Dynamics

The dynamics found in A necessitate much filling out, even after applying them in strictly parallel places. They are also sometimes puzzling, as noted in Chapter 9, because the chanted sections are always marked f and the polyphony p, which hardly accords with contemporary descriptions of the variations possible. Mendelssohn, speaking of the performances in 1831, is perhaps the most eloquent:

Herold, sixteen years earlier, had also observed this, and added some technical detail.

Nor could Spohr’s description (in Chapter 8) of the very first chord as ‘a beautiful 5-part chording, tender and pure, like a harmony from another world’ be indicated by f in its normal sense.

No doubt f often simply meant louder than p rather than simply loud, and p not necessarily soft, but in any case softer than f. But it may be even more subtle than that. It was suggested in Chapter 9 that these indications are roughly equivalent to a piacere and a misura, which are found in the earliest manuscripts (Man and P) and which reappear in M. Historically the relation is made explicit by Mil, which replaces the a piacere and a misura indications of Man and P with for[te] and dol[ce], while retaining a very large part of the earlier readings. The real meaning of forte in this context is therefore dramatic, i.e. following the meaning of the text (a piacere – occasionally col direttore in M); while dolce implies regularly and calmly following the written notes, i.e. a misura. In the first the sense of the words predominates, in the second the musical composition.