Notating-Accompanying-Conducting: Intabulation Usage in the Levoča Manuscripts

Seventeenth-century organists of the Zips region (then in Royal Hungary, now in Slovakia) relied on German letter notation to intabulate works for practical use. Manuscripts in the Library of the German Evangelical Church in Levoča show that organists played works by internationally known, contemporary composers, that they composed new works, and that churches had the personnel to mount large-scale, Venetian-style polychoral performances. The manuscripts further show that, although organists had the know-how to play from a thoroughbass line or a reduced set of parts, they apparently preferred to play-and direct-from intabulations that served as conductors' scores.