Virdung, Sebastian (EN)

Virdung, Vierdung, Sebastian, *ca. 1465 Amberg, †between 1511 and 1518, German music theorist and composer, a clergyman. His father obtained citizenship of Amberg in 1475 and of Nuremberg in 1486. Virdung matriculated at the University of Heidelberg in 1483, and in 1486 studied law there and sang as an alto in the chapel of Philip the Upright of Wittelsbach, from whom he received church benefices in 1489 and, as chaplain, in 1500. In Heidelberg, he must have encountered the outstanding organist A. Schlick, who was active there; their contacts intensified during their stay at the ceremonial session of the parliament in Worms (1495), later developing into a sharp conflict. There are two preserved letters sent by Virdung to the heir to the throne in France, dated 1503 and 1504, requesting the treatises of Johannes de Muris (ca. 1322) and F. Gaffurius (1496), as well as the works of J. Ockeghem. Around 1505–06, Virdung worked at the court of Ulrich, Duke of Württemberg, in Stuttgart, and from January 1507 at the cathedral in Constance, from which he was dismissed in January 1508 due to inadequate care and neglect in the teaching of boy singers. In 1510, during the session of the Augsburg Parliament, he unsuccessfully sought a patron to publish a comprehensive work he called Ein deutsche Musica (a lost work); as a result, he published only a small portion of it, titled Musica getutscht (i.e., “in German,” Basel 1511). The treatise, written in the form of a dialogue between the author and his student, contains a vast amount of information on the approximately 1,500 wind, percussion, keyboard, and plucked string instruments; descriptions, especially of the instruments, are illustrated with numerous woodcuts, some of which (especially the keyboard instruments) confuse the right and left sides of the image. After describing and classifying the instruments themselves, Virdung moves on to notation. He begins with “Gwidon’s hand,” but then presents, for the first time in history, detailed instrumental notations: German keyboard and lute tablature. He presents the intavolations of his four-voice religious song, first reproduced in mensural notation. These involve mechanical notation of the parts using tablature systems, with the lute intavolation providing insight into the early development of this instrument, as it is not intended for a soloist playing four voices, but for a quartet of lutenists playing monodically, likely using a plectrum. Finally, Virdung discusses the challenges of assembling a flute quartet and the type of tablature for this ensemble. The treatise enjoyed considerable success. Among the 13 surviving copies, three variants have been discovered (differing not only in their graphics), suggesting a later reprint and pirated edition (most likely in Augsburg). In 1518 O. Luscinius made a Latin reworking of the work (he mentions that Virdung was already dead), which he published in 1536 and 1542; M. Agricola’s Musica Instrumentalis (1529, 5^th ed. 1545) is also a reworking of the treatise, and quite accurate anonymous translations (published in Antwerp) include the Flemish Dit is een seer schoon boecxken (J. van Ghelen, ca. 1528, also 1554 and 1568) and the French Livre plaisant et tres utile (G. Vosterman, 1529); the treatise was still used in 1618 by M. Praetorius (vol. 2 of Syntagma musicum).

Four secular four-voice songs by Virdung are preserved in an anthology printed by P. Schöffer (Mainz 1513, the so-called Liederbuch), and one in a collection printed around 1535. Both these and the religious songs belong to the tenor song type, but their textures are somewhat varied; alongside homorhythms and free polyphony, imitations appear between the soprano and tenor. Virdung probably also composed single-voice songs, as two melodies bearing his name are preserved in four-voice arrangements by P. Hofhaimer and E. Lapicida in a collective publication from 1539.

Literature: B.A. Wallner Sebastian Virdung von Amberg. Beiträge zu seiner Lebensgeschichte, “Kirchenmusikalisches Jahrbuch” XXIV, 1911; K. Nef Sebastian Virdungs Musica getutscht, in: Musikwissenschaftlicher Kongress in Basel, ed. J. Wolf, Basel 1924; H.H. Lenneberg The Critic Criticized. Sebastian Virdung and his Controversy with Arnold Schlick, “Journal of the American Musicological Society” X, 1957; M. Schuler Der Personalstatus der Konstanzer Domkantorei um 1500, “Archiv für Musikwissenschaft” XXI, 1964; F. Krautwurst Bemerkungen zu Sebastian Virdungs Musica getutscht (1511), in: Festschrift Bruno Stäblein zum 70. Geburtstag, ed. M. Ruhnke, Kassel 1967; G. Stradner Bemerkungen zu den besaiteten Tasteninstrumenten in Sebastian Virdungs “Musica getutscht…”, in: Der klangliche Aspekt beim Restaurieren von Saitenklavieren, ed. V. Schwarz, Graz 1971; E.M. Ripin A Reevaluation of Virdung’s „Musica getutscht,” “Journal of the American Musicological Society” XXIX, 1976; G. Stradner Neue Erkenntnisse zu Sebastian Virdung’s “Musica getutscht” (Basel, 1511), “Die Musikforschung” XXIX, 1976; C. Meyer Sebastian Virdung Musica getutscht. Les instruments et la pratique en Allemagne au début du XVI e siècle, Paris 1980 (contains transcriptions of five songs); M. Staehelin Bemerkungen zum geistigen Umkreis und zu den Quellen des Sebastian Virdung, in: Ars musica, musica scientia: Festschrift Heinrich Hüschen, ed. D. Altenburg, Cologne 1980; R. Denk “Musica getutscht”. Deutsche Fachprosa des Spätmittelalters im Bereich der Musik, Munich 1981; G. Stradner Spielpraxis und Instrumentarium um 1500 dargestellt an Sebastian Virdung’s „Musica getutscht” (Basel 1511), Vienna 1983; B. Bullard Musical Instruments in the Early Sixteenth Century. A Translation and Historical Study of Sebastian Virdung’s „Musica Getutscht” (Basel 1511), dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1987; B. Bullard Musica getutscht. A Treatise on Musical Instruments (1511) by Sebastian Virdung, Cambridge 1993; S. Scharenberg Sebastian Virdungs Musica getutscht – ein Sachbuch? Der Traktat von 1511 neu gelesen, “Tibia” XVIII, 1993; C. Knispel Ein „onmöglich” Lautenstück aus Sebastian Virdungs Musica getutscht (1511), “Concerto. Das Magazin für Alte Musik” XVI, 1999–2000; F.R. Selch and H.R. Butler Legacy of Sebastian Virdung. An Illustrated Catalogue of Rare Books from the Frederick R. Selch Collection Pertaining on the History of Musical Instruments, New York 2005; H. Minamino The Schlick-Virdung lute intabulation controversy, “The Lute” XLVI, 2006; M. Grassl Einige Beobachtungen zu Sebastian Virdung und Arnolt Schlick, in: NiveauNischeNimbus. Die Anfänge des Musikdrucks nördlich der Alpen, ed. B. Lodes, Tutzing 2010; M. Lewon „Auf die […] grossen unnd kleinen Geygen / auch Lautten”. Strategien zur Intavolierung von Vokalmusik in deutschen Lehrbüchern des frühen 16. Jahrhunderts, “Basler Beiträge zur historischen Musikpraxis” XXXIX, 2020.