Epilogue: The Music in “St. Jerome's Study”

Abstract

THE two pieces of music in Carpaccio's St. Jerome in His Study—now shown to be St. Augustine Visited by St. Jerome (Fig. 7)—one appearing on the large single sheet standing on the floor, the other in the small book in quarto resting on a lectern, both are written in choirbook style: each voice-part has its own field on the page so that three or four singers can sing the parts from one single sheet or book. Gustav Ludwig and Pompeo Molmenti, in their monograph on Vittore Carpaccio—of which the French translation by H. L. de Perera, Paris, 1910, was at my disposal—published a painstaking transcription of the single parts followed by a score. Furthermore, a detail of the music and a transcription of the three-part work is available in Gaetano Cesari's preface to the edition of Giovanni Gabrieli's Canzone e Sonate … of 1597, Istitutioni e Monumenti Dell'Arte Musicale Italiana, Milano, 1932, pp. XXXIII-XXXIV. We followed their transcription except for adding in the four-part work from the volume in quarto, the notes marked by Ludwig and Molmenti as no longer visible. Since at least two or three parts are perfectly legible at all times, it is possible to supplement plausible notes from the harmonic context. All added notes are in parenthesis; so are the flats and sharps that indicate where the singers, according to the rules of the time, lowered or raised a tone. Ludwig and Molmenti, who believed the seated cleric to be St. Jerome, try to interpret the music in connection with St. Jerome's achievements as reformer of the sacred liturgy. But even if the contribution of the Saint had extended to the musical part of the liturgy—which it did not—the two compositions on Carpaccio's painting contradict such an explanation. The difficulty in discussing the music lies in the absence of the text. But even so it is possible to make the following observations: The three-part composition (see Example 1) written for men's voices on the sheet at floor level seems to be a secular work of Italian origin. This needs to be stressed since Italy was at the time inundated by Flemish music and musicians. In contrast to the contrapuntal technique of the Flemish masters this piece has the typically Italian harmonic texture; it is set prevailingly in strict homophony. Its lively rhythm (see especially the rhythmic pattern of measures 3–4 repeated in measures 5–6, 10–11), the beginning with upbeat in all parts, exceptional at the time and impossible in sacred music, the repetitions of brief incisive motives, and the rapid parlando—indicated through tone repetitions demanding a declamation of one syllable to a tone—are all undeniable features of secular style. Indeed, we may have here a Venetian folk song such as Carpaccio must have heard daily in the streets and on the canals.1