Basso Continuo Realization and Ornamentation: Ongoing projects
Realizing Basso Continuo Parts
Since 2021, I have been directing the Baroque music program at my university and realized (harmonized) basso continuo parts for beginner students of harpsichord and organ, who learn thoroughbass (figured bass). For example, in Fall 2021, a student ensemble consisting of two recorders and basso continuo performed J. S. Bach's Sonata (Trio Sonata) No. 1, BWV 525, which was originally written for organ:
The last several measures from the first movement of J. S. Bach's Organ Sonata (Trio Sonata) No. 1, BWV 525
This piece is transcribed for two flutes and basso continuo by Paul M. Douglas as shown below:
Realization by Paul M. Douglas
The realization of the basso continuo part looks very authentic. That is, the harpsichordist is expected to play the part in an unobtrusive, reserved manner.
And the following is my realization for alto recorder, violin, and basso continuo:
Figured and realized by Akira Takaoka
I have shown the scores of these two transcribed versions of BWV 525, both anonymously, to six harpsichordists separately and asked each of them for their comments on them. One of them was very critical of my score and said that, while the one by Paul M. Douglas was authentic, my realization was just outrageous and unthinkable because the piece was not anything like Brandenburg Concerto No. 5. 🤣 Actually, I expected a reaction like this. Her critical comment is, of course, perfectly legitimate and I am fully aware that my realization of the basso continuo part is quite unusual and maybe, as she described it, outrageous. To my huge surprise, however, all five others said that they would rather prefer to play my version.
Although I understand the critical comment by one of the harpsichordists, I can't believe that, when Bach played basso continuo parts on harpsichord himself, he played them in an unobtrusive, reserved manner. In response to this comment, Prof. George B. Stauffer, a prominent Bach scholar and my former organ teacher, also says in personal correspondence, "I agree with you about continuo playing: I can’t believe that Bach playing continuo in a 'reserved manner.' He was too talented for that, and the one eyewitness account that we have of his continuo playing describes him reaching around the body of one of his students and adding still more notes to the continuo part that the student was realizing." In fact, according to a figured bass treatise of 1756 by Johann Friedrich Daube, "In general, his [J.S. Bach's] accompanying was always like a concertante part..." and, according to C.P.F. Bach, "[J.S. Bach] accompanied trios on more than one occasion on the spur of the moment and, ... on the basis of a sparsely figured continuo part just set before him, converted them into complete quartets, astounding the composer of the trios."😄 (Koopman 2008, 126)
In this regard, some autographs by Bach himself seem informative. They show that his own realization was not "reserved" at all. I owe this observation to brilliant musicologist, violinist, and colleague of mine Dr. Kiko Matsuhashi 松橋輝子. She drew my attention to Bach's Flute Sonata, BWV 1030 because Bach's autograph of the piece is one of only two instances of basso continuo parts realized by Bach himself that have survived to date. Traverso player Marten Root also talks about the significance of the autograph:
In this video, Root says,
When a harpsichordist plays Bach and other such composers, he's usually faced with a bass line and the figures above it. The figures tell you which chords to play but not only that. You're supposed to link them in a sensible and interesting fashion. There were people in the past, and particularly in the Netherlands, who felt that it should sound restrained and reserved. You shouldn't make the chords too rich and you stayed lower than the soloist's part. But what Bach himself does is amazing: he doubles the flute part. He writes not only four-part but also five-part and once even six-part chords. Going against all the 20th-century rules that were formulated in the Netherlands.
Danish harpsichordist Lars Ulrik Mortensen (1996) also points out, "Regarding balance within the ensemble, 'freedom' for the soloist(s) has a very high priority: the continuo is expected not to double the solo line and generally to keep away from (i.e. stay lower than) its register, and rhythmical activity and ornamentation is [sic] kept to a minimum. On the whole, discretion and unobtrusiveness are currently much in vogue in continuo playing, and in several recent books on the subject one repeatedly finds those very characteristics highly praised and recommended. (665)" and argues, "A strikingly similar German version of the doubling practice can be found in the written-out realization of Tomaso Albinoni's sonata in A minor, op.6 no.6, made by Heinrich Nikolaus Gerber (1702-75) during his studies with Johann Sebastian Bach. Bach's own suggested improvements are documented in the surviving source, but nothing suggests that he did not consider Gerber's realization for the beginnings of the second and third movements ... entirely appropriate. (Incidentally, J. S. Bach provides us with a good example of the German interest in full-voiced continuo [emphasis added] in the second movement, marked Largo e dolce [sic], of the sonata in B minor, BWV 1030, for flute and harpsichord.) ... it is very difficult to avoid the impression that the discretion and unobtrusiveness in continuo playing so strongly advocated nowadays would have seemed no more than a curious relic of the past to an 18th-century Italian musician. (677)" (For the full-voiced (vollstimmig) form of thoroughbass realization, see Buelow (1963), Hammel (1977, 1978), and Cypess (2019))
Basso continuo realization and Partimento
Coming soon!
Issues of Ornamentation
Bériot (1857, 189) states that "... la mélodie n'était autre chose que l'ornement raisonné de l'harmonie." In other words, as Bériot suggests, since the realization of a basso continuo part can be considered as embellishment of harmonic tones implied by a bass line, issues of the realization of basso continuo parts are closely related to those of ornamentation, a performance practice especially significant for composers and performers of the Baroque period. Some research into ornamentation has led me to highly insightful papers on Baroque music by brilliant violinist, musicologist, and colleague of mine Dr. Yuki Horiuchi堀内由紀. Yuki-san is one of the most distinguished performers of the Baroque violin and period instruments in Japan and, as a researcher, specializes in the performance practice of Baroque music. She is a regular member of such renowned ensembles as Bach Collegium Japan (BCJ) and Orchestra Libera Classica (OLC).
The following (starting at 15:04) is a stunningly beautiful and subtle performance filled with "free ornamentation" by violinist Shunske Sato:
Sato's ornamentation and J.S. Bach's original violin and basso continuo parts are shown below:
Mm. 40-50 of aria "Bereite dir, Jesu, noch itzo die Bahn" from J.S. Bach's cantata Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben, BWV 147,
Transcribed by Akira Takaoka
An analysis of Sato's ornaments is coming soon!
Implications for Contemporary Classic Music and Algorithmic Composition by Computers
The finest examples of ornamentation such as those by Shunske Sato and, as we shall see below, Yuki Horiuchi堀内由紀 need to be examined from a historical point of view. The frequent use of ornamentation declined throughout the 19th century, the process of which is well traced in Horiuchi (2018). She argues that the decline gradually happened in part due to the more elaborate harmonies that emerged during the 19th century. This observation may be supported by Leonard Meyer's theory of style change (Meyer 1967, 1989). Meyer (1967, 283) argues,
Because a novel grammar and syntax necessarily involves a low level of cultural redundancy, works in a new style must show a high level of compositional redundancy if they are to be intelligible -- and if subsequent learning is to take place. Even the learning of our native language depends at first upon the repetition of easy words, simple syntactical constructions, and so on.
That these observations are relevant to the learning of musical styles is shown by the course of development followed by particular styles in the history of music. New styles tend, as we have seen, to begin with relatively high levels of compositional redundancy and move toward lower levels as the style becomes familiar and audiences learn, or internalize, its grammar and syntax. If the history of style is viewed in this fashion, total serialism and experimental music, which generally have very low rates of compositional redundancy, should perhaps be thought of as representing the final stage of the style that began around 1750, rather than as a new style.
If Yuki-san and Meyer's observations are correct, a new style that is currently emerging must also have a high rate of compositional redundancy and may allow for spontaneous ornamentation.
A Preliminary Study in Algorithmic Composition in a New Style: Improvised Ornamentation in Violin Music of the Eighteenth Century
Not many notated ornaments of 18th-century violin music have survived to date. Some of the rare exceptions are those written for Corelli's Violin Sonatas, Op. 5, which was the most popular violin piece of the time and its score was reprinted more than fifty times even during Corelli's lifetime. Its first edition was published in 1700 and so-called the "Amsterdam edition" in 1710, in which ornamented violin parts are presented alongside the original ones from the 1700 edition.
Dr. Yuki Horiuchi堀内由紀 (Horiuchi 2018) has examined all the surviving scores and manuscripts of the piece from the eighteenth century and identified prototypical ornamentation patterns and the derivation rules with which all the ornaments found in those scores and manuscripts can be derived from the prototypical ones. Since Yuki-san is a distinguished violinist as well as an accomplished musicologist, she makes use of her findings when she plays Corelli. The following are a set of various ornaments applied to Corelli's Op. 5, No. 5 m. 1 by performers, composers, and educators of the 18th century as well as Yuki-san:
Free ornamentation for Corelli (1700) by Yuki Horiuchi and others
Copyright (C) 2024 Yuki Horiuchi
Transcribed by Akira Takaoka
The following video (courtesy of Yuki Horiuchi) shows that Yuki-san plays her own ornaments for Corelli's Violin Sonata, Op. 5, No. 5, mm.1-5 including mm. 1-2 in the score above:
The ornaments in the score above (Horiuchi 2018) played by Yuki Horiuchi
Copyright (C) 2024 Tokyo University of the Arts
An Initial Attempt to Automated Composition in a New Style: A Style Simulation of Ornamentation of the 18th Century
Yuki Horiuchi's 堀内由紀 papers on "free ornamentation" are very useful for compositional purposes because they analyze the patterns of ornaments and the relationships among them and make clear the way ornaments changed from the 18th to the 19th centuries. Since the types and the usage of various ornaments are classified in those papers, it's relatively easy for me to implement the rules of ornamentation in my computer programs for algorithmic composition.
The following is the first, modest output of one of my latest theoretical studies, the automated realization of improvised ornamentation and figured bass. Since it's still in its initial stage of development, some ornaments sometimes sound rather funny. 😉 When fed with the first five measures from Violin Sonata, Op. 5, No. 5 by Arcangelo Corelli (1700), just the solo and basso continuo parts, for example, the Java program generates ornaments in any of the styles of Corelli himself (1710), Roman (c.1715-21), Dubourg (c.1725), Festing (c.1733-36), McGibon (c.1740), Geminiani (1751), Galeazzi (1817), Tartini (n.d.), and so on. The opening five measures from No. 5 in the original score, or the 1st edition (Corelli 1700), look like the following:
Mm. 1-5 from Corelli's Violin Sonata, Op. 5, V (Corelli 1700)
This Java program is strictly rule-based. No neural nets are employed. The rules originate from the recent work by Yuki Horiuchi 堀内由紀 (2018, 2020) (currently available only in Japanese), a musicologist and violinist and a colleague of mine, which is a groundbreaking study in the free ornamentation of the 17th and 18th centuries. She examined notated examples of free ornaments in all the published scores and manuscripts of those periods and then identified some principles of "free" ornamentation, that is, its patterns and relationships among them. It is those principles that are implemented as a set of rules in my Java program.
The following video clip shows that, when fed with the following excerpt, mm. 1-5 from Corelli's Op. 5, V, for example, the program produces ornaments and basso continuo:
The synchronization among those three instruments is a little tricky because, as you see in the score from Corelli's Violin Sonata, Op. 5, No. 5, many ornaments by Yuki Horiuchi and other performers and composers are non-metric. In other words, the length of each beat constantly changes. In my Java program, all the instruments synchronize at the onsets of harmony change. If you feel that all the instruments synchronize well, perhaps human players also try to synchronize that way.
The entire code will be integrated into my Java program for algorithmic composition that generates instrumental part(s) and RTcmix score files.
My next goal is to rewrite this Java program so that it can generate more elaborate and complex ornaments like those Yuki-san plays in the following video (courtesy of Yuki Horiuchi). She plays mm. 9-16 from Corelli's Violin Sonata, Op. 5, No. 11:
Free ornamentation for Corelli's Violin Sonata, Op. 5, No. 11, mm.9-16 played by Yuki Horiuchi:
Copyright (C) 2024 Yuki Horiuchi
A list of the patterns of free ornaments by performers and composers of the 18th century and the relationships among those patterns analyzed by Yuki Horiuchi as well as the improved Java program are coming soon on this page!
References:
Allsop, Peter. 1999. Arcangelo Corelli: New Orpheus of Our Times. New York: Oxford University Press.
Arnold, Franck Thomas. 1965. The Art of Accompaniment from a Thorough-Bass: As Practised in the XVIIth & XVIIIth Centuries, 2 vols. London: Oxford University Press, 1931. Reprint, New York: Dover.
Baillot, Pierre. 1834. L’art du violon. Paris: Imprimerie du Conservatoire de Musique, s.d. 1834).
Bernstein, Leonard. 1976. The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Bériot, Charles de. 1857. Méthode de violon, op. 102. Paris: l’Auteur.
Borgir, Tharald. 1987. The performance of the basso continuo in Italian baroque music. Ann Arbor, Mich.: UMI Research Press, 1977. Reprint, Rochester, New York: University of Rochester Press.
Boyden, David. 1965. The History of Violin Playing from its Origins to 1761 and its Relationship to the Violin and Violin Music. London and New York : Oxford University Press.
Buelow, George J. 1963. "The Full-Voiced Style of Thorough-Bass Realization." Acta Musicologica. International Musicological Society 35 (4): 159–171.
Burney, Charles. 1789. A General History of Music. Reprint, New York: Dover Publications, 1957.
_______. 1802. "Adagio." Abraham Rees ed. The New Cyclopaedia, or,Universal Dictionary of the Arts and Sciences, vol. i. London: Longman.
Christensen, Jesper Bøje. 1997. 18th Century Continuo Playing: A Historical Guide to the Basics. Translated by J. Bradford Robinson. Die Grundlagen des Generalbassspiels im 18. Jahrhundert: ein Lehrbuch nach zeitgenössischen Quellen. Kassel; New York: Bärenreiter, 2002.
Cope, David. 1991. Computers and Musical Style. Madison: A-R Editions.
Cypess, Rebecca. 2019. "How thorough was Bach’s thoroughbass? A reconsideration of the trio texture." Early Music. Oxford University Press 47 (1): 83–97.
Galeazzi, Francesco. 1791. Elementi teorico-pratici di musica con un saggio sopra l'arte di suonare il violino analizzata, ed a dimostrabili principi ridotta, vol. i. Rome, 1791, 1796, enlarged 2/1817.
Gatti, Enrico. 2016. "Però ci Vole Pacientia - Un excursus sull’arte della diminuzione nei secoli XVI, XVII e XVIII per uso di chi avrà volontà di studiare." In Regole per ben suonare e cantare, pp. 71-180. Edited by Ausikia Magaudda and Carlo Lo Presti: Edizioni ETS.
Gasparini, Francesco. 1708. L’armonico pratico al cimbalo. Venice. The Practical Harmonist at the Harpsichord. Translated by Frank S. Stillings. Edited. by David L. Burrows. New Haven: Yale School of Music, 1963.
Geminiani, Francesco. ca. 1748. Rules for playing in a true taste. Opera VIII. London.
_______. 1749. A Treatise of Good Taste in the Art of Musick. London: s.e.
_______. 1751. The Art of Playing on the Violin. London.
Habeneck, François Antoine. 1842. Méthod théorique et practique de violon. Paris: Canaux.
Hammel, Marla. 1977. "The Figured-bass Accompaniment in Bach's Time: A Brief Summary of Its Development and An Examination of Its Use, Together With a Sample Realization, Part I." Bach. Riemenschneider Bach Institute 8 (3): 26-31.
_______. 1978. "The Figured-bass Accompaniment in Bach's Time: A Brief Summary of Its Development and An Examination of Its Use, Together With a Sample Realization, Part II." Bach. Riemenschneider Bach Institute 9 (1): 30-36.
Hogwood, Christopher. 2013. “Introduction” in Arcangelo Corelli. 2013. Sonatas for Violin and Basso continuo, With contemporary embellishments, and a keyboard realisation by Antonio Tonelli (1686-1765), vols. 1, 2. Edited by Christopher Hogwood and Ryan Mark. Kassel: Baerenreiter: III-VIII.
堀内由紀. 2018. 『ヴァイオリン音楽における緩徐楽章の「恣意的装飾」: 18世紀から19世紀初頭にかけての演奏習慣の「継承」と「断絶」』 博士論文、東京藝術大学
(Horiuchi, Yuki. 2018. "Arbitrary Ornamentation" in Slow Movements for Violin: The "Inheritance" and "Disruption" of Performance Practice from the 18th Century to the Beginning of the 19th Century. Ph.D. diss., Tokyo University of the Arts).
堀内由紀. 2020. 「コレッリ『ヴァイオリン・ソナタ集』(作品 5)における「恣意的装飾」の分析研究 —アムステルダム版(1710 年)における伝統と革新—」『音楽表現学』18巻: 11-20
(Horiuchi, Yuki. 2020. "Analytic studies of Willkührlichen Veränderungen (arbitrary ornamentation) in Sonate a violino e violone o cimbalo, op. 5 by Corelli." Bulletin of the Japan Music Expression Society 18 (0): 11-20)
Johnstone, H. Diack. 1996. "Yet More Ornaments for Corelli's Violin Sonatas, Op.5." Early Music 24/4: 626-33.
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Meyer, Leonard B. 1967. Music, the Arts, and Ideas: Patterns and Predictions in Twentieth-Century Culture. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.
_______. 1989. Style and Music: Theory, History, and Ideology. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Mortensen, Lars Ulrik. 1996. "'Unerringly Tasteful'?: Harpsichord Continuo in Corelli's Op.5 Sonatas Author(s)." Early Music. Oxford University Press 24 (4): 665–79.
Neumann, Fredrick. 1978. Ornamentation in Baroque and Post-Baroque Music. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
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Rasch, Rudolf. 1996. "Corelli's Contract: Notes on the Publication History of the 'Concerti Grossi ... Opera Sesta' [1714]." Tijdschrift van de Koninklijke Vereniging voor Nederlandse Muziekgeschiedenis, Deel 46, No. 2: 83-136.
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Remeš, Derek. 2017. "J. S. Bach’s Chorales: Reconstructing Eighteenth-Century German Figured-Bass Pedagogy in Light of a New Source." Theory and Practice 42: 29-53.
_______. 2019. "Thoroughbass Pedagogy Near Johann Sebastian Bach: Editions and Translations of Four Manuscript Sources." Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft fuer Musiktheorie 16/2: 95-165.
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Scores:
Corelli, Arcangelo. 1700. Sonate a Violino e Violone o Cimbalo, Op. 5. 1st ed. Rome: Gasparo Pietra Santa.
_______. 1710. Sonate a Violino e Violone o Cimbalo di Arcangelo Corelli Da Fusignano Opera Quinta Parte Prima Troisième Edition ou l’on a joint les agréemens des Adagio de cet ouvrage, composez par Mr. A. Corelli comme il les joue. Edited by Estienne Roger. Amsterdam. facs. a cura di Marcello Castellani, Firenze, SPES 1979.
_______. 2013. Sonatas for Violin and Basso continuo, With contemporary embellishments, and a keyboard realisation by Antonio Tonelli (1686-1765), 2 vols. Edited by Christopher Hogwood and Ryan Mark. Kassel: Baerenreiter.
Dubourg, Matthew. c.1725. Corelli’s Solos Grac’d by Dobourg, versioni ornate delle Sonate op. 5 di Corelli. ms. del sec. XVIII, collezione privata ignota.
Festing, Michael Christian. c. 1733-36. GB-LbI (The British Library, London), Add. MS 71244.
McGibbon/McLean. c.1740. US-BEm (Jean Gray Hargrove Music Librare U n of California, Berkeley), MS 957.
Manchester* c.1750. GB-Mp (Manchester Public Library), Newman Flower Collection, MS. 130 HD 4 v.313.
Roman, Johan Helmich. c.1715-1721. Elaborazioni delle sonate delle op. 5 di Arcangelo Corelli. Stockholm. Musik-Och Teater Biblioteket, Roman Collection Ms. 97.
