Plainchant is the oldest substantial body of music that has been preserved in any shape or form. It was first written down in Western Europe in the eighth to ninth centuries. Many thousands of chants have been sung at different times or places in a multitude of forms and styles, responding to the differing needs of the church through the ages. This book provides a clear and concise introduction, designed both for those to whom the subject is new and those who require a reference work for advanced study. It begins with an explanation of the liturgies that plainchant was designed to serve. It describes all the chief genres of chant, different types of liturgical book, and plainchant notations. After an exposition of early medieval theoretical writing on plainchant, Hiley provides a historical survey that traces the constantly changing nature of the repertory. He also discusses important musicians and centers of composition. Copiously illustrated with over 200 musical examples, this book highlights the diversity of practice and richness of the chant repertory in the Middle Ages. It will be an indispensable introduction and reference source on this important music for many years to come.

The motet in the post-tridentine world : an introduction / Esperanza Rodríguez-García & Daniele V. Filippi -- Proper to the day : calendrical ordering in post-tridentine motet books / David Crook -- Vespers antiphons, motets and the performance of the post-tridentine liturgy / Jeffrey Kurtzman -- Motets and the liturgy for the dead in Italy : text typologies and contexts of performance / Antonio Chemotti -- Motets pro defunctis in the Iberian world : performance contexts and practices / Owen Rees -- Palestrina's mid-life compositional summary : the three motet books of 1569-75 / Noel O'Regan -- Modality as orthodoxy and exegesis : strategies of tonal organisation in Victoria's motets / Marco Mangani and Daniele Sabaino -- Beyond the denominational paradigm : the motet as confessional(ising) practice in the later sixteenth century / Christian Thomas Leitmeir -- In search of the English motet / Kerry McCarthy -- Songs without words : the motet as solo instrumental music after Trent / John Griffiths -- The soundtrack for a miracle and other stories of the motet from post-tridentine Milan / Daniele V. Filippi -- Mapping the motet in post-tridentine Seville and Granada : repertoire, meanings, and functions / Juan Ruiz Jiménez

Heri s. 325-352: Hans Fagius: The organ works of Mendelssohn and Schumann and their links to the classical tradition

"Professor William Mahrt of Santford Univeristy and the Church Music Association of America has written a sweeping book--one that it is at once scholarly and practical--on that most controversial topic of music and the liturgy. He provides an over-whelming argument that every parish must have high standrads for liturgical music and he makes the full case for Gregorian chant as the model and the ideal of that liturgical music." - back cover