Once upon a time, there was a community of nuns in a far away land called Hanceville, Alabama. They resided in the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament.

These nuns devoted their lives to their religion and lived far away from the distractions of everyday life. One of their favorite activities was making music to perform.

The head nun was called Mother Angelica, and she instructed all of the sisters in transcribing music.

Today, sisters, we will be transcribing Guillaume DuFay's "Ave Maria" and Johannes Tinctoris's "Virgo Dei throne digna." DuFay was a choir boy and teacher in his lifetime. Tinctoris was a choral master and music theorist.

The DuFay piece is for three voices and is a prayer to our Mother Mary. The Tinctoris piece is for three voices as well, though less obvious.

How do we even begin, Mother Angelica?

How do we know the key of the pieces?

Great question! You must look for the clef, first. In the DuFay, the clef is on the second line from the bottom, on the note 'G'. Now you can figure out all of the other notes!

In the Tinctoris piece, you see that the clef changes on the bottom two staves like the picture I have here. This indicates another voice. On the second page, the third clef appears.

So we know what the note names are now, but how can we tell what the duration is? There are no measures!

You have to familiarize yourself with mensural notation first. This graph made by Sister Elias and Sister Grau will explain the differences between old and new music notation.