The first important event in the musical history of the Christian era was the institution, by St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, of a uniform version of Church music. Prior to his time, the melodies in use in the Church had been transmitted from generation to generation by mere oral tradition. Under even the most favourable circumstances, it would have been almost impossible to preserve the ancient melodies of the Church in their original purity with this hap-hazard method of perpetuation; and when it is remembered that the Church itself only passed from the direct dangers of the persecutions, to the almost as great, if less obvious, dangers of imperial favour, it will be readily understood that Church music, in its original form at any rate, ran a considerable risk of perishing altogether.
With a view to removing such corruptions as already existed, and preventing the possibility of others arising in the future, St. Ambrose, about the year 384, made a general collection of the tones or tunes to which the Psalms were then sung, and setting forth each in the purest form possible. This formed the orthodox music of the Church for more than two hundred years, and in St. Ambrose’s old diocese of Milan it continues in use to this day.
Two centuries later the uniformity introduced by Ambrose had become very much relaxed; the Ambrosian chant was still in use throughout the Church at large, but with two hundred years use had come many modifications, and the modifications of one country differed materially from those of another. The necessity for a remodelling of the music of the Church was consequently very apparent. To this task Gregory the Great, who became Pope in 590, gave his earnest attention: and the system of Plain Chant which he arranged, broader in conception than that of Ambrose, and designed to meet the liturgical requirements of the entire year, under the title Gregorian, remains in use to the present time. Gregory also revised the Office of the Mass and gave it that form which still remains unchanged, and upon which some of the grandest musical con
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