The Mulliner Book
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The Mulliner Book (
British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
Add MS 30513) is a historically important musical
commonplace book Commonplace books (or commonplaces) are a way to compile knowledge, usually by writing information into books. They have been kept from antiquity, and were kept particularly during the Renaissance and in the nineteenth century. Such books are simi ...
compiled probably between about 1545 and 1570, by Thomas Mulliner, about whom practically nothing is known, except that he figures in 1563 as ''modulator organorum'' (organist) of
Corpus Christi College, Oxford Corpus Christi College (formally, Corpus Christi College in the University of Oxford; informally abbreviated as Corpus or CCC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1517, it is the 12th ...
. He is believed to have previously resided in London, where
John Heywood John Heywood (c. 1497 – c. 1580) was an English writer known for his plays, poems, and collection of proverbs. Although he is best known as a playwright, he was also active as a musician and composer, though no musical works survive. A devout ...
inscribed the title page of the manuscript ''Sum liber thomas mullineri / iohanne heywoode teste.'' ('I am Thomas Mulliner's book, with John Heywood as witness.') A later annotation on the same page states that: ''T. Mulliner was Master of St Pauls school'', but this has so far proved unsupportable. The provenance of the MS is unknown before it appears in the library of
John Stafford Smith John Stafford Smith (bapt. 30 March 175021 September 1836) was a British composer, church organist, and early musicologist. He was one of the first serious collectors of manuscripts of works by Johann Sebastian Bach. Smith is best known for w ...
in 1776. After passing through the hands of
Edward Francis Rimbault Edward Francis Rimbault (13 June 1816 – 26 September 1876) was an English organist, musicologist, book collector and author. Life Rimbault was born in Soho, London, to a family of French Huguenot extraction that had emigrated to England in 1685 ...
the MS was given to the British Museum in 1877 by
William Hayman Cummings William Hayman Cummings (22 August 1831 – 5 June 1915) was an English musician, tenor and organist at Waltham Abbey. Cummings was born in Sidbury (near Sidmouth) in Devon. He was educated at St Paul's Cathedral Choir School and the City of L ...
.


Contents

Of the 121
keyboard Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Musi ...
pieces over half are based on Catholic
liturgical Liturgy is the customary public ritual of worship performed by a religious group. ''Liturgy'' can also be used to refer specifically to public worship by Christians. As a religious phenomenon, liturgy represents a communal response to and partic ...
chants, and most of the rest are transcriptions of
part song A part song, part-song or partsong is a form of choral music that consists of a song to a secular or non-liturgical sacred text, written or arranged for several vocal parts. Part songs are commonly sung by an SATB choir, but sometimes for an all ...
s and
anthem An anthem is a musical composition of celebration, usually used as a symbol for a distinct group, particularly the national anthems of countries. Originally, and in music theory and religious contexts, it also refers more particularly to short ...
s, some twenty or so of which are secular. There are only two dance pieces and no
variations Variation or Variations may refer to: Science and mathematics * Variation (astronomy), any perturbation of the mean motion or orbit of a planet or satellite, particularly of the moon * Genetic variation, the difference in DNA among individuals ...
. There are also nine pieces for the
cittern The cittern or cithren ( Fr. ''cistre'', It. ''cetra'', Ger. ''Cister,'' Sp. ''cistro, cedra, cítola'') is a stringed instrument dating from the Renaissance. Modern scholars debate its exact history, but it is generally accepted that it is d ...
, the earliest extant music for this instrument. The sixteen named composers represented are among the most important of the time, including
Thomas Tallis Thomas Tallis (23 November 1585; also Tallys or Talles) was an English composer of High Renaissance music. His compositions are primarily vocal, and he occupies a primary place in anthologies of English choral music. Tallis is considered one o ...
(18 pieces),
John Redford John Redford (c. 1500 - died October or November 1547) was a major English composer, organist, and dramatist of the Tudor period. From about 1525 he was organist at St Paul's Cathedral (succeeding Thomas Hickman). He was choirmaster there from ...
(35 pieces), John Blitheman (15 pieces),
John Taverner John Taverner ( – 18 October 1545) was an English composer and organist, regarded as one of the most important English composers of his era. He is best-known for ''Missa Gloria tibi Trinitas'' and ''The Western Wynde Mass'', and ''Missa Coro ...
(1 piece) and
Christopher Tye Christopher Tye (c.1505 – before 1573) was an English Renaissance composer and organist. Probably born in Cambridgeshire, he trained at the University of Cambridge and became the master of the choir at Ely Cathedral. He is noted as the music ...
(2 pieces). Nineteen pieces are unattributed.


See also

*
The Dublin Virginal Manuscript The Dublin Virginal Manuscript is an important anthology of keyboard music kept in the library of Trinity College Dublin, where it has been since the 17th century under the present shelf-list TCD Ms D.3.29. History The Manuscript was probably pur ...
*
My Ladye Nevells Booke ''My Ladye Nevells Booke'' (British Library MS Mus. 1591) is a music manuscript containing keyboard pieces by the English composer William Byrd, and, together with the ''Fitzwilliam Virginal Book'', one of the most important collections of Renais ...
*
Susanne van Soldt Manuscript The Susanne van Soldt Manuscript is a keyboard anthology dated 1599 consisting of 33 pieces copied by or for a young Flemish or Dutch girl living in London. Its importance lies mostly in the fact that it is the only known source of early Dutch keybo ...
*
Clement Matchett's Virginal Book Clement Matchett's Virginal Book is a musical manuscript from the late renaissance compiled by a young Norfolk man in 1612. Although a small anthology, it is notable not only for the quality of its music but also for the precise fingering indicati ...
*
Fitzwilliam Virginal Book The ''Fitzwilliam Virginal Book'' is a primary source of keyboard music from the late Elizabethan and early Jacobean periods in England, i.e., the late Renaissance and very early Baroque. It takes its name from Viscount Fitzwilliam who beque ...
*
Parthenia (music) ''Parthenia or the Maydenhead of the first musicke that ever was printed for the Virginalls'' was, as the title states, the first printed collection of music for keyboard in England. 'Virginals' was a generic word at the time that covered all ...
*
Priscilla Bunbury's Virginal Book Priscilla Bunbury's Virginal Book is a musical commonplace book compiled in the late 1630s by two young women from an affluent Cheshire family. It is important more for its fingering indications than for the quality of the music it contains. Th ...
* Elizabeth Rogers' Virginal Book *
Anne Cromwell's Virginal Book Anne Cromwell's Virginal Book is a manuscript keyboard compilation dated 1638. Whilst the importance of the music it contains is not high, it reveals the sort of keyboard music that was being played in the home at this time. The manuscript The ...


Notes


Further reading

* ''The Mulliner Book'' edited by
Denis Stevens Denis William Stevens CBE (2 March 1922 – 1 April 2004) was a British musicologist specialising in early music, conductor, professor of music and radio producer. Early years He was born in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire and attended the Royal ...
. ''Musica Britannica'' vol. I, Stainer & Bell, London 1973. *
Denis Stevens Denis William Stevens CBE (2 March 1922 – 1 April 2004) was a British musicologist specialising in early music, conductor, professor of music and radio producer. Early years He was born in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire and attended the Royal ...
, ''The Mulliner Book: A Commentary'' (London n.d., 1952?). * ''The Mulliner Book revisited – some musical perspectives and performance considerations.'' Gifford, Gerald, in ''The Consort'', vol. 58, Summer 2002, pp 13-27. * ''The Mulliner Book'' newly transcribed and edited by John Caldwell. ''Musica Britannica'' vol. I, Stainer & Bell, London 2011. .


External links


Table of Contents for Stainer & Bell's Mulliner Book compilations
*
The Mulliner Book on the British Libraries Collection
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mulliner Book Renaissance music Books on English music Compositions for organ Compositions for keyboard Renaissance music manuscript sources 16th-century books British Library additional manuscripts