Camaldolese Artists: Guido d'Arezzo

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Part of "Camaldolese Artists"

1. Guido d'Arezzo

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What I'd like to do in these five sessions is to give you a taste, a little taste, mostly factual. I don't know an awful lot about music itself, the intricacies of Guido, for instance, but I can give you some facts about him and his Kamal Dali's connection and that sort of thing I'll be doing with the artists also, our most famous artists anyway. I had suggested that if there was extra time, see I'd originally done a sixth class for Saturday, which I bumped out of this series because technically they're not artists as such and we could easily do without. And I really can use them probably next time, whenever that is in the future, that I come here and give lectures on our most famous houses, their histories, because they would fit there also. If I were to talk about Murano, I would necessarily speak of two of the abbots of Murano anyway,

[01:20]

the people who did the Annales, Kamal Dali's, and also Fra Mauro, so it's not necessary. So what I'd rather do is after each session, if there's extra time, just open it up. Also as we're going along, just yell out questions or comments as we go. So, this first session is on Guido Monaco, and you will run across all of these different names, pardon me, he goes by in history, different appellations, but probably the most famous is Guido d'Arezzo and Guido Monaco, those two are the ones you'll run across mostly. This one here, Guidone Pomposiano, Guido of Pomposa, only comes in the 15th century at the earliest, and it really comes by way of, shall we say, polemics, anti-Kamaldanese polemics,

[02:30]

slightly anti-Kamaldanese, a matter of Guido really wasn't Kamaldanese from the beginning, and so Pomposa, and some of the monks in history connected with Pomposa, or music, in the Benedictine order, got a little polemical at times. Anyway, one of these most famous polemicists was Pellegrino Garnetti, I met him at San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice, and he has since died, but I have a copy of an article he did which is nasty, [...] against the Kamaldanese and their pretensions and all this stuff. And he was a fairly nasty man, actually. He was a real bone of contention in their community, he was the one who had kept them from changing any of the liturgy to Vatican II, it was the past.

[03:34]

Remember we talked about that, Robert? Anyway, he's now past his reward, and they've changed their office into Italian. But if anyone is interested in reading that bombast of his, which is fun to read, just ask me, I'll get you a copy. We don't know for certain whether Guido even was from Arezzo, in fact we don't think he was from Arezzo at all, most people assume that because of the name given him, but we're fairly certain that the name is given him because of his famous stint that he did with Bishop Teodaldo of Arezzo, later on, in the actual time when Kamaldali was being founded. Bishop Teodaldo is that famous bishop who actually deeded the church of the Sacro Eremo to the first five monks of Kamaldali, to the founding fathers.

[04:36]

So there's already in the beginning, and this is while Guido is with Teodaldo, there is a connection between Guido and Kamaldali, we're fairly certain. There are a number, Arezzo by the way does claim him, in fact to Robert, when we were walking down the street, remember we walked past that one window and it had a great big plate underneath, this was where Guido was born, the very room, and you'll see Guido Arezzo stuff all over the city, and a statue of Guido in one of the major piazze, I don't remember which one, probably near the Duomo in Arezzo. And there's a whole number of little towns around Arezzo that all claim him too, so periodically they all fight about it, whenever an anniversary comes up, and they all have their own claims to Guido's birth and rearing in their town, but we're fairly certain he

[05:41]

wasn't from any of them. He was born somewhere around 990, right around the millennium, and he either died in 1050 or 1058. We're fairly certain he died on May 17th, we just don't know which year. There are two traditions, and depending on whether you believe he went back to Pomposa at the end of his life and lived that final eight years at Pomposa, you'll date it accordingly. But there is a Kamaldali's tradition, by the way there are Kamaldali's traditions throughout the centuries that disagree with one another too, so it's not like there's a straight Kamaldali tradition and everybody else differing. The Kamaldali's traditions differ also on Guido. But there is a Kamaldali's tradition, I'll talk about that a little bit later, where

[06:43]

Guido is listed as one of the priors of Fonte Avalana, and that he died at Fonte Avalana as prior on May 17th, 1050. That's probably not true at all, but he was there, and he was an esteemed monk there, and he spent years there at Fonte Avalana. Anyway, we'll get to that. There are also claims that he was German, and that he was a French monk, so we bring in other countries. Everyone's trying to claim it because he's so central to what happens with the scale in modern music, and he invented it. And so he's a biggie, and everybody wants a piece of the pie. If you've been to the Uffizi, did you go to the Uffizi this year? Not this time. But you've been there before, yeah. There's a large statue of Guido there also. I think there are duplicates, the ones I know that I saw at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.

[07:45]

Regardless of all the nitpicking about dates, and whether he was Camaldolese and all that stuff, everyone is fairly agreed upon the fact that he was a great man, and he was a great musician, and he did wonderful things, and he got a lot of music together, chant music together, at a time when it was quite a mess. We'll get to that a little bit later too. Titles that do come down to us, connecting or concerned with Guido, are that he was beato, so that he was beatifying, blessed Guido, that he was venerabilis, and that's from our own tradition, and that he was also santissimo, not only holy, but the most holy. He has a very revered name and history, and is very important too, as I say, the history of music.

[08:56]

We know that he was a monk of Pomposa, Santa Maria di Pomposa. Sometimes it's della Pomposa, sometimes it's di Pomposa. This is a monastery which was part of the Romualdian reform movement. It was an abbey that already existed, and joined the Romualdian movement, that Romualdian branch that was centered around Fonte Avalana, and the work of Peter Damian. In fact, Peter Damian, if you've read his life, you'll remember that after he had been at Fonte Avalana only one year, he was called by the abbot, the famous abbot Guido, this is another Guido, abbot Guido, abbot Saint Guido of Pomposa, to come and lecture on the scriptures to the monks of Pomposa, and the prior of Fonte Avalana let Peter Damian go there, and he was there for two years, lecturing, this is as a junior monk, not really,

[10:05]

but I mean it's equivalent to that. And thus their connection, which became stronger throughout the years, and later they were quite officially listed as Romualdian, was begun with the abbot Guido and Peter Damian himself. This monastery of Pomposa is between Ravenna and Ferrara, where Alessandro is from, Alessandro is from Ferrara, and that is north of Ravenna in the Po River region, the Po Delta region. And we know that this monastery, in line with its Romualdian roots, had a hermitage, there was a connection already predating abbot Guido, the former abbot William became a hermit,

[11:12]

and there's a connection there between William and what's going on in that area, hermetically speaking, but it becomes quite firm once Peter Damian steps into the arena. Anyway, there is evidence that there was a hermitage attached, that the former abbot was in that hermitage, and we have that fact through this particular tome, or set of tomes, the Rerum Pomposianorum Historicorum, and I saw those come out also, I believe, in the monastery library. Anyway, book one mentions that this hermitage was under the obedience to the abbot of Pomposa, so it shows you right there that they're not Romualdian yet, because under the Romualdian

[12:15]

movement of reform, there's no abbot of a cenobitical house that's over the hermitage. Romuald, in fact, in his movement, changes that. It's always the hermit who's in charge of those things, when the two are together. History has assigned the year 1010 as the date for Guido's entrance into Pomposa, and once we get him into Pomposa, there's a brilliant musical career there. He becomes the scola master at Pomposa, and he decides that things are not, he must have been a fairly high J, and probably a one on the enneagram, and everything, the chaos of the musical situation was driving him crazy, and so he decided to set things aright, especially for the younger monks coming into the community, so that he could at least start off the new crop, understanding music, and having some method for singing the chant, because at that

[13:21]

time, until Guido, you had chant being sung differently in every monastery, in every house, and, I mean, we don't just normally think that it's going to be da-da-da-da-da, not so. I mean, whoever's in charge of the chant in the house would decide how high it would go between the intervals, and that's the way it was, which was driving Guido nuts, of course, and would drive us nuts too. He decided that it was much more advantageous to set a system where chant would sound more or less the same wherever one went, and, as simple as it sounds, it sounds ridiculous, Guido's golden rule that if a note appears on this line there, that down the line it didn't appear to begin, it's going to have the same sound, was very controversial in

[14:23]

his day, and he got into a lot of hot water over this. In fact, it got so bad at his house that he had to leave. He was asked by the abbot, Guido, to leave the community for a while, not to leave, stop being a monk, but just to go elsewhere and let a little fresh air breathe through the cloister, and he was in much demand at that time. People were hearing what he was doing, and he had great success with the young monks at Composa, so a number of bishops wanted Guido to come to their cathedrals and teach the cathedral choirs how to sing chant that way so that they could get their feet on the ground, musically speaking, and we know that he went to a number of these cathedrals, and I don't have them listed here. We know of at least three that he went to, the most important being Arezzo with Bishop

[15:30]

Teodaldo. Teodaldo wanted him to instruct his cathedral choir, too, because he had already heard that Guido had had great success in two other cathedrals, and we have a document commending, a document by Teodaldo, commending the work Guido is doing with the choir at the cathedral dated 1025. Well, this is right at the time Romuald is founding Camaldoli. You can date Camaldoli. I mean, there's an earlier tradition that Camaldoli was founded in 1012, and no. Camaldoli was, you can date the founding of Camaldoli in the 20s, 23 to 25, 26, right down there is when Camaldoli is actually being founded, and this is right when Guido is there with Teodaldo.

[16:31]

Pope John XIX, I've put, I think, all the spellings and dates up there if you're interested in that sort of thing. He had heard about Guido from various bishops for whom Guido had worked, and he invited him to Rome. Now, you have problems if you're going to look this up because there are, there's real historical problems with the enumerations regarding Pope John, especially from John, is it John VIII, John VIII and onwards. You have anti-popes and popes who were not sure existed, and the numbers will differ because of that. But anyway, they assigned this man, the name John XIX, and he was begging Guido to come to Rome and teach the choirs at Rome his new techniques for singing, and Guido wouldn't

[17:48]

go. Guido liked it in Arezzo, and he stayed on there, and we're fairly certain that he went to Camaldoli for a period. That is the Sacra Ero. We actually have a document listing the visiting of a monk named Guido, well, not a Benedictine, a monk. At that time, they would have said Benedictine. But we're not certain that it was Guido, this Guido, but it was a monk who was connected with chant, so it's quite likely, but we can't prove it. Camaldoli's sources assume that it was Guido in Arezzo, and that he taught his techniques to the hermits at Camaldoli, who embraced both Guido and his music from there on. Finally, at the third invitation of the Pope, Guido went to Rome, and the Pope studied his

[18:56]

techniques, his music, and highly approved and recommended him to bishops all over the place. And Guido quickly got malaria and had to leave Rome. The Pope wanted him to work in Rome, but he wasn't there very long because he got what we think was malaria, at least the symptoms sound like it, and malaria was quite common at that time in Rome anyway. Much of the precise dating and chronological order for Guido's life and works have been derived from various deductions people could make, piecing together evidence of his presence there, his writing this letter, various documents of bishops referring to him, not always with dates, however, so they've had to bring in other dates, other documents, and correlate, but not without some suppositions and hypotheses being made.

[20:01]

We get to know a little bit about the history, general history of Guido from a letter he wrote from Rome to Framiche, a brother of Michael at Pomposa, his good friend, and in that letter, Guido talks about the situation where he had to leave because of the jealousy of his brothers and the urging of Abbot Guido in order to preserve the peace of the house and da-da-da-da-da. And Guido mentions in the letter he isn't ready to go back yet. There is some urging, especially from the Abbot, now is the time to return, but Guido won't do it. And this is where we think he went to Fontana after his Roman sojourn. Basically, other than that one little mention of Guido and something to do with chant being

[21:09]

at the hermitage, we don't have any direct connection that we can absolutely scientifically prove between Guido d'Arezzo and Camaldoli itself. Everyone is fairly certain he was at Fonte Appolana and for a protracted period, but Camaldoli itself we don't know about. It would be strange if he hadn't gone to Camaldoli, considering all the opportunities he had, and since he was with Bishop Teodaldo, was his musician master, and Teodaldo in 1027 deeded over the church at Camaldoli and was there. It would be crazy if he weren't there, but we don't know that for sure. There is evidence that he was at Fonte Appolana, but we don't know in what capacity he was there. And there's a cherished tradition at Fonte Appolana itself that he was one of the priors

[22:18]

and one of the actual listings of the priors of Fonte Appolana, I think from the 1200s, if I'm not mistaken. He's listed as a prior of Fonte Appolana, but I remember I asked Lino Vigilucci when I was there whether he thought Guido was really a prior of Fonte Appolana, and Guido, Lino gets this sort of half-moon face, and made sounds that made me believe that he didn't believe it at all, but discreet monk that Lino is, he wouldn't come out and say for sure that he wasn't. Anyway, we know that he was there, and he had some influence at Fonte Appolana. We also know that he was drawn to solitude, and so that was probably another reason he was at Fonte Appolana in those years. We have a number, and I can give you them, a number of instances where historians during

[23:23]

the centuries, and some of them quite eminent historians, mostly Benedictine and our own Camaldolese historians, and the ones with asterisks are Camaldolese historians, referred to Guido as the prior of Fonte Appolana, or a monk of Fonte Appolana, or in some cases the abbot of Fonte Appolana. Well, Fonte Appolana didn't have abbots at that time, so we don't quite know what to make of that. Guido Grandi, in his dissertation on this Camaldolenses, refers to Guido d'Arezzo being there as a prior, as a prior with a sort of a co-adjutor abbot type status.

[24:24]

So he was there, and he was ready to take over as the next prior. That could be true. And it could be that he was acting as prior, that he was a prior of Fonte Appolana for a while. It's also quite true that he, in the end, did go back to Pomposa and died back in his former monastery, Benedictine monastery. Although, we're not sure. We're just not sure. They're not sure about anything when it comes to Guido. They know that he existed and that he wrote a couple of things, and everyone's claiming him. And there's good cause for us to claim some connections, especially through Fonte Appolana, but a lot of it you can just sort of put in parentheses and think, well, historically there's not much to say. We do have one codex, a chronicle of Camaldo, which is dated 1050, or excuse me, Guido was

[25:32]

found under the year 1050, and it reads, Blessed Guido of Arezzo, morto, died 10 years after the death of Beato Forte, hermit of Avallano. May 17, 1050. So this is the Camaldolese tradition, is that he died on May 17, 1050. But as I say, Pomposa has something different to say, and there are externs on both sides, and nobody knows for sure. So what do we have regarding Guido and Camaldo? Well, we know that he was Romualdian. In other words, we know that he was part, through Pomposa and Fonte Appolana, and possibly from Camaldo, of St. Romeo's influence that's going on in monastic reform at that time.

[26:32]

We know that. We know that he most likely lived for a number of years at Fonte Avallana, and he could perhaps have been superior of Fonte Avallana, but not likely, to be honest. It's quite likely that Guido lived his last years out back at his abbey of Santa Maria della Pomposa, or di Pomposa. And certainly, if you're reading anyone that says he died in 1058, that's the tradition we're holding, that he went back to Pomposa. And because during this time, you have the abbot of Pomposa pleading with Guido to come back. It's time to come back. And his stability is to Pomposa. His works that we have are the Micrologos, and then a collection of chants, a collection of antiphons, which is an antiphonarium.

[27:34]

We have those two. He may have written other things, but we don't know for sure. We have two letters of his also. A famous one to Brother Michael of Pomposa, in which he talks about earlier problems with the monks and regarding music and all of that. And one to Teodaldo of Arezzo. That's all we have. But the Micrologos is what's given him his fame. This is a dissertation on music. And it's dated after 1026, but it doesn't, I mean, people will give it dates, but there is no certain date for this. We just know it happened after 1026 and before, probably before 1028. So one of those three years. 26, 27, 28. Right around the time of Camaldoli's actual formal founding at the Sacrare.

[28:36]

He wrote this work as a teaching device, a didactic tool for his boys in the choir of Arezzo. So it's under Teodaldo, his patronage, that we actually get Brito's work in a written form. The antiphonarium is dated somewhere between 1028 and 1032. So before he goes to Rome, he gets the volume of antiphons done. We know some of his sources. We know that he uses Cassiodorus, those of you who took the monastic history course, the founder of Vivarium, the monastic experiment of Vivarium. Also Boethius he uses as a source, but those two he's using philosophically as a source.

[29:39]

His real musical source is the Dialogus, the dialogue of Pseudo-Odo, or Pseudo-Odome. And it's through this Pseudo-Odo, that you see many of the elements of Brito putting things together and coming up with a composite picture for music, a composite technique, let's say. And he's using that Dialogus to a great extent. He gets his stuff, I'm not going to go into this stuff, monochords and octaves and all of that. Siprian someday can talk about that sort of business, because most of us aren't generally equipped, I'm certainly not, to be talking about that sort of thing. But in general, it's the theory of modes and modalities in music,

[30:40]

the general music theory regarding intervals and stuff, at least the basic groundwork that he's going to use to come up with his system, the realities of range and pitch, are going to come from this work. Also what Pseudo-Odo has to say about Organa, and some of these pieces in the Antiphonarium, evidently, I haven't seen them, are Organa pieces. Do you know what Organa is? Diaphany or Organa? We should sing some Organa. It's in fifths or fourths. That's the one we did the Our Fathers. Yes. When we go off into two parts and it sounds kind of oriental. That's Organa. That's Organa in fifths. So isn't he changing his diaphany to Organa? Often. Often it is, yeah.

[31:40]

Or it's using Organa from time to time. Anyway, those are his sources. Guido's golden rule, I repeat, is every note placed on the same line must have the same sound. Period. Period. This is one of the things that causes the most problems for people. It's no wonder that there was reportedly chaos in the field of music if even something like that hadn't been settled. And if you read the sources we have, and they describe, most of these books on Guido try to give you some background, and they describe what it was like in these monasteries. It must have been horrifying because it all depended on who was in charge of the music at that time and how he wanted things sung. And it could mean that there's long slurs and dips and trills or whatever.

[32:44]

All of that was up to the person, individual person at that time. It still kind of that way. There it is. Was this referring to Cyprian at all? What he's most famous for is the six-tone scale. That is, Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La. The T came later on. But we have the six-tone scale, and what he did was he took the first paragraph, let's say, the first strophe, of the hymn, the first verse, blocked in, in a blacked out area, of the first Vespers hymn, the Feast of John the Baptist, on the 24th of June. He took that first strophe, and he just took the first words off the beginning of each line for his Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La. And that's why we have Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La.

[33:46]

Still, well, a millennium later. And that's where it comes from. This is what he's most famous for. Which doesn't seem like a lot, but when there was nothing to begin with, this was a lot. Because this gave a basis for music to have rules and for music to sound the same, more or less, wherever you were. Okay? If you're interested in this, in what it was like, descriptions of what it was like, or with his actual method and the history involved, we have some things in the library. They're all relatively new. This one I stole from Italy. A pile of discarded books. I found it and yelped with glee. This was at Ponte Verona. If you read Italian, we have this one, entitled Guido d'Arezzo.

[34:54]

It's by our own people. Eremiti Camadonesi di Toscana. That was our name before we joined the Benedictine Order. If you read Latin, this is the authoritative work. And it's a German scholar. What's his first name? Joseph Schmitzmann, I don't know, Wiesberger? I don't know German. And he did his doctoral dissertation, and it's all in Latin. But it has wonderful pictures, if you're into pictures. Nice charts. The Latin isn't all that difficult. This kind of Latin is actually fairly easy. We're talking about university Latin, because they have to make things comprehensible. So it's not all that bad. In English, I was able to hunt down,

[35:56]

through the University of Michigan reprints, this volume here, originally 1950-something. The reprint is 78. Anyway, translations by Warren Babb. And one of the three treatises he translates, and it's a nice, readable English, is the Mikros of Guido. So we have it in English. The most delightful of the sources that we have, I don't have it with me. Cyprian has it checked out to him. And this is David Heide's relatively new Western Plainchant. It comes out of Oxford. I found a reference to it in one of the book reviews of the historical volumes that we get, and I ordered it through Blackwell's. And it's a marvelous, marvelous book. And there's a nice section on Guido there in core,

[37:00]

and then they keep referring to Guido later on. So if you're interested in Guido, we have something now. We didn't have anything until just a couple years ago. So at least we can look at what he did. And if you want to read about the flavor of the times and what he had to deal with, and what he's given to music, I would say David Heide is the one to read that. Well, he's the only one to read, unless you want to read a different language. This is something that Claude Paliska wrote in the introduction to the Micrologus. I think it must be this one that I got from the University of Michigan about the Micrologus. Quote, The message of Micrologus is so rich in significance, both for understanding the music of its time

[38:01]

and for the real beginnings of indigenous Western theory that the full meaning of its text has not yet been fathomed, even after generations of commentary. Because it was so basic and so simple at the time that we really haven't quite managed yet to trace how powerful it was to the formations of various lines of music theory and history since then. And so they really honestly do look to Guido as one of the pillars of modern music. It sounds strange to say modern music. We're talking about a man who died in 1050 or 1058, but that's how powerful it was. He's really one of the pillars for modern music theory. What I hope to do with these lectures as I form them, and I'm just going to do it segment by segment.

[39:02]

I started with the artists, and I'm going to do the houses next, and then the scientists, I think. It's hopefully get together enough material that we can publish a history, a more comprehensive history than what we have with Nino. Nino's a nice, very beautiful digest, and hopefully we can really get something more comprehensive. I don't know. We'll see. But at least we'll have it in the community library, all the collected talks and whatnot in English so that later on our young ones can, people coming in can read our history and our heritage, which is quite rich. Of the five talks I'm giving, this is the most iffy regarding how Kamaldolese is Guido. Later on we're going to be talking about people

[40:04]

who were verifiably Kamaldolese and very powerful in their own ways, too, in the arts, in Kamaldolese history. With Guido, it's just nothing one can say authoritatively. There is a very strong tradition, not just within the Kamaldolese family, but outside that says, yes, he's connected with Fonte Abalana and perhaps a little bit with Kamaldolese, but to claim him as a prior of Fonte Abalana and Kamaldolese and to get involved in all of the polemics that went back and forth, yes, even with the Edomite Kamaldolese in the early part of this century, you don't go anywhere with something like that because there's not enough evidence to say one thing or another. But we have a man who's connected with our heritage at least and certainly had influence musically on Fonte Abalana

[41:07]

and was a monk of a house in the Romualdian movement. So there are definite reasons for calling him at least Romualdian. This isn't a time to call him Kamaldolese anyway because we don't have Kamaldolese at this time. Not until 1105 can you say that in any serious way. But in spirit, in spiritu, he loved solitude and obviously has that connection with Fonte Abalana, so he's at least Romualdian. I tried to find other musicians in our heritage and we just don't have anything written in any language about our musicians except a few references to some of our more gifted recluses of Kamaldolese who were also musicians and wrote, chanted and actually scribed and illuminated their own. This is Simone and this is another Simone,

[42:10]

not the one whose cards we have for sale in the guest house. Simone and Pellegrino, I think, of Kamaldolese. And they were two recluses who ran the music. The recluses now, when we're talking about recluses in Kamaldolese, the strong tradition, the recluses are not walled up. A lot of their time is spent in solitude, but the recluses in Kamaldolese over the centuries were quite often the teachers of the young for the community, the designated confessors and designated lecturers and homilists of Kamaldolese. So when there were recluses, they usually held these posts. And these two were intricately involved with the library, with manuscripts and with the composition of music. But other than those two recluses at Kamaldolese,

[43:16]

I've never run across much of anything regarding famous musicians in our own tradition, historically. And undoubtedly there are very competent musicians from time to time at various houses. And the status of our own chant goes up and down through the centuries, just like anything else. We will run across references to the beautiful music, the beautiful chant at Firenze or at Murano at a particular time. It was remarked by La Serenissima in Venezia or something like that about how beautiful the music is at San Michele or whatever. But we don't know anything about the musicians as such, outside of Guido and, as I mentioned, these two recluses. We do know something about functioning,

[44:17]

or artists functioning in the areas of painting at Fresco. When I talk about Bartolomeo De La Gata on Monday, he's just an incredible man, a very holy man also. And I think, as much as I love Lorenzo Monaco, he's much more talented than Lorenzo, in the sense that he did everything and he did it well. I mean, he was into frescoes, organ building, painting, oil, tempura, design, architecture. He designed three cathedrals. Just an incredible man. So we have a number of artists of whom we can be very, very proud in our heritage. And we'll cover those main artists. Tomorrow will be Lorenzo Monaco. And I will talk generally on Friday of the various miniaturist schools we had,

[45:20]

and evidently these new books that have come back from Italy. On these, or at least especially, who is the one artist from Da Venezia? This focuses on a miniaturist of Da Venezia, of Santa Maria. See, and that's relatively new. Beautiful books. Yeah, as far as it being in a written form and accessible. You sent an email, an in-email form, the name of the particular artist that they think, and I forget, but I had run across his name once, but I never thought of him as a Camaldo. He's miniaturist, or artist, as such. I had run across him in reference to Murano, but not as a monk. And that, you know, I'm anxious to look at those things. And there was another book about a later artist who was thought first to be secular. Just recently it's been discovered that he was a Camaldese monk.

[46:21]

Maybe at the other congregation. Coronese. Yeah. But that's quite later. That's the, what, 16th? 16th, 17th. Those were the paintings at the Hermitage that had just been restored. And where are those? Those paintings? The paintings are now back at the Hermitage. There was a lovely exhibit at Hopi, at the Castle of Hopi. And they came out with this book on this artist, along with other artists. Just came out with it now? Yeah. Or two years ago? I think it's just now. Two years ago, I think it was the manuscript booklet that came out from Hopi. On illuminations. This is a book on these recent restorations of Camaldoli's paintings. Neat. I look forward to seeing that. Does anyone have anything to say or ask about Guido? I probably can't answer it. A proposal with Benedictine? Yeah.

[47:22]

I've been telling everybody it's Camaldoli's now. Well? I have all these music people, and I have nothing lying to them. Well, it was Romualdian, and later on it is Camaldoli's. In what sense, later on? Later on, once in the 12th century, once we got the official papal bulls, on 1105, 1113, that set us up as a congregation. At that time, we gathered a whole number of monasteries and gave them to Camaldoli, or put under Camaldoli. Within the subsequent years, there was tremendous growth. At one point, within a century, one pope, I forget who, I don't have my notes with me, gave Camaldoli permission not only to take in houses, but whole congregations, whole monastic congregations. There were a lot of little congregations. And so, during the 12-1300s, it's at that time that houses like Santa Polonare in Classe

[48:25]

becomes Camaldoli's, and Pomposa becomes Camaldoli's. Did Pomposa become Camaldoli's? He did. I'd have to look that up. I can't say. They were certainly Romualdian and considered Camaldoli's, but I'm not, I'd have to look it up. Is it still around, that Pomposa? Yeah, and it's not Camaldoli's. But, I mean, since the Suppressions, everything that's Camaldoli's, most Camaldoli's houses are not monasteries anymore. His own original work in it? They think so, yeah. They assume that that's what it is, his own compositions. But I don't know where there's a copy of that. I mean, there are copies in Italy, and there could very well be at some place like Yale. Yale has an incredible amount of things we can get our hands on, Camaldoli's-wise. So does Harvard, I've discovered. Because we're trying to build up a collection of antiphonics for ourselves. It'd be interesting if there'd be anything that we could take on from his antiphonology.

[49:26]

Well, we wouldn't want to do that unless we were sure he was a prior in front of... We don't want to do this. We're sure. I mean, Berkeley does have, they sell several bottles. I was in correspondence with someone, so they have several bottles of... Oh, I saw those letters, yeah. And also a sample... Not letters, but the information. They have one from the late 13th century from one of our houses. Do you remember which one, Christopher? I don't either. One of our Camaldolis. But each house had its own, you know. It didn't have its own tradition. Well, it did in a certain way. But I mean, they each had their own sets that were being done by our miniaturists. In fact, that's why our miniaturist schools actually got started, was to do our own choir books for our own houses. And of course, the choir books were this big. So a whole group of monks could read from them.

[50:27]

And there were two or two, basically two to three on each side, facing both ways. So you had groups of monks around these huge books. Well, once they got their own copies made, people started paying for that sort of thing. And we'll talk about the miniaturists on Friday. But it became very lucrative to have... And of course, by that time, our miniaturists were so good at it that they became renowned. And we were... You know, Camaldolis weren't the only miniaturists. I mean, there were wonderful Franciscan miniaturists, in fact, and other Benedictines also. We have committed these things. Periodic. And some of the Franciscans and Camaldolis worked together. For instance, they're fairly certain that towards the end of Lorenzo Monaco's life, he worked with Raphael. Yeah. Also, that he worked with...

[51:32]

Who's the one that was just blessed? Angelico. Fra Angelico. On some miniatures for one of the projects that our Florence house was trying to get done and ran into some problems, and that Angelico came and helped Lorenzo. Thank you. Forget that business I said about Raphael. I meant Angelico. Angelico. He was French. The Benedictines are Benedictines. Oh. You have twice, I think, made reference to the love of Guido of Solitude. How would we know that from this letter? Well, I don't... You know, I don't remember from the letter itself. They deduced that from Fonte Avalona because of Fonte Avalona at the time. It's always in connection with Fonte Avalona

[52:38]

that that is mentioned. And, of course, this is more or less from the Camaldolis tradition that his love for Solitude is mentioned. And then it is from a stereotypical pose that has this hermitage. That's interesting. Yeah. Because our upcoming monastery in Southern California is Camaldolis. Is that the case, Chuck? Is that the case? Yes. Epiphany has already started to fundraise. Oh. Pamposa is... Where is that? Is that... Is that the area? Remember, that's the one between Ravenna and Ferrara. The cove of that family. That doesn't sound very Italian. Poe... Yeah. Are there any Camaldolis that you ran across that were famous for, like, sculpture, other mediums of art? You're mentioning the musicians and then the frescoes or paintings.

[53:40]

You didn't run into anything like sculpture? No. No. Ceramics? Yeah. And a little bit was done... A little bit was done at Murano, but nobody famous. I mean, there are references to busts being done. And also working with metal and doing commemorative metals and whatnot, carving them. There's some of that at Murano, but no, not sculpture. Did he compose any original hymns or poetry? Anything that would indicate... You mean, words-wise? I don't think so. I mean, I don't think that was his... He was using texts that existed, yeah. He's known for some of his antiphonics, two pre-existing texts, liturgical sect texts.

[54:45]

Peter Damian has hymns that he composed also. This is Saint Peter Damian. Yeah, there's a number of them. And in print. Are you looking for texts? I'm just wondering what sort of... For the hymnal? Spirituality or whatever. The influence is the creative... It's hard to say that about music, but from words, you could sort of say there seems to be an area of influence here. What was the influence behind the creative influence? Yeah. No, I don't know of anything written poetically, you know, by Guido. Does he argue for... For what? I'm talking towards you. I'm talking about his first masterpiece. For this? Yeah. You mean when he came across with this scale?

[55:46]

Yeah, for that part. Oh gosh, no, it was when this... You mean when the original first... Thus this hymn of this was set up? I don't know. Well, when you... He's using it here. He's using a hymn that already exists. And then he's doing this with it. And this would be in the 1020s. When he's doing the rest. 1020s. I don't know when the original first... That's because in that hymn, in fact, does it go from a Do to a Re to a Mi? That is, what's the connection? Is it totally arbitrary? This is the first strophe. Yeah, and is the first line... Well, start with a Do. Does the second line then go to a Re? No, not musically, just word-wise. Just word-wise. I don't know. Whose music? I don't know. Well, I don't know in the sense that I... I've just... A lot of chant.

[56:47]

When I was... I was singing chant when I was this little. I mean, who knows, maybe, some of that was... Originally, it's just so long ago. Lord knows how many modifications it might have gone through. And I've never seen these. I'd love to see them. Next time I'm over there, if I can get them. We had no manuscripts from that time. That have Guido? Yeah. If you read these people, you're going to run across a couple of supposed compositions and whatnot, but again, we're not certain. But if you can get your hands on that after Phanaria, when you're over there in Italy next time, you're over there, you can look. It's on my list. Well, in this technological age, who knows what's going to happen. You know, St. John's, they have an amazing microfilm library, medieval, from all over Europe. It'd be interesting to just look up Guido

[57:49]

and all of our giants. We'll have a contact there next year. We'll have our own man. That's what I mean. If you could steal some things. I mean, if you could look up some things. My understanding of a chant in the 21st century is they have very little, any of it written down. That's why the Abbey of Solemn had to basically look at what they might have intended and try to rewrite it almost. They have some things that... But the thing is, they have some things like this, but it's just chaos and it's just very sporadic and just sort of like, sometimes instead of doing notes, we'll just do... And you just fill in the blanks. One group might put 15, or a glissando down with 15 notes, and another one might jump one to another. I mean, that was when we got Guido, so... I'm not going to get into this dialectic.

[58:53]

Being a J, it'd be awesome. Okay, we've gone over our hour. So tomorrow we do Lorraine's chant. Thank you.

[59:05]

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