Sounding Manuscripts: A Concert by Vox Silentii
When: Monday 06 July, 20.30-21.30
Where: Leeds Universities Catholic Chaplaincy (see here for directions to the venue)
Open to: All Welcome (IMC Delegates and the Public)
Price: £13.50
How to Book: Advance Booking Required via IMC Registration or Book Tickets via Open Up
Performed by Johanna Korhonen and Hilkka-Liisa Vuori
In this concert, the duo Vox Silentii sings chants from medieval liturgical parchments from Turku diocese (medieval Finland) from the 13th through to the 16th century. Photos of these fragments will be included in the program leaflet for listeners to follow as the singers perform them. The music comes alive in dialogue with the parchment and with the church space. The architecture and the acoustic sphere shape the rhythm and tempo of the music, determining the silences, the pauses, and the breathing between and within phrases. In between the chants, we sing vocal tunings, which help the listener to adjust to the natural tunings, overtones, and the church acoustics.
Singing from a manuscript is the work of both the hands and the mind. The hands draw 10th-century musical notation in the air, capturing the subtle nuances of the neumes, which were written as arched signs above the sung text. These signs evolved from the oral tradition, embodying the movement of the melody. Even before the written neumes were put down on the parchment, they were visible in the hand gestures of the singing teacher.
The notations we sing are quadratic, except for the neumes that appear only in small remnants, as liquescent notes, yet the hands can find the neumatic gestures within or behind the square notations when the text is combined with notation and respect is paid to the groupings of notations. The mind and eye direct the hand; the hand directs the voice.
In some of the chants we warmly welcome the attendees of the concert to join the singing. In singing the manuscripts, the chants resonate in space, body, heart, and mind, awakening feelings and memories - pathways to other chants and worlds. Each person travels alone in their own inner musical landscape, yet the same path can also be walked by others, and the feelings and associations become shared, intersubjective memories. Vox Silentii (Johanna Korhonen and Hilkka-Liisa Vuori) researches, teaches, and performs medieval liturgical chants. The duo has published 15 CDs (since 1992).
This concert is part of the project 'Tradition and Variation: Medieval Chant in the Diocese of Turku' in co-operation with the Finnish Research Council and the National Library of Finland, University of Helsinki.