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74
Kisch
⦁
Casting the Bigger Shadow
During Attaingnant’s later years, however, craftsmen such as Robert
Granjon became famous enough to operate as freelance punchcutters,
and Attaingnant likely purchased type from him rather than engraving
his own. Several examples of Granjon’s type still survive (Figure 4).
After comparison and study of both Granjon’s specimens and
Attaingnant’s later publications, I am led to believe that Attaingnant did
indeed purchase and use type from Granjon.
29
Figure 4: Music type made from Granjon’s matrices
30
Regarding spacing, Attaingnant and Petrucci took completely different
approaches to the relative note positions. While Petrucci used kerning to
space his noteheads as evenly as possible, regardless of flags and other
protruding elements, Attaingnant seemed to give more consideration to
the duration of the notes, the position of the lyrics, and the spacing across
systems.
For example, in Figure 5 wider spacing is given to the phrase “luy dus
me voulez vous” in order to accommodate the lyrics. Additionally,
Attaingnant has given this page narrower spacing as a whole in order to
fit all the music on one page.
29
Philippe Canguilhem, “Deux Recueils Inconnus de Pierre Attaingnant
Retrouvés à Montauban,”
Revue de Musicologie
93, no. 2 (2007): 473, 476.
30
Heartz,
Royal Printer of Music
, 47.