Top line or third?

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Wed, 02/13/2013 - 18:02 — Haruo

Can someone knowledgable (not I!) look at S1856 and tell me if the tunes are meant to have the melody line in the soprano or in the tenor? I can't do an Incipit without that knowledge, and I don't know how to tell for sure. The particular case I'm looking at is england_selah, but it would be nice if the book turned out to be consistent throughout.

Thanks!


Comments

Wed, 02/13/2013 - 23:34 — cfenner

As far as I can tell, the two-staff settings have the melody in the soprano part. Several of these are recognizable, including OLD 100. The four-staff settings are less clear, although at page 161 the melodies are obviously in the third staff because of the way the text is set. Usually the rule of thumb is to see which voice ends on DO, but even this is not done consistently. At page 177 the three-staff settings are almost certainly soprano melodies.

Thu, 02/14/2013 - 02:32 — Haruo

...ENGLAND (Selah), the case I'm most instantly concerned with? All parts except the alto end on B flat (two flats in signature). I think the tenor "feels" more like the melody, but I'm notoriously incompetent at such intuitions, and crave and solicit outside suggestions.

Thu, 02/14/2013 - 08:33 — cfenner

Yes, I think it's safe to say all the four-staff arrangements have their melodies in the third staff, including the one in question. The tenor part of ENGLAND certainly does have a stronger melodic character to it.

Also, I take back what I said about the three-staff/four-part arrangements. The melody there is in the second voice (top note of the second staff). I recognize SPANISH HYMN (216), and the others fairly consistently have a melody that ends on DO.

Crazy how the melodies are in different voices; there must have been an introductory page that explained this. Is there a way to access page scans from the introductory material?

Thu, 02/14/2013 - 14:07 — Haruo

I was only concerned about ENGLAND (Selah) because I was researching tunes for "O Worship the King" as alternatives to LYONS and HANOVER, and this is one of the few such published settings I could find in the database. (And while I was at it I redid the text authority links so "O Worship the Lord", when it is otherwise the Grant text, even if attributed to Peel, has o_worship_the_king_all_glorious_above as its authority.)

I expected to find a few instances set to PADERBORN; I must be misremembering something.

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