Abstract

Preceded by a brief premise regarding the methodology of guided listening, the paper describes a project partially carried out with a class in the third year of middle school. The starting point was a free discussion after listening to Alleluia "Dies sanctificatus". This was followed by various "stages", in which the piece in question was compared with other forms of music and artistic expression. Each reflection becomes the starting point for further activities that generate a sort of research approach to the Gregorian chant, opening up the discussion to different types of expression and different cultural issues. The main musical and historical characteristics of Gregorian chant are explained but not in the form of a traditional lesson. The project aims to simulate discussion which can lead on to the listening of music from other historical periods which, either diachronically or synchronically, can be seen in relation to this Alleluia. This plan was in part actually carried out, in part remained at the theoretical level. However, it aims to simulate an understanding of the link between music and meaning, with the historical past being seen in a dialectical relation with the present and with the personal experience and existence of the listener. For example, observation of the long melismas can lead on to the listening to other melismatic and syllabic chants (thirteenth century lauda, eighteenth century "aria col da capo", or even work songs) and thus to reflections upon the musicality of words; similarly, perception of the use of free rhythm can lead on to a consideration of the concept of rhythm and the complex relation between music and tempo. In the concrete experience described here, Gregorian chant was compared with the lauda "Cristo è nato", with the Gloria from Ockeghem's "Missa prolationum" and Palestrina's motet "Dies sanctificatus". The four pieces were associated with graphic symbols that were devised by the children in order to identify the relation between music and tempo and to explain the concept of texture and structure. They were then linked with some artistic images (Byzantine mosaics, Giotto's "Nativity", Jan van Eyck's "The Madonna of Chancellor Rolin" and Raphael's "Sistine Madonna"). This not only served to understand the music within its own historical context but also stimulated a discussion of the meaning that Gregorian chant can have nowadays, of how it can echo existential experience and continue to be used and transformed. This discussion concluded with the pupils listening to Arvo Part's "Magnificat" and to another Gregorian chant ("Regnantem sempiterna") in the version performed by the Hilliard Ensemble together with the saxophonist Jan Garbarck - both pieces in which one can hear a very personal assimilation and transformation of the sound of Gregorian chant.