Estudio y edición de dos breves tratados musicales catalanes del siglo XVIII

This article focuses on the study and editing of two unpublished 18th-century musical treatises written in Catalan that are included in a volume containing five theoretical works from different periods preserved at the Biblioteca de Catalunya. Both short manuscripts provide insight into 18th-century music pedagogy and their pages show how music was understood and taught at the time. The study of their contents unveils what a musician needed to know in order to carry out his daily work and how he acquired that knowledge in the 18th century. It is very likely that both the recipient and the copyist of the manuscripts was a prospective singer in a church’s music chapel. This can be assumed because both treatises focus on practical matters concerning, mainly, the performance of plainchant. Another point that must be taken into consideration is the fact that both manuscripts are written in Catalan. Even though other music treatises written in Spanish were produced and known in Catalonia, as was also the case for other disiciplines, it is no less true that in that geographical area music teaching was largely carried out in Catalan.