antiphon
antiphon
The primary sense of “antiphon” is the chanting of alternate choirs. It is still used in this sense in the West for the psalmody of the office. But in the Latin tradition the term has come, from at least the 7th-8th cc., to designate a formula, often very brief, chanted before and after the psalm or sometimes between the verses. By extension, the term is also employed for formulae of the same type chanted independently of the psalmody. In the Byzantine liturgy the term “antiphon” is employed in the same senses, but further designates the 68 groups of psalms into which the psalmody is divided and more especially the gradual psalms (anavathmi) and the three groups of verses with refrain and troparia chanted at the start of the Divine liturgy.
“Antienne”, DACL, 1, 2, 1907.Find this resource:
E. Nowacki, “The Gregorian Antiphons and the Comparative Method”, Journal of Musicology, 4, 1985–1986, 243-75.Find this resource:
T. Bailey, Antiphon and Psalm in the Ambrosian Office, Ottawa, 1994.Find this resource:
J. Halmo, Antiphons for Paschal Triduum-Easter in the Medieval Office, Ottawa, 1995.Find this resource:
