The Relationship between Text and Liturgical Assignments in the Vespertini

Abstract

Abstract THE VESPERTINUS GENRE, like other Hispanic rite genres, has chants prescribed for just one liturgical day, and chants prescribed for two or more liturgical days. The prescription of these chants, however, was not random, but instead resulted from a deliberate process of chant assignment. As shown in this chapter, detailed analysis of the relationship between the text of each vespertinus and its liturgical assignment(s) yields data that demonstrates the extent to which these assignments were deliberate. To visualize the vespertinus repertoire for each series of offices and the number of assignments of each chant within each series, it was necessary to organize the vespertini following their liturgical assignment(s). This way of displaying the repertoire also enables a clear appreciation of how each series of Hispanic rite offices is distinct in its total number and selection of vespertini and in its proportion of unique vespertini.