A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Transposition of the Ecclesiastical Modes

TRANSPOSITION OF THE ECCLESIASTICAL MODES. Composers of the Polyphonic School permitted the transposition of the Ecclesiastical Modes to the Fourth above or Fifth below their true pitch; effecting the process by mean of a B♭ placed at the Signature, and thereby substituting for the absolute pitch of a Plagal Mode that of its Authentic original. Transposition to other Intervals than these was utterly forbidden, in writing: but Singers were permitted to change the pitch, at the moment of performance, to any extent convenient to themselves.

During the transitional period—but very rarely earlier than that—a double Transposition was effected, in a few exceptional cases, by means of two Flats; B♭ raising the pitch a Fourth, and E♭ lowering it, from thence, by a Fifth—thus really depressing the original pitch by a Tone. As usual in all cases of progressive innovation, this practice was well known in England long before it found favour on the continent. A beautiful example will be found in Wilbye's 'Flora gave me fairest flowers,' composed in 1598; yet Morley, writing in 1597, severely condemns the practice. It will be seen, from these remarks, that, in Compositions of the Polyphonic aera, the absence of a B♭ at the Signature proves the Mode to stand at its true pitch; while the presence of a B♭ proves the Composition to be quite certainly written in a Transposed Mode.^[1] In modern reprints, the presence at the Signature of one or more Sharps, or of more than two Flats, shows that the pitch of the piece has been changed, or its Mode reduced to a modern Scale, by an editor of the present century.

[ W. S. R. ]

1. See vol. ii. p. 474a.