Basic bibliography
Manfred Bukofzer, Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Music (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1950)
https://archive.org/details/studiesinmedieva0000manf
Willi Apel, The Notation of Polyphonic Music, 900–1600 (Cambridge, Mass.: The Medieval Academy of America, 1954)
https://archive.org/details/notationofpolyph1953apel/mode/2up
Frank Ll. Harrison, Music in Medieval Britain (New York: Praeger, 1959)
https://archive.org/details/musicinmedievalb00harr/page/n5/mode/2up
Magnus Williamson, “The Early Tudor Court, the Provinces and the Eton Choirbook.” Early Music 25 (1997): 229–243. https://academic.oup.com/em/article-abstract/XXV/2/229/414274 (available for download to University of Vienna accounts)
Susan Boynton, “Boy singers in medieval monasteries and cathedrals,” in Susan Boynton and Eric Rice (ed.), Young Choristers, 650–1700 (Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2008): 37–48.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/young-choristers-6501700/boy-singers-in-medieval-monasteries-and-cathedrals/6C619827A313B2DD7EBC1D7016484F32 (available for download to University of Vienna accounts)
Anne Bagnall Yardley, “The musical education of young girls in medieval English nunneries,” in Susan Boynton and Eric Rice (ed.), Young Choristers, 650–1700 (Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2008): 49–67 https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/young-choristers-6501700/musical-education-of-young-girls-in-medieval-english-nunneries/58B54AFF167C73F03C520FAD9691E6FC (available for download to University of Vienna accounts)
David Fallows, “The most popular songs of the fifteenth century,” in Anna Maria Busse Berger and Jesse Rodin (ed.), The Cambridge History of Fifteenth-Century Music (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015): 787–801. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/cambridge-history-of-fifteenthcentury-music/most-popular-songs-of-the-fifteenth-century/84E958554FA48594F02F33A6122E79A8 (available for download to University of Vienna accounts)
Keith Polk, “English Instrumental Music in the Fifteenth Century.” In Jennifer M. Bloxam, Gioia Filocamo and Leofranc Holford- Strevens (ed.), Uno Gentile et Subtile Ingenio (Turnhout: Brepols, 2009): 659–667 (PDF files to be supplied)
Lisa Colton, Angel Song: Medieval English Music in History (London: Routledge, 2017)
https://www-taylorfrancis-com.uaccess.univie.ac.at/books/mono/10.4324/9781315567068/angel-song-medieval-english-music-history-lisa-colton?context=ubx&refId=d114f324-c538-466a-b1cf-942e5ec4a0ed (available for download to University of Vienna accounts)
David Fallows, Henry V and the Earliest English Carols: 1413–1440 (London: Routledge, 2018)
https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781315610900/henry-earliest-english-carols-1413%E2%80%931440-david-fallows?refId=d016fb53-51ff-4925-810c-a8d6b09563d4&context=ubx (available for download to University of Vienna accounts)
Richard Rastall and Andrew Taylor, Minstrels and Minstrelsy in Late Medieval England (Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2023)
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/minstrels-and-minstrelsy-in-late-medieval-england/A3A722FADDFB59D7F22E7806D6831021 (available for download to University of Vienna accounts)
James Cook, Grantley McDonald and Adam Whittaker (ed.). Manuscripts, Materiality, and Mobility: Essays on Late Medieval Music in Memory of Peter Wright (Lucca: Libreria Musicale Italiana, 2024) (PDF files to be supplied)
Schedule
1. Friday 03.10.2025 11:30 - 13:45
The Christian calendar and liturgy
2. Friday 17.10.2025 11:30 - 13:45
Political developments in England 1: The Hundred Years’ War; Institutions in which music was cultivated
Reading: Harrison 1959, 1–45, 156–219.
3. Friday 07.11.2025 11:30 - 13:45
French style v. English style (isorhythm and contenance angloise); Musical Sources (Old Hall, Fountains Fragments)
Reading: Harrison 1959, 220–294; Bukofzer 1950, 34–85, 86–112 (optional).
4. Friday 28.11.2025 11:30 - 13:45
Dunstable and Power; the Caput Mass and the Missa veterem hominem
Reading: Bukofzer 1950, 217–256; Colton 2017, 85–115; James Cook, “The life and afterlife of the Caput mass,” in Cook et al. 2024, 163–175 (optional; copy to be sent as PDFs); Andrew Wathey, “Dunstable, Power, and the mid-fifteenth century,” in Cook et al. 2024, 251–291 (optional; copy to be sent as PDFs)
5. Friday 05.12.2025 11:30 - 13:45
Votive antiphons and Magnificats; musical education
Reading: Harrison 1959, 295–307; Boynton 2008; Yardley 2008
6. Friday 12.12.2025 11:30 - 13:45
Responds, Carols, Benedicamus and other musical forms
Reading: Harrison 1959, 353–424; Fallows 2018, 1–18
7. Friday 19.12.2025 11:30 - 13:45
Political developments in England 2: The Wars of the Roses; the notation of fifteenth-century music
Reading: Apel 1954, 85–195.
8. Friday 09.01.2026 11:30 - 13:45
Continental responses to English music: Dufay, Binchois, Okeghem, Obrecht
Reading: Bukofzer 1950, 256–310; Colton 2017, 133–148.
9. Friday 16.01.2026 11:30 - 13:45
The Eton Choirbook
Reading: Harrison 1959, 307–329; Williamson 1997.
10. Friday 23.01.2026 11:30 - 13:45
Instrumental music and secular song
Reading: Polk 2009, Fallows 2015; Rastell and Taylor 2023, 315–361 (optional)
- Profesor: McDonald Grantley Robert