, with which indeed neither that of the parrot or nightingale, nor of whatever else there may be that is more remarkable in this kind, can compare. For this facility is displayed in long passages running up and down, in dividing or in repeating notes, in repeating phrases, and in clashing together of voices, while in all this the high or even the highest notes of the scale are so mingled with the lower and lowest, that the ears are almost deprived of their power to distinguish.

In 1322 Pope John XXII issued a decree which specifically deplored singers who “truncate the melodies with hockets, deprave them with discants, and even trope the upper parts with secular songs!”

Small wonder that it caused a pope’s irritation, these texts:

Well above all things must I praise only love, for my heart has made me accord it such a lofty place, for which I must always give it thanks with all true lovers. Nothing can vex me, not even lies, for love makes me feel this for this lovely one. Sweet God! I love her so that I cannot forget her great beauty, which causes me to think on her day and night and often to sigh. And her great nobility, her wit and goodness, which we must remember, for one could find none other more virtuous than this one who has thus captivated me. Alas, O God, alas! I am no longer able to contain myself that I must now speak to her, but I fear lest my love should fail, and for this I pray in singing that she would keep me as a lover, and in this I also rejoice in God, for I have served Him loyally in faith. (Triplum of Codex Montpellier, Number 262.)

Translated from the medieval French by M. A. Bichsel.

The specific function of the organ in the church before the 14th century remains largely a matter of conjecture, It was probably used to give pitches and regulate the intonation of the singers. Most writers agree that the organ must have reinforced the long tenor notes of the organa and polyphonic motets. Thus in our performance of a 13th-century motet from the Codex Montpellier, the organ assumed its historic function and sounded the Kyrie, while the two secular-texted lines were sung above this supporting melody. The transcription of this charming music was made by Yvonne Rokseth and is published in her Polyphonies du XIII. siècle (Paris, 1939).

Example 2

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During the 14th century the technical advances necessary to enable the organ to become a solo instrument were made. For instance, the organ of Rouen Cathedral acquired a rudimentary “Rückpositiv” in 1386. Open-flue drone pipes for sounding long tenor lines became quite common in the larger instruments; in some cases they seem to have become too prominent, as in Rouen Cathedral, where, in 1382, the organ builder was asked to remove these pipes, because the tenor was overweighing all the other stops. The roller-board, allowing disposition of pipes elsewhere than directly above the keys controlling them, was already known in the 14th century. As early as 1312 we read of pedal keys to control bells of the carillon in Antwerp, a device soon transferred to the control of the larger organ pipes. The first specific mention of the organ pedal in France occurs in the Annals of the Cathedral of Troyes, where a pedal of eight notes was added to the organ in 1432. And, among other novelties, the much-abused “shaking-stoppe,” or tremulant, came into being.

While the organ was being prepared to play a larger role in the church service, new styles for performance of the Mass came into vogue. Felix Raugel has suggested that the alternation of organ and schola cantorum in various parts of the Mass may have begun as early as the 11th century, while Yvonne Rokseth even surmises that the organ, taking the place of congregational responses, may have been employed for this purpose as early as the 10th century, when this responsorial role of the congregation seems largely to have disappeared.

At any rate, in 1414 a report of a Mass, alternating between organ and schola, at St. Jacques de la Boucherie in Paris, is the first official note we have of this practice. Henry of Saxony, employed as organist of Notre Dame, Paris, in 1415, has left a record of his duties there. He played during the Kyrie, Gloria, Sequences, Sanctus, and Agnus of the solemn Masses.

In 1662 Martin Sonnet compiled his Caeremoniale Parisiense as a guide to church practices in the city, and as an attempt to secure uniformity in the playing of the Mass. To quote from this delightful book of directives: “The organist must be modest and diligent, and must guard particularly against being loud, lascivious, or profane at the organ. He should give careful attention to the bells in order not to delay or hurry the service. No unauthorized persons should be admitted to the organ, and it should be kept closed when not in use—and clean and free from dust.”

Surely M. Sonnet must have been the original “chairman of the music committee!” The Caeremoniale further directs the uses for the organ in the Mass: it is to play the plainchant, to guide the celebrant, soloists, and chorus, to give pitch to the singers, “lest cacophony and dissonance of the voices should arise from the lack of such things.” Specific versets of the Mass are designated as ones in which the organist should play the cantus firmus: the first and last Kyries, Et in terra pax, Suscipe deprecationem nostram, In gloria Amen, first Sanctus, and first Agnus. “In those versets where the cantus firmus is present, it must not be altered, mutilated, or falsified, but must be presented exactly as it occurs in the Parisian chant books.”

This work of 1662 seems to describe time-honored Parisian practice, for the next of the “Kyrie compositions” dates from 1531—131 years earlier than Sonnet’s book—and yet it satisfies the requirements for the organ Mass set forth therein.

The first organ music in France, that is, music specifically designated for the organ, was published in seven small tabulature books by Pierre Attaignant of Paris in 1531. These are the only French organ pieces from the 16th century to survive—and indeed only one copy of these works is extant, and that no longer in France, but in the Staatsmuseum Bibliothek in Munich. The works contained in the Attaignant organ books are by anonymous composers, and Yvonne Rokseth, who transcribed the tabulature and prepared the practical edition (Paris, 1930), believes that they are not all the works of one man.

In the performance of the Kyrie, Christe, and Kyrie from “Messe fons” of the Attaignant organ books, the organ alternated with the Schola Cantorum, as was done on feast days and festivals in 16th-century Paris. The organ, contrary to ecclesiastical decree, played the opening verset, a practice which, however, seems to have been quite common.

Example 3

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In the Christe, the chant melody forsakes its more usual tenor range, and is found in the soprano. Perhaps this is an ideal spot to utilize the tremulant!

Example 4

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With the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century, the “Fons bonitatis” melody, along with many other Gregorian tunes, was taken over into the Lutheran liturgy, unchanged, as the Kyrie Summum of Luther’s Deutsche Messe. German words, simply a translation of the 11th-century trope, replaced the Latin, and “Fons bonitatis” became Kyrie, Gott Vater in Ewigkeit.

Dr. Friedrich Blume, writing on the establishment of a Protestant organ style, has said, “The practice of alternation and the chorale prelude were the main outlets for the development of a specifically Protestant school of organ composition.” Further, concerning this alternations-praxis: “In the Evangelical church, as in the Catholic church until well into the 17th century, the organ could itself take over the major role in the Mass service. It was much practiced, for instance, in the Kyrie, to have ‘Kyrie eleison’ sung by the priest and the choir, the ‘Christe’ played on the organ, and the second ‘Kyrie’ performed by the choir.” The French essayist Montaigne, writing of a Lutheran service in Kempten, Germany, where he visited in 1580, expressed surprise at hearing the organ alternating with the choirs in the performance of the Kyrie.

Choral settings of the “Kyrie fons bonitatis” by Praetorius, Schütz, and others still exist. Short versets for the organ have not survived from many composers; perhaps most were not written down but merely improvised. However, from the pen of Johann Sebastian Bach’s contemporary, Tobias Volckmar (1678–1756), came 33 measures—three “fughettinas,” as it were, on Kyrie, Gott Vater in Ewigkeit. Volckmar, organist, cantor, and musical director in Reichenstein, Laubau, and Hirschberg, was a pupil of Johann Krieger.

In his three short versets, Volckmar has composed simple fugal expositions of the three subjects which he has derived from the chant-choral melody.

Example 5

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In 1731 J. S Bach’s Six Partitas for Klavier were engraved on copper plates and published as the Klavierübung, Opus I.. The second part, consisting of the Italian Concerto and the French Overture in B Minor, appeared in 1735, and in 1739 followed the third part, with the title:

Third part of the keyboard practice, consisting in Various Preludes on the Catechism and Other Hymns for the Organ for Music Lovers and especially for Connoisseurs of Such Work composed by Johann Sebastian Bach, Royal Polish and Electoral Saxon Court Composer, Capellmeister and Director Choir Musici In Leipzig.
Published by the Author.

In this collection flanked by the Prelude and Fugue in E-flat, we find 11 1arge-scale chorale preludes based on the Lutheran chorales corresponding to the liturgical parts of the service; hence the name by which the work is often known, “The German Organ Mass.” The ten shorter chorale preludes have been said to symbolize Luther’s Shorter Catechism, just as the larger works may symbolize the Greater Catechism. Much symbolism may certainly be read into this chorale collection; perhaps even the use of the key signature of E-flat, with its three flats, is symbolic of the Trinity.

The first compositions following the B-flat Prelude are those based on Kyrie, Gott Vater in Ewigkeit. In these three chorale preludes Bach sets the Kyrie, Christe, and Kyrie of the Lutheran Mass. In the first Kyrie the cantus firmus is in the soprano; in the Christe it is found in the tenor; for the final Kyrie the cantus appears in augmentation in the pedal, while a five-voice fugue is built above it. The extreme chromaticism at the conclusion of the composition nobly expresses the word “eleison” and recalls with its intensity such other Bach works as the Crucifixus of the B Minor Mass, the three-sectioned chorale prelude O Lamm Gottes, unschuldig, or the 11th counterpoint of the Kunst der Fuge.

The three shorter fughettas based on Kyrie, Gott Vater in Ewigkeit follow next in the collection. These gems are to be played manualiter.

During the classic period the organ fell into a period of decadence already hinted at in the full flowering of the organ building of Silbermann, when the ensemble of the instrument began to take second place in importance to the solo voices and the imitative possibilities of the instrument. The composers of the time turned their attentions to the improved and developing orchestras and to the novel and exciting “loud-soft” or “fortepiano.” The chorale fell into disuse as the more catchy pietistic Lieder became ever more popular, and Gregorian chant, too, suffered many indignities; in many churches it fell completely into disuse.

Here and there, it was true, an artistic flame was kindled, shone brightly, then flickered: Mozart’s organ works are true gems, although so few compositions were written, and these are mostly for mechanical clock-organ; in France Boely continued the contrapuntal art for another generation; Lemmons began the organ school which led to Franck and Guilmant, and in Germany, Felix Mendelssohn learned to know the works of Bach from his teacher, Zelter, and the revival of interest in the Thomaskantor’s works brought a minor renaissance of interest in the organ and its possibilities—a renaissance which led to the excellent compositions of Mendelssohn, the monumental single work of Reubke, the immense tone pictures of Liszt, and the charms of the little-known organ works of Schumann.

But the Kyrie fons bonitatis was stilled; there was no place for Gregorian chant in the rhapsodic outpourings of Franck or in the romantic meanderings of his successor, Pierné. But the next occupant of the organ bench at the Church of Ste. Clothilde in Paris was Charles Tournemire, who spearheaded a return to the chant as a source of inspiration for his improvisation and composition. In the preface to his monumental opus L'Orgue Mystique, a set of 51 volumes based on the Gregorian propers for each Sunday of the liturgical year, Tournemire said, “. . .The author found at Solesmes Abbey many appreciated encouragements and retained marvelous impressions concerning chant. Plain-chant . . . really is an inexhaustible source of mysterious and splendid lines; plain-chant (is) the triumph of modal art. . . .”

Since these volumes are based on the propers, we do not expect to find the fons bonitatis melody in L’Orgue Mystique. There may be a hint of it in Volume XXVI for Trinity Sunday, or this may be only my wishful thinking. At any rate, the return to the chant as a source of inspiration for variation has continued with the composers of the present. Tournemire’s successor at Ste. Clothilde, the blind organist Jean Langlais, incorporated fons bonitatis in the Tiento of his Suite Médiévale (Paris, Éditions Salabert, 1947). The tiento, as a form, dates from the 16th century, from Spain, where it was a forerunner, together with the ricercar, of the fugue.

Finally, to bring fons bonitatis to a setting as contemporary as the morning paper, we have Neely Bruce’ Fantasia for Organ. This brilliant young composer, born in 1944, agreed to accept a commission to write a closing work for the Fons bonitatis Recital. At no point in the composition is there a direct statement of the Gregorian melody, but the influence of its melodic shape and its free rhythm may be found, and hints of the melody itself are heard throughout the composition.

The Prelude presents a quiet figuration for a single 4-foot flute; this serves as accompaniment to the free melody, to be played on a cornet combination.

Example 6

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The Theme and Variations, reminiscent of the style of Sweelinck, become increasingly more virtuose and dissonant, but culminate, in the fifth variation, in a most introspective Lento.

Example 7

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Example 8

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The Finale (Maestoso, quasi Passacaglia), is built over a recurring 12-tone bass, above which a theme, clearly derived from the font bonitatis, is varied. After a variation above a pedal augmentation and a short chordal interlude, the work concludes with a whirlwind “vivace,” and fons bonitatis is brought safely to rest in the second half of the 20th century.

Example 9

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The Fantasia for Organ by Neely Bruce received its first performance at the Eastman School of Music, March 9, 1961. It had been composed during February of the same year.

Bibliography

Ameln, Konrad, ed. Handbuch der deutschen evangelischen Kirchenmusik. Göttingen, 1940.

Anglès, Higini. El Codex Musical de las Huelgas. Barcelona, 1931.

Bedbrook, Gerald Stares. Keyboard Music from the Middle Ages to the Beginnings of the Baroque. London, 1949.

Blume, Clemens. Tropen des Missale, I (Analecta Hymnica). Leipzig, 1905.

Blume, Dr. Friedrich. Die evangelische Kirchenmusik (Handbuch der Musikwissenschaft). Potsdam, 1931.

David, Hans T., and Arthur Mendel. Bach Reader. New York, 1945.

Das Erbe deutscher Musik. Volume IX: “Orgelchoräle und Johann Sebastian Bach.” Braunschweig, 1937.

Fortescue, Adrian. The Mass: a Study of the Roman Liturgy. London, 1930.

Howell, Almonte C., Jr. The French Organ Mass in the XVI and XVII Centuries.  Chapel Hill, N. C., 1953. (On Micro-cards; unpublished doctoral dissertation.)

Jungmann, J. A., S. J. The Mass of the Roman Rite. New York, 1951.

Keller, Hermann. Die Orgelwerke Bachs. Leipzig, 1948.

Kittler, Günther. Geschichte des protestantischen Orgelchorals von seinen Anfängen bis zu den Lüneburger Orgeltabulaturbüchern. Ueckermünde, 1931.

Moser, Hans Joachim Die evangelische Kirchenmusik in Deutschland. Berlin-Darmstadt, 1954.

Rokseth, Yvonne. La Musique d’Orgue au XVe siècle et au début du XVIe. Paris, 1930.

Rokseth, Yvonne. Polyphonies du XIII. siècle. Paris, 1939.

Stevens, Denis. Ars Antiqua (Pelican History of Music). Baltimore, 1960.

Sumner, William Leslie. The Organ. London, 1955.

Tournemire, Charles. L’Orgue Mystique. Paris, 1928.

Ursprung, Dr. Otto. Die katholische Kirchenmusik. Potsdam, 1931.

Eastman School of Music
University of Rochester

From The Musical Heritage of the Church, Volume VI (St. Louis, Mo.: Concordia Publishing House, 1963). Copyright Concordia Publishing House. Printed by permission. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior permission of Concordia Publishing House.