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II: MARTINUS NIjHOFF PUBLISHER - TIfE HAGUE
Recently published:
R. STEVENSON
University of California
*
Juan Bermuda
Juan Bermudo, the most prolific writer on music in sixteenth-century
Spain, was also one of the best-informed of the vernacular theorists.
He was the only prominent musicographer of his century to win the
testimonial of a printed recommendation by a major composer -
Morales, in his instance. His remarkable personality showed in
numerous ways. He was the first to compose and publish any organ
music in Spain. As if the publication of such music in staff-notation
were not enough, he also published the first Spanish keyboard piece
in tablature. He was the first in Spain to print any music in score.
He is cited by Pincherle as the first to publish a harp method
anywhere. He pioneered with the first treatise specifically designed
for female use. He also "enjoys" the distinction of having become in
Tapia's Vergel de Musica (1570) the most ruthlessly plagiarized
writer in Spanish musical history.
MARTINUS NIJHOFF - PUBLISHER - THE HAGUE
Those who have most comprehensively studied Spanish musical
literature have always been Bermudo's greatest admirers. His mind
was as keen and inquisitive as any of the century. He had an
advanced outlook that runs sharply counter to all his competitors,
even the best of them such as Tomas de Santa Maria. The recent
publication of his magnum opus, the Declaraci6n de Instrumentos musi
cales of 1555 in a facsimile edition, makes all the more the oppor
tune the issue of Dr. Stevenson's monograph - the first that criti
cally examines Bermudo's entire output.
Dr. Stevenson, associate professor of music at the University of
California at Los Angeles, is the author of numerous books and
articles devoted to Spanish music, and its New World counterpart.
He is a contributor to Grove's Dictionary (1954) and Die Musik in
Geschichte und Gegenwart. The present monograph will radically
improve the general appreciation of Bermudo's work, and will show
him to have been a figure of no less importance in Renaissance
Spain than Zarlino was in Italy and Morley in England.
CONTENTS
Preface
Biographical Summary
I. An Annotated Bibliography of Bermudo's Works
II. Introductory Matter in the Editions of 1549, 1550, and 1555
III. Bermudo's Sources
IV. Synopsis of the 1555 Declaraci6n
V. Keyboard Arrangements and Original Compositions
List of Works Cited
Index
1960. VII and 98 pages. With 23 musical examples. 4to.
Guilders 9.50
One guilder = abo $ 0.277 = abo 1/11 s = env. N.F. 1,30 = ca DMW 1.11
Obtainable through any bookseller or direct from the publisher
Juan Bermudo
R. STEVENSON
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
LOS ANGELES
Juan Bermudo
I I
MARTINUS NI]HOFF / THE HAGUE / 1960
ISBN 978-94-015-0226-9 ISBN 978-94-015-0735-6 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-94-015-0735-6
Copyright [gOO by Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, Netherlands
All rights reserved, including the right to translate or to
reproduce this book or parts thereof in any form
Preface
BERMUDO alone of the many Spanish theorists and composers of the 16th
century seems to have written anything specifically for New World use. All the
more fitting is it, then, to have completed this monograph in a part of the
Spanish Indies that was stirring every Andalusian's imagination during the
days when he was first sending his books across the Atlantic.
In every way his was a remarkable personality. He was the first to compose
and publish any organ music in Spain. As if the publication of such music in
staff-notation were not enough he also published the first Spanish keyboard
piece in tablature. He was the first in Spain to print any music in score. He
is cited by Pincherle as the first to publish a harp method anywhere. He
pioneered with the first treatise specifically designed for female use. He also
"enjoys" the distinction of having become in Tapia's Verge! de Musica (1570)
the most ruthlessly plagiarized writer in Spanish musical history.
If bulk determines preeminence he stands above even Tomas de Santa
Maria - who published only one volume, and that containing considerably
less text. If range of interests determines rank no one else writing in Spanish
during his century even approaches him. Nor does anyone else in Spanish have
so many authorities at his fingertips.
Best of all, his was an extraordinarily keen, inquisitive, and even daring
mind. He himself knew that he was writing not only for his own century, but
for the ages. The recent facsimile publication of his magnum opus under the
vigilant care of Santiago Kastner (Volume XI of the print facsimiles offered by
Barenreiter) makes all the more opportune the issue of this first monograph to
be devoted to his entire ceuvre.
For courtesies during the gathering of material I am indebted to Richard S.
Hill, Frank Campbell, and others on the staff of the Library of Congress. I am
v
Preface
also under obligation to Don Cristobal de Losada y Puga, director of the
Biblioteca Nacional in Lima and his able coadjutors in the Seccion de Investi
gaciones. Miss Ellen Cole placed me under debt by supervising the typing.
Dean David Jackey of the College of Applied Arts at the University of Califor
nia, Los Angeles, kindly made possible my leave of absence while holder of a
Fulbright Research Grant in Peru.
R.S.
United States Educational Commission in Peru
Lima, Peru
August I, I958
NOTE
Throughout this monograph, Middle C is c, the octave below is C, two octaves below is
C1• The octave above Middle C is cl, two octaves above is c2• In first citations oj I6th
century Spanish titles, the original capitalization and orthography (without accents) are
preferred; thereafter, modern accented forms are used. Direct quotations from Bermudo's
iext are given without accents and in his spelling.
VI
Contents
Preface v
Biographical Summary
1
I. An Annotated Bibliography of Bermudo's Works
3
II. Introductory Matter in the Editions of 1549, 1550, and 1555
9
III. Bermudo's Sources
IV. Synopsis of the 1555 Declaraci6n
Books I (37), II (40), III (43), IV (48), V (60).
V. Keyboard Arrangements and Original Compositions
List of Works Cited
Index
VII
Biographical Summary
scion of a distinguished and well-to-do Ecija family,! began
JUAN BERMUDO,
music study in his home town with a teacher whom he later recalled as a great
lover of secrecy. Because a friend of this teacher begged, however, for a copy of
the "secrets," the teacher had the young Bermudo write them down. He ever
afterwards hated secretive maestros.2 From personal experience, he could
vouch that such maestros rot with envy of their more talented pupils, and
always try to hide knowledge from students with retentive memories.
In about 1525, when he was fifteen, he became an Observant Minorite novice
(Andalusian province). Mter preliminary studies at Seville he was sent to the
University of Alcala de Henares, there to read mathematics 3 in the college for
members of his order, San Pedro y San Pablo. The most sharply etched musical
1 Such biographical details in the first three paragraphs as are not disclosed in chs. I of the 1549 or
1555 Declaraci6n de instrumentos are taken from Angel Ortega's neglected precis, "Fray Juan Bermudo,"
Archivo Ibero-Americano, ano II [1915], num. xi (tomo 4), pp. 216-224. Ortega listed the names of some
half-dozen other members of the Bermudo clan in Ecija, all of whom are known to have specially
favored the Minorite order - among them Benito Bermudo and Licenciado Crist6bal Bermudo (p. 2 I 6,
n. 3), Leonor Diaz Bermudo and Maria Bermudo (p. 217, n. 3). Crist6bal, a university graduate, was
a cleric in minor orders. Leonor, a religiosa, made her testament on June 7, 1565. Maria, the wife of one
Juan Perez, made hers on September 18, 1580. The latter two may well have been sisters of the theo
retician. In any case, the family was well-to-do. Only their support, on Bermudo's own admission, made
possible the publication of his treatises.
2 DeclaraciOn de instrumentos (Osuna: Juan de Le6n, 1549), fo1. 4V. Perhaps the most famous hoarder of
secrets in 1549 was Nicola Vicentino (15II-1572). On October 25, 1549, he swore a half-dozen pupils
to secrecy for ten years. See G. Danckerts, "Sopra una differentia musicale" (Rome: Bib1. Casanatense,
MS 2880), p. 9. Also, G. Baini, lvfemorie storico-critiche della vita e delle opere di Giovanni Pierluigi da Pa
lestrina (Rome: Soc. Tipografica, 1828), I, 342-343; Adrien de la Fage, Essais de Diphthhographie
musicale (Paris: O. Legouix, 1864), pp. 227-228.
3 Declaraci6n de instrumentos (Osuna: Juan de Le6n, 1555), fo1. I, col. J. Thisfamosa and doctissima
university, as Bermudo calls it, was at its apex during 1525-1530.
1
Biographical Summary
memory of his student years seems to have been hearing contrapunto concertado
sung in the primate's chapel at Toledo.4
But even though the famous Alcala professor, Pedro Ciruelo, had made
music the capstone of the four mathematical sciences,l Bermudo deliberately
forbore studying music theory while at the university - because of the low
esteem in which Observants held music. Not until he was stricken by a prolonged
illness did he decide to give himself to it seriously. During his convalescence he
felt providentially impelled to continue his studies for the benefit of his order
and of the church. These at length culminated in his epoch-making publi
cations (1549-1555).
OnJune 24, 1560, during a provincial meeting of the Observant Minorites at
Baeza,2 he was elected one of the four dejinidores in the Andalusian province.
Normally this honor would have been a step towards some such higher
responsibility as that of minister-provincial. Since he does not, however, seem
to have been honored with any further distinctions, he is conjectured to have
died ca. 1565.
IF A MAN'S writings betray his character, Bermudo had an unusual passion for
accuracy. He so frequently takes time to call his Spanish predecessors and
contemporaries to book for their carelessness that Santiago Kastner gives the
1555 Declaracion the Charakter einer Reklameschrift (Na chwort to the Barenreiter
facsimile). This zeal for accuracy takes on an ironic tinge when the times that
Bermudo was himself to be later misrepresented or plagiarized are taken into
account (see below, pages 4-7). Like his great predecessor, Ramos de Pareja
(called a "Paduan professor of music" 3 who "first propounded the theory
equal temperament" 4 by responsible historians), Bermudo has had to be the
victim of much inaccurate reporting.
4 Ibid., fol. 128, col. 2. See also below, p. 68.
1 Cursus quattuor mathematicarum (Alcala de Henares: Arnau Guillen de Brocar, 1516), fols. 72-93.
Ciruelo retired from the chair of Thomist theology at the university in 1524.
2 Angel Ortega, "Las Casas de Estudios en la Provincia de Andalucia," Archivo [bero-Americano:
Estudios histtiricos sabre La orden franciscana en Espana y sus misiones, tomo 5, ano III, nllin. xiv (March
April, 1916), p. 189. For information concerning Baeza (Ramos de Pareja's hometown) see Fernando de
C6zar Martinez, Noticiasydocumentos para La historia de Baeza (Jaen: Estab. Tip. de los Sres. Rubio, 1884),
pp. 154-156,481. In 1530 Baeza was larger than Jaen or Ubeda. At the end of the century the popu
lation of Baeza stood at 19,036. Bermudo's principal Baeza friend seems to have been Juan Martinez
Lechuga (whose keyboard instruments included keys for all the possible sharps and flats).
The Andalusian province of the Observants (formed in 1499) included in 1570 some 30 houses.
Bermudo's own religious house at Ecija (San Francisco was the third casa grande of the Andalusian
province) is described in Archivo [bero-Americana, xiii (Jan.-Feb., 1916), at p. 42. Begun in 1473, the
buildings surrounded a "beautiful garden." The church's three naves were dedicated to SS. Antonio,
Diego, and Bonaventura.
3 Otto Kinkeldey, "Franchino Gafori and Marsilio Ficino," Harvard Library Bulletin, 1/3 (Autumn,
1947), p. 38r.
4 J. B. Trend, "Ramos de Pareja," Grove's Dictionary, 3rd and 4th editions, IV, 322.
2
Description:BERMUDO alone of the many Spanish theorists and composers of the 16th century seems to have written anything specifically for New World use. All the more fitting is it, then, to have completed this monograph in a part of the Spanish Indies that was stirring every Andalusian's imagination during the
