Neume Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description

Neumes are an ancient musical notation used to write down Gregorian plainsong. They are very well suited to this kind of monophonic, melismatic music. As neumes were used during the Middle Ages, a period that covers a millennium, in all regions of Western Europe, they exist naturally in dozens of flavors. The earliest neumes were simply accent marks over the lyrics, showing the outline of the melody, whereas the most sophisticated ones indicate even the smallest nuances of the music, or trace the melismas in an elaborate, almost artistic way.

The major neumatic traditions include:

• Sangallian neumes (Sankt-Gallen, Switzerland)
• Beneventan neumes (Benevent, Italy)
• Mozarabic or hispanic neumes (Spain)
• Messine neumes (Laon, France)
• Aquitanian neumes
• Germanic neumes
• ...
• Modern square neumes

Many neumatic notations do not indicate pitch precisely, but rather show the outline of individual pitch groups -- this is called in campo aperto. Later, neumatic systems evolved in which the vertical position had a relation with the pitch -- these are diastematic notations. Later still, horizontal lines were added to clarify the notation further -- these evolved on to our modern staff notation.

Table of contents

1 Sangallian neumes 1.1 Encoding in text 2 Rhytmic interpretation 3 External links

Sangallian neumes

The neumes of Sankt-Gallen are a "classic" and easy to learn variety, having a simple form, yet an enormous power due to their ample repertory of expressive markings.

Basic 1-note neumes: (some images missing: approximating with text characters)

• high note: (virga "staff")
• low note: (punctum "point") or - (tractulus "dash")

Basic 2-note neumes:

• low-high: Variants: (pes or podatus "foot")
• high-low: Variants: (clivis)

Basic 3-note neumes:

• low-high-low: J\\ (torculus)
• high-low-high: ∩/ (porrectus)
• three rising notes: ../ (scandicus)
• three falling notes: /.. (climacus)

Basic neumes can be joined to form longer melismas, for example

• low-high-2 falling: J.. (pes subbipunctis "foot with two points underneath")
• low-high-low-high: J\\/
• low-high-low-high-low-high-low-high-2 falling: J\\∩∩/..

Expressive neumes (having sometimes quite obscure and discutable interpretations):

• ' (apostropha), '' (bistropha), ''' (tristropha)
• ∴ (trigon "triangle")
• ~ (oriscus)
• ~. (pressus minor), /~. (pressus maior)
• .~/

Encoding in text

Neumes were finally encoded along with other musical symbols in Unicode in the Supplementary Multilingual Plane, in the range U+1D1D0–U+1D1D9. Most user agents as of 2004 cannot display any characters in this range, but in the near future it should be possible to properly encode neumes in plaintext.

𝇐 C clef
𝇑 F clef
𝇒 B square
𝇓 Virga
𝇔 Pes / Podatus
𝇕 Clivis
𝇖 Scandicus
𝇗 Climacus
𝇘 Torculus
𝇙 Porrectus

Rhytmic interpretation

A controversial subject concerning:

• episemas
• romanus letters
• neumatic breaks

(I intend to show one hypothetical interpretation...)

External links

• http://www.schuyesmans.be/gregoriaans/EN/ENmu_05.htm

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