music summary

The Renaissance (1450 – 1600)

I. History and Culture

The term “Renaissance” is misleading because it implies a “sudden awakening” of intellectual awareness and rebirth of learning in history. But history is a continuum. The previous period (late Medieval period) was not stagnant, and the Renaissance was just the next phase in the development of Europe. The Renaissance originally flourished in Florence, Italy with several other movements in other parts of Europe.

It marks the passing of European society from a sacred to a more secular one, the passing from a more religious society to a society of reason and scientific inquiry. They began to rely on the senses rather than religious authority. The focus was on life of earth rather than the hereafter. People in Europe gained a new confidence in problem solving using reason and a rational ordering of the world.

It was also an age of exploration, starting with searching for new trade routes to and from China and the Indies, which eventually lead to the “discovery” of North and South America and also dispelling the myth that the earth was flat!

In painting and sculpture, artists began to focus more on Realism rather than Symbolism. In architecture, the construction of palaces and villas replaced the construction of gothic cathedrals. There was a new interest in balanced proportion in architecture and visual art.

The Renaissance marked the birth of a more modern European spirit and a rebirth of literacy. Much of this came through Italy because they were closer to Classical Greek and Roman culture. There was a rediscovery of old writings from Greek and Roman culture, which pre-existed the Medieval period. Greek and Roman culture was a highly literate society, in which a “cultivated individual” focused on philosophy, math, early science and astronomy, music, the arts, athletics, and architecture. Intellectuals in Renaissance society looked back to the ancient Greek and Roman literati for answers and inspiration

Things that shaped the era:

Interest in ancient Greek and Roman ideas and writings

The Humanists

The invention of Gunpowder

The Compass

The Printing Press

Martin Luther and the Lutheran Church

Continued rise of the merchant class

II. Music

The best and most advanced Renaissance musicians could find support through the church, and through the aristocracy. They could be employed as choirmasters, singers, organists, instrumentalists, printers, and publishers. There was also a growth in supporting institutions like schools, churches, civic wind bands and publishing houses. There was also a large growth in the development of better instruments and professional instrument builders. The rise of the merchant class had their own group of musical patrons, and an emergence of amateur musicians among the cultivated middle and upper class.

A) The Renaissance Motet

Even though the Catholic church was losing power to the kings, music in the church still developed by leaps and bounds. The main development of music came through the church through polyphony. Polyphony is a texture which uses two or more simultaneous melodies. Gregorian chant was still used, but in a new way. Englishman John Dustaple and composers from Burgundy, France (known as The Burgundian School) developed a new and radical approach to writing “God’s music”.

The range of voices expanded to the soprano (high female voice), alto (lower female voice), tenor (high male voice) and bass (low male voice), known as SATB. The composer would take a fragment of chant melody (called the cantus firmus) and build a whole new composition based on it. The art of combining four melodies into a single texture is called counterpoint. This was done in three ways:

1. In imitation (close and distant)

2. In voice pairs (S/A, T/B or S/B, A/T or S/T, A/B)

3. In homorhythm (all voices singing different pitches, but singing the exact same rhythm together, like a hymn.

Not only did the composers have to pay attention to how the melodies moved horizontally/ linearly, but also vertically. They found a pleasing sound when notes lined up vertically to form what are called chords.

They incorporated the intervals of 3rds and 6ths into the musical texture, thus filling out the sound, as well as using 4ths, 5ths, unisons, and octaves. This provided a rich full sound that was pleasing to Renaissance ears, and worthy of God’s ears. The voices had to adjust the tuning of Pythagorean 3rds and 6ths instantaneously, because they sounded out of tune. This led to using Meantone tuning for voices and fixed-pitch instruments.

They were still using the seven church modes, but eventually gravitating towards just two modes: the Ionian (major scale) and Aeolian (minor scale):

Ionian

c d e f g a b c

Aeolian

a b c d e f g a

On EACH scale degree, they discovered that there could be a corresponding chord (triadic) formed when stacking 3rds from the root note. There are four chord types:

From c

C e g (Major), C eb g ((Minor), C eb gb (Diminished), C e g# (Augmented)

A flat (b) moves the pitch down a half step, a sharp (#) raises the pitch up a half step. These are called “accidentals” and were starting to be used more and more as the Renaissance period continued. Back then this was called Musica Ficta.

The use of polyphony lead to the development of harmony, or “functional harmony”, where each chord built upon the root notes of the scale has a function. The main purpose of functional harmony in conjunction with melody is to build tension and release.

Motets were originally a more secular genre in its infancy but developed further in the church (written for Masses) by the Burgundian School, and the genre spread to churches throughout Europe. But church authorities were concerned because imitation obscured the text, which was most important. The Council of Trent, during the Catholic Counter-Reformation, eventually made rules for the church composers to follow, demanding that they use mostly homorhythmic textures to make sure the text declamation was clear.

Musical Example: Ave Maria by Josquin Des Prez of the Burgundian School. Follow the listening guide in your textbook and listen to how he uses imitation, voice pairs and homorhythm. The listening example is on D2L. Describe the piece in your essay.

B) Secular Instrumental Music in the Medieval and Renaissance.

As stated earlier, musicians were mainly employed by the church and the court. The aristocrats hired musicians to play for different feasts and other occasions, even playing in the bed chamber of the king. There were also musicians who lived and played on the fringes of society, called troubadours. Also known as “wandering minstrels” or “buskers”, these musicians were members of troupes who wandered the countryside for entertainment and news exchange. These types of musicians were not only musicians, they also performed feats of magic, they acted in skits, performed animal acts, juggled etc.

In the Medieval period, the instruments were usually hand-made by the musician himself, but toward the Renaissance, as technology advanced, instruments were made by professional instrument builders. With the advent of the printing press during the Renaissance, sheet music and books of musical collections were made available. The first book of musical pieces was called the Odhecaton, published in 1498. These types of collections contained the musical parts, but no specific instrumentation. Musicians would play the parts on whatever instruments they had on hand.

Instruments can be classified as strings, winds, keyboard, and percussion, but during these historical periods there were two classifications:

Bas (indoor instruments)

Haut (outdoor instruments)