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Motetti, madrigali et canzone francese ... Giovanni)

Grove Music describes this collection as "examples of embellished motets, madrigals and chansons by Willaert, Clemens non Papa, Crecquillon, Lasso, Rore, Striggio, Palestrina and Marenzio", which would indicate that these are not straight publications of the composers' original madrigals, but arrangements.

I have put this comment on the page, but the contents list makes it look like a straight publication of other composers' madrigals. Does anyone have a suggestion for a short way of making it clear that these are based on the other composers' works -- maybe [title], based on [composer] + a link if we have the original. Or "based on [title, composer]".

Or other suggestions?

Hi Steltz!

I don't know if my statement will be clear at some point but I think this relates to the solution (or not) of your question. At least until the Baroque era we cannot confirm with certainty what is a piece in this original (i.e. as intended by the composer) form. Of course we can look for autograph manuscripts, rely more on editions made with the composer's permission, but I'd say that is relatively rare to find the same piece in different sources without discrepancies, from a single sharp to entire sections (except in that cases where we can confirm a meticulous copy from a previous source). That is true for Renaissance and much more for Medieval era. It's worth to note that even the conception of 'original composition' didn't exist as we understand it today (much more close to the conception originated in 18th and 19th centuries).

So, I'd consider the Bassano's collection as one more source of those motets, madrigals and chansons, and not to try compare it with a "straight publication" of the original pieces, since we cannot assert what is a "straight publication" for this period.

If we compare other sources of pieces included in the Bassano's collection, we can confirm he made embellishments on the superius voice of them (a common practise at the time). But to consider that as arrangements, for my point of view, it's not so correct. The paradigm of composition was the vocal style and the interpretation was not based on the compositor's indication but on the availability of the moment. The term "voice" referred to a contrapoint line rather than human voice itself. To play with instruments or voices was not relative to composition itself and even the performers added one or more voices to the piece without considering an arrangement.

The term arrangement can be apply in late Medieval and Renaissance eras to some sources based other pieces where we can see a clear idiomatic style of writing, like sources for the lute and keyboard instruments (most of the cases those sources are tablatures), otherwise pieces for the human voice or instruments are the same.

To resume, I think that the workpage should remain as it is now, since the pieces are not arrangements or based on other compositions, but they are the compositions themselves.

(BTW, when tagging for renaissance period, for example a classical piece with C1, C3, C4 and F4 clefs, I prefer to discriminate the tags as "4vv" instead "sop alt ten bass", firstly because we can have clef changes in the middle of piece and also the voices on the contrapoint concept refers to the relation between them ("contratenor altus"=above the tenor, "contratenor bassus"=below the tenor, "superius"=above all) and not a specific range of a voice register like we see it in a baroque cantata or romantic opera.

Sorry for writing so much...