Notation and performanceAccording to
Margaret Bent (1998), "Renaissance notation is
under-prescriptive by our standards; when translated
into modern form it acquires a prescriptive weight
that over specifies and distorts its original
openness." Accidentals were not necessary, somewhat
like fingering notation today. However, Renaissance
musicians would have been highly trained in dyadic
counterpoint and thus possessed this and other
information necessary to read a score, "what modern
notation requires [accidentals] would then have been
perfectly apparent without notation to a singer
versed in counterpoint." A singer would interpret
his or her part by figuring cadential formulas with
other parts in mind, and when singing together
musicians would avoid parallel octaves and fifths or
alter their cadential parts in light of decisions by
other musicians (Bent, 1998).
