The Scola Gregoriana Brugensis was founded in 1970 by Roger
Deruwe, organist of Bruges cathedral, as a choir to sing at
high mass in the cathedral.
Soon after, Deruwe opened a school specialising in the study
of Gregorian Chant. In 1974 the students visited Solesmes
for the first time and also gave their first concert outside
the Cathedral.
The Scola first took part in the Flanders Festival in 1979,
and have performed there regularly ever since. They have sung
at many other festivals such as those at Mosan, Bregenz, Bourgogne,
Avignon, Paris, Salzburg, Madrid, San Sebastián, Santander,
Palma de Mallorca and Cuenca. They have also toured in Holland,
Britain and Switzerland.
The Scola regularly take part in the religious services broadcast
on radio and television by BRT, RTB, France Musique, Radio
Televisión Española and Basque Television. They
have recorded four discs.
The style of chant of the Scola Gregoriana Brugensis is based
on the research and performance experience of the monks at
Solesmes. One of the aims of the Schola is to encourage the
revival of Gregorian Chant and to contribute to its recognition
as an artistic treasure of the Church and a corner stone of
Western European musical culture. The Schola does not see
Gregorian Chant as a fossilised art from the distant past:
they perform every chant as living music, and stress the importance
of performing the music in its original context religious
services and the Eucharist.
Roger Deruwe studied at the Bruges and Ghent Conservatoire,
where he was awarded first prizes in harmony, counterpoint,
fugue and history of music, as well as a special prize in
organ performance. He has been organist at the Church of St.
James, the Basilique du Saint Sang and resident organist at
Bruges Cathedral.
For 30 years, Roger Deruwe was conductor of the a capella
ensemble Brugeois Veremanskoor, taking part in the main religious
festivals at the Cathedral, as well as giving concerts throughout
Europe and South Africa. In 1970 his interest in the revival
and preservation of Gregorian Chant led him to found the Schola
Gregoriana which sings in the weekly high masses at Bruges
Cathedral.
As an organist, Roger Deruwe has given recitals in France,
Germany and Austria.
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The gregorian
chant and the latin Christian liturgy
Joaquim Garrigosa,
Musicòleg i director del Conservatori de Vila-seca. |
Gregorian chant is one of the greatest contributions of Western
culture to the musical heritage of mankind. However, due to
the close relationship existing between the chant and the Latin
liturgy of the Christian church, the chant's aesthetics cannot
be explained in the terms normally used when discussing music.
The composers of Gregorian chant created melodies whose main
purpose was to act as a vehicle for religious texts with a clearly
defined style of expression. For this reason, gregorian chant,
as seen from our present perspective, combines its characteristic
austerity with a unique expressive power that emanates from
the text which the music is there to support, and from the textual
accentuation which determines the rhythm of the music.
Reference is often made to the free rhythm of Gregorian chant,
but it would perhaps be more correct to talk of a cursus of
the text which adapts the melody in such a way as to bring out
the text's poetic rhythm. Here indeed lies one of the most important
secrets which must be taken into account when performing gregorian
chant the subtlety of the neumes, the prolongations and the
rhythms of the melismata which can only be performed adequately
if there is total comprehension of the text. In addition, the
expressive character that needs to be given to every detail
of the chant is closely related to the meaning of every word,
sentence and caesura of a text.
The apparent monotony of gregorian chant is broken only by
the alternation between the choir and the schola in the antiphons
and versicles of the different pieces. Similarly, contrast
is important when works are treated in a clearly textual or
more melodic manner. Syllabic continuity of the hymns is modified
in responsorial chants, when the neumes give more emphasis
to the melody. It is, however, in the melismatic chants that
musical expression can rise to unexpected heights, especially
in the case of those chants sung at the Christmas and Easter
services. Here the composer, in expressing the joy of praising
God, brings out the full transcendence of the Christian message.
In Catalonia, the fragments which remain of the original
codices show that the Roman service (and gregorian chant)
progressively replaced the Hispanic rite during the course
of the 9th. century. Recovery of the Narbonne region as from
the middle of the 8th. century and of the northern part of
the Tarragona1 region at the end of that century, together
with the problem of Bishop Felix of Urgell's advocacy of the
adoptionist heresy, allowed the Church to reorganise the most
important rites the Eucharist and the Canonical Hours along
the lines of the new service. However, Hispanic influence
did not disappear entirely, as the liturgical reform made
it necessary to maintain the Hispanic rite still in use in
the Narbonne area, as it was more complete and better organised
than the Roman service in the case of other sacraments and
ceremonies. While to the south of the Pyrenees the change
in the liturgy must have been more gradual, there are many
indications that it continued steadily throughout the 9th.
century. At the end of the 10th. century and beginning of
the 11th., the Catalan church had become well established
both religiously and culturally. Despite such episodes as
the devastation of Al-Mansur and the death of clergy during
the subsequent expedition to Cordoba, a new generation was
to bring an age of great splendour to the Catalan church.
The leading figure was that of Abbot Oliba (c. 971-1046),
noted for his work of religious and cultural renovation.
As from the last third of the 11th. century, the Cluny reforms
were brought into Catalonia by papal legates as a meams of
combating the simony which, as in the rest of Europe, had
undermined the church hierarchy in Catalonia. Abbeys and cathedrals
began to enter fully into the new reforming spirit instigated
by Rome. It is worth pointing out that in the course of this
process of reform, Catalonia became an important cultural
nerve centre, and scribes at work in Girona, Vic, Ripoll,
La Seu d'Urgell, Barcelona, Sant Cugat and elsewhere assured
supply of the religious books which were in such demand at
the time hence the large number of manuscripts of religious
music dating from these three hundred years. The origin of
the "Catalan notation" used is not clear, although
it probably had its beginnings in the Narbonne region. As
from the middle of the 12th. century, the expanded repertoire
and the impossibility of indicating precise changes in melodic
pitch made this notation lose out in popularity to the "Aquitaine
notation", much more precise in the indication of intervals,
that is the placing of the neumes at different pitches on
the stave, thereby making performance easier.
The programme of the Schola Gregoriana Brugensis takes us
on a religious musical journey beginning with pieces whose
subject is the mystery of the Holy Trinity, with chants sung
in honour of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Syllabic pieces
(hymns and sequences) alternate with others of neumic character
(introits and antiphonal chants) or melismatic works such
as alleluias.Gregorian chant is a significant point of reference
for many reasons, and its revival in concerts such as the
one held this evening serves to take us back to the sources
of musical creation in Western culture.
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