Mecanismos y motivos teológicos no musicales que propiciaron la evolución de la liturgia musical católicaun estudio desde los primeros cristianos hasta el Renacimiento musical y el punto de inflexión que supone el Concilio Vaticano II

Résumé

Christian Catholic liturgical music presents a unique and well differentiated style compared to other musical styles. However, since it is a music that is linked to the Christian cult from its origins, it presents a series of characteristics that have historically conditioned its evolution. At the musicological level, liturgical music is usually analyzed from its rhythmic, melodic, harmonic and textural components (without prejudice to other historical musical elements such as spellings), generally ignoring its spiritual and religious dimension. For this reason and, given that the history of music is usually centered on the musical discipline, there is no study that analyzes in depth the level of influence of the cult in the musical liturgy. Some of the changes that affected the Catholic musical liturgy have been produced by extra-musical causes that have nothing to do with the "natural" evolution of other styles of music. These causes are related to the sacred scriptures, the understanding and different documentation that the religious authorities, generally not experts in music, have been producing. This paper investigates these changes and the mechanisms by which they are applied. Thus, the relationship and influence that Christianity has on the musical style used within the propitious divine office is an issue that has been studied succinctly and without going deeply into its religious dimension. This work will address two fundamental issues: the non-musical theological reasons that conditioned its evolution and through what processes or mechanisms these theological motives are integrated into the musical liturgy. The first aspect to take into account are the sacred scriptures that fix in the Old and New Testament two quite differentiated visions of music. In the OT the music is used in festive as well as military and religious ceremonies. However, the NT vocal music prevails and instrumental music is, compared to the AT, limited in the number of times it appears in the scriptures and is usually associated with references to the OT and divine entities (angels). This dichotomy between the OT and the NT will limit the use of music in primitive Christianity. The second aspect is the transmission of knowledge that occurs from the Ancient World to the Middle Ages. The ecclesiastical centers, insofar as they become the main centers of knowledge, are the only references for much of the Ancient knowledge. Because of this, only that knowledge they transmit is known, so that by transmitting a certain idea of music to Christians the knowledge of musical liturgy is also conditioned by an extramusical factor. The third aspect is the attempts that the liturgy (including its music) does not lose its purity and is corrupted in front of a large number of heretical movements that hit Christianity in its first centuries. Because of this, the Fathers of the Church and other relevant authorities exhorted an orthodox version of the New Testament, through which the use of instruments was forbidden in the liturgy. Another of the extra-musical mechanisms is the use of musical writing to fix music and liturgical texts. Previously the Greeks already used a musical system in which above the text different symbols were written that indicated the height of the notes. The Christian musical system (which is the one that has passed into the present) changes the order of priority, fixing with precision the height and rhythm of the notes first and then the text. The last of the mechanisms are the various Reforms and Councils that were used to unify the cult. Although it is true that most of them do not play in depth the musical issue, they are not less prominent and, as it is also one of these extramusical reasons that conditioned the evolution of the musical liturgy, they have been included in this work. Finally, a last section on the Second Vatican Council has been included. This Council presents a point of inflection regarding different aspects by including direct mentions to the composers and the didactic system of music teaching of the Church. However, it also includes two aspects that contradict various theological currents previously established. The first of them is referred to the text, since it allows to use the vulgar languages in the songs and also music without singing (that is, instrumental). The second one is that it leaves in the hands of the competent local authority a wide range of issues related to musical practice, thus promoting a heterogeneity in musical uses and forms that had previously been tried hard to unify with various reforms and councils.