Andreas Werckmeister’s Musicalische Paradoxal-Discourse: A Well-Tempered Universe

175 Pages·2017·2.42 MB·English

by  Andreas Werckmeister

Andreas Werckmeister’s
Musicalische Paradoxal-Discourse
Contextual Bach Studies
Series Editor:
Robin A. Leaver
Westminster Choir College, emeritus
The music of Johann Sebastian Bach has been the object of intensive study
and analysis, but in the past many of these studies have been somewhat nar-
row in focus. The received view of Bach’s music was to some degree incom-
plete because it was largely discussed on its own terms without being fully set
within the contextual perspective of the musician’s predecessors, contempo-
raries, and successors. It is only in fairly recent times that the music of these
other composers has become accessible, allowing us to appreciate the nature
and stature of their accomplishments, and at the same time giving us new
perspectives from which to view a more rounded picture of Bach’s genius.
The monographs in this series explore such contextual areas. Since much
of Bach’s music was composed for Lutheran worship, a primary concern of
these monographs is the liturgical and theological contexts of the music.
But Bach’s music was not exclusively confined to these specific religious
concerns. German culture of the time had more general religious dimensions
that permeated “secular” society. Therefore, in addition to specific studies
of the liturgical and theological contexts of Bach’s music, this series also
includes explorations of social, political, and cultural religious contexts in
which his music was composed and first heard.
Titles in the Series
Bartel, Dietrich. Andreas Werckmeister’s Musicalische Paradoxal-Discourse:
A Well-Tempered Universe, 2017.
Paczkowski, Syzmon. Polish Style in the Music of Johann Sebastian Bach, 2017.
Irwin, Joyce. Foretastes of Heaven in Lutheran Church Music Tradition: Johann
Mattheson and Christoph Raupach on Music in Time and Eternity, 2015.
Goncz, Zoltan, translated by Peter Laki. Bach’s Testament: On the Philosophi-
cal and Theological Background of the Art of Fugue, 2013.
Leahy, Anne, edited by Robin A. Leaver. J. S. Bach’s “Leipzig” Chorale Pre-
ludes: Music, Text, Theology, 2011.
van Elferen, Isabella. Mystical Love in the German Baroque: Theology, Poetry,
Music, 2009.
Cameron, Jasmin Melissa. The Crucifixion in Music: An Analytical Survey of
Settings of the Crucifixus between 1680 and 1800, 2006.
Andreas Werckmeister’s
Musicalische Paradoxal-Discourse
A Well-Tempered Universe
Translation with Commentary by Dietrich Bartel
LEXINGTON BOOKS
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Werckmeister, Andreas, 1645–1706, author. | Bartel, Dietrich, writer
of supplementary textual content, translator.
Title: Andreas Werckmeister’s musicalische paradoxal-discourse : a
well-tempered universe / translated with commentary by Dietrich Bartel.
Other titles: Musicalische Paradoxal-Discourse. English
Description: Lanham : Lexington Books, 2017. | Series: Contextual Bach
studies | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017043358 (print) | LCCN 2017047374 (ebook) | ISBN
9781498566353 (Electronic) | ISBN 9781498566346 (cloth : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Music theory—Early works to 1800. | Composition
(Music)—Early works to 1800. | Music—Instruction and study—Early works
to 1800.
Classification: LCC MT6.W34 (ebook) | LCC MT6.W34 M8713 2017 (print) | DDC
781—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017043358
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
Contents
Series Editor’s Foreword ix
Preface xiii
Part I
Introduction to the Musicalische Paradoxal-Discourse 3
Werckmeister Biography 8
Werckmeister Treatises 10
Contents and Sources of the
Musicalische Paradoxal-Discourse 14
Part II T ranslation of Musicalische Paradoxal-Discourse
Musical Paradoxical-Discourse,
or uncommon expostulations 51
Preface 53
Index and contents of the chapters 57
Chapter 1 A n introduction to this work: the division
of the musical proportions 59
Chapter 2 A testimonial through mathematics and Holy
Scriptures themselves, that the course of the
heavens are harmonic 63
v
vi • Contents
Chapter 3 H ow the mortal body and soul are harmonically
created, and furthermore, on the influence of the stars 66
Chapter 4 W hy humans find such pleasure in music, and
whence composers and musicians arise 70
Chapter 5 A s the image of God, humans are to praise the
Creator with music. Buildings and eras in scripture
are also harmonic wonders of spiritual music 73
Chapter 6 O n the abuse of music, which the authorities
could abolish 78
Chapter 7 H ow the inclination of a people determines its
attitude toward music, and how the heathens were
so scattered in their views on music 82
Chapter 8 O n the music of the early Christians, and the
subsequent changes 86
Chapter 9 T he great difficulties arising out of solmization and
the linear staff system 89
Chapter 10 P roof that the linear staff system is accompanied by
great difficulties 92
Chapter 11 P roof of how everything can be played or sung
through the twelve note-names 99
Chapter 12 F urther proof that the linear staff system has many
more variants than the twelve note-names 102
Chapter 13 H ow the temperaments can be examined, and on
German tablature 106
Chapter 14 H ow the chromatic system is to be applied to the
tempered keyboard 113
Chapter 15 O n the disorder of hymn singing 118
Chapter 16 O n the simplicity of old organs 120
Chapter 17 H ow the musical modes can be differentiated 122
Chapter 18 O n the nature and property of the harmonic numerals 125
Chapter 19 O n the hidden meaning of the numerals 127
Contents • vii
Chapter 20 O n the properties of the harmonic numerals, when
they themselves are subdivided 132
Chapter 21 O n the subdivision of the harmonic numerals 134
Chapter 22 O n the properties of the dissonant musical numerals 136
Chapter 23 H ow the harmonic radical numerals are
transformed into a tempered tuning, and of their
hidden meaning 138
Chapter 24 A comparison of incorrect tempered tuning with
false Christianity 141
Chapter 25 H ow the temperament can be perfect or imperfect,
and how the same can be compared with Christianity 145
Chapter 26 T he Lord’s Prayer in the musical proportional
numerals 148
Bibliography 151
Index 155
About the Author 157

Series Editor’s Foreword
Andreas Werckmeister, music theorist, organist, composer, and author of
numerous treatises on music, remains an important source for understand-
ing baroque music. He is known to organists and organ builders as an au-
thority on all aspects of late seventeenth-century organ building and tonal
design, notably in his Orgel-Probe, first published in 1681, expanded and
reissued in 1698.1 Similarly, he is known to performers of baroque music,
especially keyboardists, as an expert on tuning and temperament, especially
his Musicalische Temperatur that first appeared in 1686 or 1687, of which no
copy survives, but the work was revised and reissued in 1691, with its promo-
tion of the well-tempered tuning “Werckmeister III.”2
Not so well-known is Weckmeister’s philosophical and theological think-
ing that undergirds his practical approaches to music. A significant work in
this regard is his Der Edlen Music-Kunst Würde of 1691, which deals with the
scriptural background for sacred music and includes extended extracts on
1. Andreas Werckmeister, Erweiterte und verbesserte Orgel-Probe (Quedlinburg: Calvisus, 1698;
facsimile, Kassel: Bärenreiter, 1927); Werckmeister’s Erweiterte und verbesserte Orgelprobe in English,
trans. Gerhard Krapf (Raleigh: Sunbury, 1976); see also Andreas Werckmeister, Organum Grunin-
gense Redivivum (Quedlinburg: Struntz, 1705), together with David Yearsley, “An Ideal Organ and
Its Experts Across the Seventeenth Century,” The Organ as a Mirror of Its Time: North European
Reflections, 1610–2000, ed. Kerala J. Snyder (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 93–112,
and Vincent J. Panetta Jr., “Praetorius, Compenius, and Werckmeister: A Tale of Two Treatises,”
Church, Stage, and Studio: Music and Its Contexts in Seventeenth-Century Germany, ed. Paul walker
(Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1990), 67–85.
2. Andreas Werckmeister, Musicalische Temperatur (Quedlinburg: Calvisus, 1691). See Dietrich
Bartel, “Andreas Werckmeister’s Final Tuning: the Path to Equal Temperament,” Early Music 43
(2015): 503–512.
ix