E. Karman

Full Anthem in the Works by Thomas Tomkins

The article is devoted to compositional-stylistic characteristics of anthems of the full type by Thomas Tomkins – one of the great English composers of the turn of the 16-17th centuries. The purpose of the article is to consider, on the basis of Tomkins’ works, a model of the full anthem at the junction of two epochs – the Renaissance and the Baroque. The article gives the analysis of composition, stylistics, and the specifics of polyphonic writing. There is a reliance on the style of works by William Byrd. End-to-end musical and textual compositions are distinguished by clear rhythm-harmonic cadence between sections, which are the imitation pronunciation of syntactic units of the lyrics. In a small group of anthems, a predominantly variant repetition of adjacent sections occurs, indicating a refraction of the song principles of compositional formation. In all the anthems, both the three-five-voiced ones (predominant in Tomkins’ heritage) and six or twelve-voiced ones, the composer cares about the audibility of words, relying primarily on the musical-text syllabic and various methods of defusing the texture, including rhythmic pedal enlargement of the party, putting off one of the voices in the texture. There is a peculiarly polyphonic writing of Tomkin’s anthems, in which an imitation canonic technique is developed, duplication of parties in the interval of third is used. In the choral scores of the anthems, there are some features of the verse type of anthems, as this type is also represented in Tomkins’ works. The composer uses a variety of forms of voice ensemble (in anthems of four / five or more voices), including the multi-choir principles into the music texture, that reflects the tendency of «Italianization» of musical stylistic.

Key words

Anglican music, full anthem, Thomas Tomkins.

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