From Choir to Chamber: Negotiating Vocal Music in the Zurich Reformation

Abstract

Abstract This article discusses the role of music, singing and voice in the development of the Zurich Reformation. It argues that the silencing of musical elements in the course of the Zwinglian liturgical reform was due to a new understanding of devotion, prayer and both individual and communal agency in church services. Zwingli and the Zurich reformers took issue with Gregorian chant in particular and applied a decidedly Erasmian understanding of religious communication as inward, silent devotion. Musical religiosity was transferred from the sacred space of the choir ( kor ) to the private homes of believers ( kämerlin ). Moreover, by simultaneously extending the notion of devotion and prayer to practices of everyday urban life, the liturgical reforms contributed to a sacralization and Christianization of the city as an urban space.