Montserrat 484

Description

Provenance: Monastery of Montserrat.

Description: manuscript 29x21cm; 37 pages including the paper cover (36 pages of music), sewn binding. Fourteen staves per page, except for the last page, which has twenty, and is part of a bifolium serving as the cover for the title page. Modern numbered pagination in blue ink commences at 302 (cover) and continues to 338. Paper cover. The manuscript contains a total of nineteen keyboard sonatas: two by Scarlatti and seventeen by various authors, including: Juan Moreno y Polo (1711-1776), Francesc Mariner (1720-1789), Anselm Viola (1738-1798), Juan Andrés de Lombida (1745-1811), Joaquim Suriana (?) and Antonio Soler. The nineteen sonatas are numbered in Roman numerals, with the exception of Sonata 8, which has an Arabic numeral. Inscription on p. 13: Sonata 8. And[ant] e 1770. 

Rastrum: SS (Staff Span): 0.9cm; DS (Distance between Staves): 1.2cm; TS (Total Span): 26.5cm. 

Watermarks: on the front cover and on pages 6 and 16 there is watermark consisting of a circle with three grapes at each cardinal point. Additionally, a countermark, of which the last six letters read ‘ALEGRA’, appears on pages 4, 13, 14, and 21. Both marks are probably from a Catalan manufacturer, based on similarities with other watermarks from the same period (see, for instance, Ref. 0037192 in https://www.cultura.gob.es/filigranas/buscador_detalle?idFiligrana=0037192A). 

Titles: (cover) Sonatas de / órgano del Pdre / Fra Antonio / Soler, 1786, framed by decorative flowers and four X-shaped crosses, one in each corner. A small Maltese cross is above the title. Below the title, a flower vase, and at its base the date 1786. The decoration is by a non-professional hand in sepia ink. (P. 2) Sonatas del Padre Soler Para CloviCordio (sic). 

Copyists: copyist A (from pp. 2 to 30) and copyist B (from pp. 31 to 37), non-professional, most probably monk/organists from the Monastery of Montserrat. Some inscriptions in Catalan are found on p. 24: salpicat (dotted); and on p. 25: ma Sola (one hand).  

Comments: The collection appears to have been copied in 1770, as indicated by the inscription on page 13. The title page dated 1786 was added later and does not correspond to the contents, which include sonatas by different composers, not only for organ, but also some specifically intended for clavicordio or clave, thus, harpsichord. This is the case on p. 2: Sonatas del Padre Soler Para CloviCordio (sic); p. 8: Sonata V por Orga o Clave mestres Señor Bruno; p.18: Sonata por Clave de Mariner; p. 25: Sonata XIII de Soler Para CloviCordio (sic). 

Some of the sonatas also appear in other manuscripts in the Montserrat archives. Thus, Sonata II by Soler (R52) which is also in Montserrat 487 (pp. 1-2); Sonata VI by Scarlatti (K533) also appears in Montserrat 654 (pp. 29-31); Sonata VII by Lombida, in Montserrat 1665 (pp. 28-30) and 1881 (pp. 36-38); Sonata XIV by Soler (R108), in Montserrat 2505 (pp. 18-19); Sonata XV by Suriana is also found in Montserrat 1881. 

Date: 1770-1786. 

Contents: Sonata K19 is attributed here to Soler. A fragment of K533 (bars 1-61 also appears in Montserrat 654. In both manuscripts, the compass a,, – e’’’ (Venice 13, 20) has been narrowed to d, – c sharp’’’.