18. Elevated Speech and Song

Abstract

Focussing on Christian performance of their liturgy, and Muslim recitation of their Qur'an, this chapter looks at more systematic and controlled ways of vocalizing the word “Jesus” and Jesus-related texts, in terms of factors like pronunciation, volume, breath control, and coordination with other peoples' utterances. Systematizing Jesus vocalization with regular rules created subtle connections accessible only through the deep ken. Some Muslims scholars, especially, inclined towards the plain ken did take into account human limitations and historical, cultural particularities, as with Al-Suyuti's interest in the Bedouins. Examples treated in the chapter include the sequence Victimae Paschali Laudes, which outside of its liturgical context was sung while performing a ballgame-dance at Easter in France. Polyphony was explicitly linked to Jesus, who was the only person able to speak and sing polyphonically simultaneously. Deep-ken meaning was brought into polyphonic liturgical music, especially through the use of a cantus firmus and through mathematics. Josquin's masses (especially those built upon the secular tune “L'homme armé”), among others, numerically encoded Jesus references. Both polyphony and its use of secular melodies provoked condemnation.