Top of page

Article Preface from Liturgical Chants of the Copts. Notated and placed in order by Father Jules Blin, S.J.

Translated from the French by Maryvonne Mavroukakis
Edited by Jan Lancaster and Carolyn M. Ramzy

The work that we are offering to the public here is not unimportant for the Coptic nation. It is the notation of its liturgical chants; a work unknown until now, because the Copts have never notated their music. However, their church music has come down to us; but tradition alone has preserved their music. Children from a very early age have heard these chants from the mouth of their fathers, and they in turn have learned them to teach them to their own children; but, as we understand it, everything was exposed to caprice and fantasy. Monsignor Aghabios Beschaï, the last bishop of the Catholic Copts, had tried to annotate liturgical chants but he died before he achieved his mission. Monsignor Marcos, Apostolic Visitor of the Copts, pursued the idea of the Bishop, and it is to answer his wishes that we have undertaken this work, with the desire for it to be useful to this Church and its present and future clergy.

We have used the skills of various Coptic cantors, under their dictation, to annotate the sung part by the people and the deacon cantor.

This work presented many difficulties, and it is not without apprehension that we initiated it. The Arabic musical scale, we believe, is divided into thirds.[1] Did Coptic music present the same problems? How does one represent such intervals with musical notation?

How many times was our work interrupted because errors were discovered? Even with much care and precautions, we had to understand that the work would remain imperfect. In spite of the difficulties that this work presented, we have tried to reach the highest possible perfection. We have tried especially to render with the highest accuracy, the melody and the rhythm of the chant. We preferred to reproduce scrupulously all that we heard, however relatively difficult to measure.[2] With this desire of precision to the smallest detail, we have kept the national character of Coptic chant. Even though they have been described as such, these chants do not contain "harsh and baroque modulations" and "savage and soporific melodies."[3] They have none of the raw character of Arabic melody. Their cadences and their rhythms, more happy than sad, do not emit a gaiety that is born from pleasure. One will find, especially, beginning from the preface of the Mass, No. 31 to the end of the Office, passages that are reminiscent of the beautiful modulations of our plain-chant.

In short, Coptic liturgical chants, like all religious chants in general, have preserved a national trait; they do not seem to have, contrary to non-religious songs, foreign influences. May this work be used to enhance the beauty of the Catholic cult of Egypt and contribute to avenging the Coptic ceremonies from injudicious critiques by unenlightened and ill-intentioned authors! Then, we will have been amply compensated for our troubles.

We believe we ought to add some remarks to clarify the organization of this work:

  1. The Copts have the tradition of repeating the vowels on which the melody is prolonged, or even making up syllables that they form and substitute for prolonged vowels. In this case, if the syllable contains the sounds i or e, the made-up syllables are é, yé, é, yé, i, etc. If, however, the syllable contains the sounds o, ou, the made-up syllable is o, wo, o, i, etc. We thought it was better to write these kinds of prolongations or additions, with Latin characters, so that the Coptic text does not suffer disfiguration.
  2. It is to be noted that in the double and triple syllables, or when two consonants meet, the Copts often emphasize the quasi-vowel e after the first consonant when singing. We wrote this kind of scheva[4] in little red italic characters for the reason mentioned above.
  3. The reason we chose this musical key to annotate these liturgical chants was to avoid the sharps and flats. Our work is especially dedicated to the students of the Coptic Seminary whose aptitudes for music are not very developed.
  4. We have kept for the priest officiating at the altar the denomination of diacre, but we will remark that generally the functions of the diacre or Shemma, are usually accomplished by children (not altar boys).[5]

Even though the faithful [the congregation] does not respond during the service, we continue to designate the Cantors with the expression le peuple [the people] as it is found in the liturgy.

Letter from his Eminence the Cardinal Simeoni,
Prefect of the Holy Congregation of the Propagation [of the Faith]

Rome, February 8, 1888

Reverend Father,

I learned, through Monsignor Marcos, Apostolic Visitor of the Copts, about the admirable patience as well as the care that Your Reverence has shown to gather and annotate the ancient and pure liturgical chant of the Copts. This same Prelate also told me that once the printing of the first part is finished, the second part will be undertaken.

In awaiting it, I am happy to present Your Reverence well-deserved congratulations for this interesting liturgical work which has cost you so much effort. I wish that She [the Coptic Church] will kindly complete it by preparing the second part of the chants. Your Reverence will have been deemed worthy by the Coptic Church; She will have preserved through you the liturgical chant which was going to be corrupted and which was in danger of being lost. Your work, moreover, will permit R[évérend] P[ère] Foujols and his successors to teach all the students of the Coptic seminary the chant as well as the ceremonies of the rite, in accordance with what was ordained by this Holy Congregation, in April 1878.

In this hope, I pray the Lord to bestow on Your Reverence abundant blessings.

Giovanni, Cardinal Simeoni, Prefect

From Blin, Jules. Chants liturgiques des Coptes. Notés et mis en ordre par Le Père Jules Blin de la Compagnie de Jésus, Missionaire en égypte. 1. Partie chantée par le Peuple et le Diacre. Cairo: Imprimerie nationale, 1888. Music Division, Library of Congress. Call number: M2160.4.C6C43 1888

Notes

  1. Egyptian Institute session, December 3, 1887. "In the scales currently used, there are only [the following] intervals: major and minor modes, 2/3 of tone, and 1/3 of a tone. Intervals of ½ and ¼ tones are missing." [back to article]
  2. It is unclear whether the author is referring to an incremental measure or musical measure here. [back to article]
  3. [Villoteau in] Description of Egypt, volume 14, pages 301-302. [back to article]
  4. Again, the meaning here is unclear. This term is also italicized in the original text. [back to article]
  5. It is likely that the term diacre here means deacon in English since the word Shemma, similar to the Arabic Shemmās, also means deacon. [back to article]

About this Item

Title

  • Preface from Liturgical Chants of the Copts. Notated and placed in order by Father Jules Blin, S.J.

Names

  • Blin, Jules -- 1853-1891 (author)
  • Marvoukakis, Maryvonne (translator)
  • Lancaster, Jan (editor)
  • Ramzy, Carolyn M. (editor)

Headings

  • -  Articles
  • -  Songs and Music

Genre

  • article

Notes

  • -  From Chants liturgiques des Coptes. Notés et mis en ordre par le père Jules Blin de la Compagnie de Jésus missionnaire en Egypte. [Première] Partie chantée par le peuple et le diacre. Cairo: Imprimerie nationale, 1888. Music Division, Library of Congress. Call Number: M2159.8.B7 (General)

Additional Metadata Formats

Rights & Access

The Library of Congress is providing access to these materials for educational and research purposes and makes no warranty with regard to their use for other purposes. The written permission of the copyright owners and/or other rights holders (such as holders of publicity and/or privacy rights) is required for distribution, reproduction, or other use of protected items beyond that allowed by fair use or other statutory exemptions. There may be content that is protected as "works for hire" (copyright may be held by the party that commissioned the original work) and/or under the copyright or neighboring-rights laws of other nations.

Responsibility for making an independent legal assessment of an item and securing any necessary permission ultimately rests with persons desiring to use the item. Users should consult the bibliographic information that accompanies each item for specific information. This catalog data provides the details known to the Library of Congress regarding the corresponding items and may assist users in making independent assessments of the legal status of these items as related to their desired uses.

Items included here with the permission of the rights holders are indicated as such in the bibliographic record for each item.

Thanks go to the following persons and organizations for granting permission for the use of items in the online presentation Coptic Orthodox Liturgical Chant and Hymnody.  Users may need to contact these rights owners for any re-use of materials:

Wassif Boutros-Ghali, President, Société d’Archéologie Copte, Cairo, for permission to reproduce articles on O.H.E. Burmester by Otto Meinardus, an atlas of Christian sites in Egypt by Meinardus, a photograph of O.H.E. Burmester, and a brochure on a map of Christian Egypt by Burmester, all published by the Société d’Archéologie Copte. 

Yasmine El Dorghamy, Turath, for permission to reproduce the article on Ragheb Moftah by Dr. Raymond Stock from Turath, August 2008.

Estate of John E. Gillespie, for permission to use two articles by John Gillespie and to reproduce the Gillespie correspondence in the American Folklife Center.

Chi Keat-Man, Syndication Account Manager, Telegraph Media Group Limited, London, for permission to reproduce three 1931 and 1932 articles on Newlandsmith from The Daily Telegraph. 

Claire Lamont, The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, London, for permission to reproduce Oriental Hymn Tunes by William Henry Temple, 1930.

Karen Lee of Cengage Learning, Belmont, California, for permission to use a selection of texts from The Coptic Encyclopedia.

Father Charles Libois, S.J., Collège de la Sainte-Famille, Cairo, and Lebanon, for photographs of Fathers Jules Blin and Louis Badet, as well as biographical sources on them.

Stephen McArthur of Multicultural Media, for permission to digitize four tracks from Echoes of the Nile: Aspects of Egyptian Music.

MVF - Michael Video, Heliopolis, for permission to reproduce film of Moftah’s funeral, 18 June 2001.

Simon O’Neill, Group Editor, The Oxford Mail and The Oxford Times, for permission to reproduce two articles on Newlandsmith’s lectures in England in  May 1931.

Alan Powell, The Star, Sheffield, for permission to reproduce an article on Newlandsmith in the Sheffield Mail, 1931.

Sinead Porter, NI Syndication, London, for permission to reproduce an article on Newlandsmith from The Daily Herald, 1931.

David Ramm, Editor-in-Chief, AMS Press, Brooklyn, New York, for permission to reproduce The Coptic Morning Service for the Lord’s Day by the Marquess of Bute.

Dr. Geoffrey Rutowski and Dr. Carl Zytowski, University of California, Santa Barbara, for permission to reproduce their memorial article on John Gillespie.

Father Thomas Sable, S.J., Director, Center for Eastern Christian Studies and Editor of Diakonia, The Theology Department, University of Scranton, Scranton, Pennsylvania, for permission to reproduce Marian Robertson’s article on Newlandsmith’s transcriptions, and for giving us a copy of Diakonia.

His Grace, Bishop Serapion, Bishop of Los Angeles, and His Grace, Bishop Youssef, Bishop of Southern USA, for permission to reproduce The Divine Liturgies of Saints Basil, Gregory and Cyril, 2001.

Youssef Sidhom, Editor-in-Chief, Watani Newspaper, for permission to use the documentary film, Eminent Copts in Egyptian History: The Power of Coptic Music, Ragheb Moftah 1998, which includes an interview with Moftah by the late Egyptian musicologist, Dr. Adel Kamel.

Welcome Video Film, Cairo, for permission to reproduce film of Moftah’s 100th birthday, 21 December 1998.

In some cases, the Library was unable to identify a possible rights holder and has elected to place some of those items online as an exercise of fair use for strictly non-commercial educational uses. The Library of Congress would like to learn more about these materials and would like to hear from individuals or institutions that have any additional information or know of their history. Please contact:  Performing Arts Reading Room.

Suggested credit line: Library of Congress, Music Division.

Cite This Item

Citations are generated automatically from bibliographic data as a convenience, and may not be complete or accurate.

Chicago citation style:

Blin, Jules, Maryvonne Marvoukakis, Jan Lancaster, and Carolyn M Ramzy. Preface from Liturgical Chants of the Copts. Notated and placed in order by Father Jules Blin, S.J. Web.. https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200155951/.

APA citation style:

Blin, J., Marvoukakis, M., Lancaster, J. & Ramzy, C. M. Preface from Liturgical Chants of the Copts. Notated and placed in order by Father Jules Blin, S.J. [Web.] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200155951/.

MLA citation style:

Blin, Jules, et al. Preface from Liturgical Chants of the Copts. Notated and placed in order by Father Jules Blin, S.J. Web.. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200155951/>.