WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

Republic of the Philippines

Department of Education
Region IV- MIMAROPA
Division of Romblon
Epiphany School of Peace and
Goodwill
IFI Learning Institution Inc.
Dapawan, Odiongan, Romblon
Email: espg_2010@yahoo.com
Telephone no. :
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

EPIPHANY SCHOOL OF PEACE

AND GOODWILL
OF PEACE
WEEK 2 AND GOODWILL
MODULE MUSIC

Learners Name: Florence Famini

Resident Address:
Parent/Guardian:
Contact Number:
Email Address:

Teacher: Rodel F. Fontamillas

Contact Number: +639770710904
Email Address: fontamillasrodel@gmail.com
Contact Number:
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

Most Essential Learning Competencies CONTENT

STANDARDS

The learner demonstrates understanding of characteristic The learner

features of the Medieval Period. Explains the performance demonstrates
practice (setting, composition, role of understanding of
composers/performers, and audience) the characteristic
features of the
Medieval,Renaisan
ce, and Baroque
Period Music
Instructions to Learner
PERFORMANCE
STANDARD
Before starting the module, I want you to set aside other
tasks that will disturb you while enjoying the lessons. Read
the simple instructions below to successfully enjoy the The learner
objectives of this lesson. performs selected
1. Follow carefully all the contents and instructions indicated songs from the
in every page of this module. Medieval,
Rennaisance, and
2. Write on your activity notebook the concepts about the
Baroque
lessons. Writing enhances learning, which is important to
periods:chants,
develop and keep in mind.
madrigals, excerpts
3. Perform all the provided activities in the module.
from oratorios,
4. Let your facilitator/ guardian assess your answers using
chorales, and
the answer key card.
trobadours.
5. Analyze conceptually every lesson and apply what you
have learned.
6. Have fun while staying safe at home.
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

LESSON: HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL

BACKGROUND OF MUSIC RENAISSANCE
PERIOD (1400-1600)

The Renaissance in Europe is known as a period of revival in culture, science,

and the arts. This was the time of inventions like the printing press and the compass.
The printing of books made it possible for knowledge to be disbursed in a magnitude
never before experienced. The availability of handbooks on how to play instruments
made information made information about music playing available to anybody who is
into music performance. The Renaissance was the era when creativity emerged. This
was the point in time where music was developed and appreciated.
The Renaissance may be described as the age of human creativity- the time
where the brilliant and greatest artists and composers were born. This golden age of
Europe emerged in the 14th century when Humanism flourished. A trend to get to
know Greek and roman literature occurred across Europe. This ultimately led to the
growth of the Humanist movement where people focused on human life and its
accomplishments.
The Renaissance Period is sometimes called the golden age of a capella-
where music did not use any accompaniment. This era significantly affected the
development of music in Europe at that time. From this shifting in the social order
emerged a common, unifying musical style, in particular the polyphonic style of the
Franco-Flemish school.
It was in the 16th century where Italian scholars began translating ancient
Greek treaties on music. They also tried to apply their ideas while composing their
music. In the 17th century, they attempted to have a major influence on the
development of monody and early opera in the birthplace of Italian Renaissance.
With the help of Copernicus’ discovery, the spirit of the Renaissance showed
itself in forms of art like in the paintings and sculptures of Michelangelo, the Drama
plays of Shakespeare, and the music of the greatest composers of the era.
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EXAMPLE /DISCUSSION

Renaissance music is music written in Europe during the Renaissance.

Consensus among music historians–with notable dissent–has been to start the era
around 1400, with the end of the medieval era, and to close it around 1600, with the
beginning of the baroque period, therefore commencing the musical Renaissance
about a hundred years after the beginning of the Renaissance as understood in other
disciplines. As in the other arts, the music of the period was significantly influenced
by the developments which define the early modern period: the rise of humanistic
thought; the recovery of the literary and artistic heritage of ancient Greece and Rome;
increased innovation and discovery; the growth of commercial enterprise; the rise of
a bourgeois class; and the Protestant Reformation. From this changing society
emerged a common, unifying musical language, in particular the polyphonic style of
the Franco-Flemish school.
The invention of the Gutenberg press made distribution of music and musical
theory possible on a wide scale. Demand for music as entertainment and as an
activity for educated amateurs increased with the emergence of a bourgeois class.
Dissemination of chansons, motets, and masses throughout Europe coincided with
the unification of polyphonic practice into the fluid style which culminated in the
second half of the sixteenth century in the work of composers such as Palestrina,
Lassus, Victoria and William Byrd. Relative political stability and prosperity in the Low
Countries, along with a flourishing system of music education in the area’s many
churches and cathedrals, allowed the training of hundreds of singers and composers.
These musicians were highly sought throughout Europe, particularly in Italy, where
churches and aristocratic courts hired them as composers and teachers. By the end
of the sixteenth century, Italy had absorbed the northern influences, with Venice,
Rome, and other cities being centers of musical activity, reversing the situation from
a hundred years earlier. Opera arose at this time in Florence as a deliberate attempt
to resurrect the music of ancient Greece.
Music, increasingly freed from medieval constraints, in range, rhythm, harmony,
form, and notation, became a vehicle for new personal expression. Composers found
ways to make music expressive of the texts they were setting. Secular music
absorbed techniques from sacred music, and vice versa. Popular secular forms such
as the chanson and madrigal spread throughout Europe. Courts employed virtuoso
performers, both singers and instrumentalists. Music also became more self-sufficient
with its availability in printed form, existing for its own sake. Many familiar modern
instruments (including the violin, guitar, lute and keyboard instruments), developed
into new forms during the Renaissance responding to the evolution of musical ideas,
presenting further possibilities for composers and musicians to explore. Modern
woodwind and brass instruments like the bassoon and trombone also appeared;
extending the range of sonic color and power. During the fifteenth century the sound
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

of full triads became common, and towards the end of the sixteenth-century the
system of church modes began to break down entirely, giving way to the functional
tonality which was to dominate western art music for the next three centuries. From
the Renaissance era both secular and sacred music survives in quantity, and both
vocal and instrumental. An enormous diversity of musical styles and genres
flourished during the Renaissance, and can be heard on commercial recordings in
the twenty-first century, including masses, motets, madrigals, chansons,
accompanied songs, instrumental dances, and many others. Numerous early music
ensembles specializing in music of the period give concert tours and make
recordings, using a wide range of interpretive styles.
One of the most pronounced features of early Renaissance European art music
was the increasing reliance on the interval of the third (in the Middle Ages, thirds had
been considered dissonances). Polyphony became increasingly elaborate throughout
the fourteenth century, with highly independent voices: the beginning of the
fifteenth century showed simplification, with the voices often striving for smoothness.
This was possible because of a greatly increased vocal range in music–in the Middle
Ages, the narrow range made necessary frequent crossing of parts, thus requiring a
greater contrast between them.

The modal (as opposed to tonal) characteristics of Renaissance music began to

break down towards the end of the period with the increased use of root motions of
fifths. This later developed into one of the defining characteristics of tonality.

The main characteristics of Renaissance music are the following:

 Music based on modes

 Richer texture in four or more parts
 Blending rather than contrasting strands in the musical texture
 Harmony with a greater concern with the flow and progression of chords

 Polyphony is one of the notable changes that mark the Renaissance from
the Middle Ages musically. Its use encouraged the use of larger ensembles
and demanded sets of instruments that would blend together across the
whole vocal range.

 Principal liturgical forms which endured throughout the entire Renaissance

period were masses and motets, with some other developments towards
the end, especially as composers of sacred music began to adopt secular
forms (such as the madrigal) for their own designs.
 Common sacred genres were the mass, the motet, the madrigale spirituale,
and the laude.
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 During the period, secular music had an increasing distribution, with a wide
variety of forms, but one must be cautious about assuming an explosion in
variety: since printing made music more widely available, much more has
survived from this era than from the preceding medieval era, and probably a
rich store of popular music of the late Middle Ages is irretrievably lost.

 Secular music was music that was independent of churches. The main
types were the German Lied, Italian frottola, the French chanson, the Italian
madrigal, and the Spanish villancico. Other secular vocal genres included
the caccia, rondeau, virelai, bergerette, ballade, musique mesurée,
canzonetta, villanella, villotta, and the lute song. Mixed forms such as the
motet-chanson and the secular motet also appeared.

 Purely instrumental music included consort music for recorder or viol and
other instruments, and dances for various ensembles. Common
instrumental genres were the toccata, prelude, ricercar, and canzona.
Dances played by Instrumental ensembles included the basse danse,
tourdion, saltarello, pavane, galliard, allemande, courante, bransle, canarie,
and lavolta. Music of many genres could be arranged for a solo instrument
such as the lute, vihuela, harp, or keyboard. Such arrangements were
called intabulations.

Towards the end of the period, the early dramatic precursors of opera such
as monody, the madrigal comedy, and the intermedio are seen.

TIME LINE OF RENAISSANCE COMPOSERS

Early Renaissance Music (1400–1467)

This group gradually dropped the late medieval period’s complex devices of
isorhythm and extreme syncopation, resulting in a more limpid and flowing style.
What their music lost in rhythmic complexity, however, it gained in rhythmic vitality,
as a ―drive to the cadence‖ became a prominent feature around mid-century.

Middle Renaissance Music (1467–1534)

In the early 1470s, music started to be printed using a printing press. Music
printing had a major effect on how music spread for not only did a printed piece of
music reach a larger audience than any manuscript ever could, it did it far more
cheaply as well. Also during this century, a tradition of famous makers began for
many instruments. These makers were masters of their craft. An example is
Neuschel for his trumpets.
Towards the end of the fifteenth century, polyphonic sacred music (as exemplified
in the masses of Johannes Ockeghem and Jacob Obrecht) had once again become
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more complex, in a manner that can perhaps be seen as correlating to the increased
exploration of detail in painting at the time. Ockeghem, particularly, was fond of
canon, both contrapuntal and mensural. He composed a mass, Missa prolationum, in
which all the parts are derived canonically from one musical line.
It was in the opening decades of the next century that music felt in a tactus (think
of the modern-time signature) of two semibreves-to-a-breve began to be as common
as that with three semibreves-to-a-breve, as had prevailed prior to that time.

In the early sixteenth century, there is another trend towards simplification, as can
be seen to some degree in the work of Josquin des Prez and his contemporaries in
the Franco-Flemish School, then later in that of G. P. Palestrina, who was partially
reacting to the strictures of the Council of Trent, which discouraged excessively
complex polyphony as inhibiting understanding the text. Early sixteenth-century
Franco-Flemings moved away from the complex systems of canonic and other
mensural play of Ockeghem’s generation, tending toward points of imitation and duet
or trio sections within an overall texture that grew to five and six voices. They also
began, even before the Tridentine reforms, to insert ever-lengthening passages of
homophony, to underline important text or points of articulation. Palestrina, on the
other hand, came to cultivate a freely flowing style of counterpoint in a thick, rich
texture within which consonance followed dissonance on a nearly beat-by-beat basis,
and suspensions ruled the day. By now, tactus was generally two semibreves per
breve with three per breve used for special effects and climactic sections; this was a
nearly exact reversal of the prevailing technique a century before.

Late Renaissance Music (1534–1600)

In Venice, from about 1534 until around 1600, an impressive polychoral style
developed, which gave Europe some of the grandest, most sonorous music
composed up until that time, with multiple choirs of singers, brass and strings in
different spatial locations in the Basilica San Marco di Venezia. These multiple
revolutions spread over Europe in the next several decades, beginning in Germany
and then moving to Spain, France and England somewhat later, demarcating the
beginning of what we now know as the Baroque musical era.
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MASSES

The fifteenth- and sixteenth-century masses had two kinds of sources that were
used, monophonic and polyphonic, with two main forms of elaboration, based on
cantus firmus practice or, beginning sometime around 1500, the new style of
pervasive imitation. Four types of masses resulted:

 Cantus firmus mass (tenor mass)

 The cantus firmus/imitation mass
 The paraphrase mass
 The imitation mass (parody mass)
Masses were normally titled by the source from which they borrowed. Cantus
firmus mass uses the same monophonic melody, usually drawn from chant and
usually in the tenor and most often in longer note values than the other voices.

INSTRUMENTS USED IN RENAISSANCE MUSIC

Many instruments originated during the Renaissance; others were variations of, or
improvements upon, instruments that had existed previously. Some have survived to
the present day; others have disappeared, only to be recreated in order to perform
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

music of the period on authentic instruments. As in the modern day, instruments may
be classified as brass, strings, percussion, and woodwind.
Medieval instruments in Europe had most commonly been used singly, often self-
accompanied with a drone, or occasionally in parts. From at least as early as the
thirteenth century through the fifteenth century there was a division of instruments
into haut (loud, shrill, outdoor instruments) and bas (quieter, more intimate
instruments). Only two groups of instruments could play freely in both types of
ensembles: the cornett and sackbut, and the tabor and tambourine.

At the beginning of the sixteenth century, instruments were considered to be less

important than voices. They were used for dances and to accompany vocal music.
Instrumental music remained subordinated to vocal music, and much of its repertory
was in varying ways derived from or dependent on vocal models.

BRASS

Brass instruments in the Renaissance were traditionally played by professionals.

The following are some of the more common brass instruments that were played:

 Slide trumpet: similar to the trombone of today except

that instead of a section of the body sliding, only
small parts of the body near the mouthpiece and the
mouthpiece itself is stationary. Also the body was an
S-shape so it was rather unwieldy, but was suitable
for the slow dance music which it was most
commonly used for.

Three cornetts: mute cornett, curved cornett, and tenor

cornett
 Cornett: made of wood and played like the recorder (discussed at greater
length below) but blown like a trumpet. It was commonly made in several
sizes; the largest was called the serpent. The serpent became practically
the only cornetto used by the early seventeenth century while other ranges
were replaced by the violin. It was said to be the closest instrument to the
human voice with the ability to use dynamics and expression.

 Trumpet: early trumpets had no valves and were limited to the tones
present in the overtone series. They were also made in different sizes.
Although commonly depicted being used by angels, their use in churches
was limited, a prominent exception being the music of the Venetian School.
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

They were most commonly used in the military and for the announcement
of royalty. Period trumpets were found to have two rings soldered to them,
one near the mouthpiece and another near the bell.
 Sackbut (sometimes sackbutt or sagbutt): a different name for the
trombone, which replaced the slide trumpet by the middle of the
fifteenth century.

STRINGS

As a family, strings were used in many circumstances, both sacred and secular. A
few members of this family include:

 Viol: this instrument, developed in the fifteenth century, commonly has six
strings. It was usually played with a bow. It has structural qualities similar to
the Spanish vihuela; its main separating trait is its larger size. This changed
the posture of the musician in order to rest it against the floor or between
the legs in a manner similar to the cello. Its similarities to the vihuela were
sharp waist-cuts, similar frets, a flat back, thin ribs, and identical tuning.

 Lyre: its construction is similar to a small harp, although instead of being

plucked, it is strummed with a plectrum. Its strings varied in quantity from
four, seven, and ten, depending on the era. It was played with the right
hand, while the left hand silenced the notes that were not desired. Newer
lyres were modified to be played with a bow.

 Lute: the lute can refer generally to any string instrument having the strings
running in a plane parallel to the sound table (in the Hornbostel–Sachs
system), more specifically to any plucked string instrument with a neck
(either fretted or unfretted) and a deep round back, or more specifically to
an instrument from the family of European lutes.
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 Lira da Braccio: the instrument was shaped essentially like a violin, but with
a wider fingerboard and flatter bridge. Generally, it had seven strings, five of
them tuned like a violin with a low d added to the bottom (that is, d–g–d’–a’–
e‖) with two strings off the fingerboard which served as drones and were
usually tuned in octaves

 Irish harp: also called the Clàrsach in Scottish Gaelic, or the Cláirseach in
Irish, during the Middle Ages it was the most popular instrument of Ireland
and Scotland. Due to its significance on Irish history it is seen even on the
Guinness label, and is Ireland’s national symbol even to this day. To be
played it is usually plucked. Its size can vary greatly from a harp that can be
played in one’s lap to a full-size harp that is placed on the floor

 Hurdy-gurdy: (also known as the wheel fiddle), in which the strings are
sounded by a wheel which the strings pass over. Its functionality can be
compared to that of a mechanical violin, in that its bow (wheel) is turned by
a crank. Its distinctive sound is mainly because of its ―drone strings‖ which
provide a constant pitch similar in their sound to that of bagpipes.

PERCUSSION

Some Renaissance percussion instruments include the triangle, the Jew’s harp,
the tambourine, the bells, the rumble-pot, and various kinds of drums.

 Tambourine: the tambourine was originally a frame drum without the jingles
attached to the side. This instrument soon evolved and took on the name of
the timbrel during the medieval crusades, at which time it acquired the
jingles. The tambourine was often found with a single skin, as it made it
easy for a dancer to play. The skin that surrounds the frame is called the
vellum, and produces the beat by
striking the surface with the
knuckles, fingertips, or hand. It
could also be played by shaking
the instrument, allowing the
tambourine’s jingles to ―clank‖ and
―jingle.‖

Jews Harp from the Civil War

 Jew’s harp: an instrument banned because of its construction of silver, and
due to the great demand on silver in nineteenth-century Austria this was
another reason for its outlawing. A steel instrument that produces sound
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

using shapes of the mouth and attempting to pronounce different vowels

with one’s mouth. The loop at the bent end of the tongue of the instrument
is plucked in different scales of vibration creating different tones.

WOODWINDS (AEROPHONES)

Woodwind instruments (aerophones) produce sound by means of

a vibrating column of air within the pipe. Holes along the pipe allow
the player to control the length of the column of air, and hence the
pitch. There are several ways of making the air column vibrate, and
these ways define the subcategories of woodwind instruments. A
player may blow across a mouth hole, as in a flute; into a mouthpiece
with a single reed, as in a modern-day clarinet or saxophone; or a
double reed, as in an oboe or bassoon. All three of these methods of
tone production can be found in Renaissance instruments.

 Shawm: a typical oriental shawm is keyless and is about a

foot long with seven finger holes and a thumb hole. The
pipes were also most commonly made of wood and many of
them had carvings and decorations on them. It was the most
popular double reed instrument of the renaissance period; it was commonly
used in the streets with drums and trumpets because of its brilliant,
piercing, and often deafening sound. To play the shawm a person puts the
entire reed in their mouth, puffs out their cheeks, and blows into the pipe
whilst breathing through their nose.

 Reed pipe: made from a single short length of cane with a mouthpiece, four
or five finger holes, and reed fashioned from it. The reed is made by cutting
out a small tongue, but leaving the base attached. It is the predecessor of
the saxophone and the clarinet.

 Hornpipe: Same as reed pipe but with a bell at the end.

 Bagpipe/Bladderpipe: believed to have been invented by herdsmen who

thought to use a bag made out of sheep or goat skin and would provide air
pressure so that when its player takes a breath, the player only needs to
squeeze the bag tucked underneath their arm to continue the tone. The
mouth pipe has a simple round piece of leather hinged on to the bag end of
the pipe and acts like a non-return valve. The reed is located inside the long
metal mouthpiece, known as a bocal.
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 Panpipe: designed to have sixteen wooden tubes with a stopper at one end
and open on the other. Each tube is a different size (thereby producing a
different tone), giving it a range of an octave and a half. The player can then
place their lips against the desired tube and blow across it.

 Transverse flute: the transverse flute is similar to the modern flute with a
mouth hole near the stoppered end and finger holes along the body. The
player blows in the side and holds the flute to the right side.

ACTIVITY 1

Find a song on the internet

You can visit Youtube and look for any video that is related to Masses. Try to sing
the song you have selected by recording it in your smartphone.

ACTIVITY 2

Gauge your singing on a scale of 1-5 using the following criteria:

Criteria Grade
Simultaneity in singing each of the
syllables in each of the words
Accuracy of the tones
Appropriateness of volume
Pronunciation and diction
Facial Expression

Legend: 1 – lowest 5- highest

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WHAT IS BAROQUE MUSIC?

Derived from the Portuguese barroco, or ―oddly shaped pearl,‖ the term ―baroque‖
has been widely used since the nineteenth century to describe the period in Western
European art music from about 1600 to 1750. Comparing some of music history’s
greatest masterpieces to a misshapen pearl might seem strange to us today, but to
the nineteenth century critics who applied the term, the music of Bach and Handel’s
era sounded overly ornamented and exaggerated. Having long since shed its
derogatory connotations, ―baroque‖ is now simply a convenient catch-all for one of
the richest and most diverse periods in music history.

In addition to producing the earliest European music familiar to most of us,

including Pachelbel’s Canon and Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, the Baroque era also
greatly expanded our horizons. The acceptance of Copernicus’s 16th century theory
that the planets didn’t revolve around the earth made the universe a much larger
place, while Galileo’s work helped us get better acquainted with the cosmos.
Advances in technology, such as the invention of the telescope, made what was
believed to be finite seem infinite. Great thinkers like Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza,
and Locke tackled the big questions of existence. Geniuses like Rubens, Rembrandt,
and Shakespeare offered unique perspectives through their art. European nations
grew more and more involved with foreign trade and colonization, bringing us into
direct contact with parts of the globe that were previously unfamiliar. And the growth
of a new middle class breathed life into an artistic culture long dependent on the
whims of church and court.

Who were the major Baroque composers, and where were they from?

Many of the well-known personalities from the first part of the Baroque period hail
from Italy, including Monteverdi, Corelli and Vivaldi. Many of the forms identified with
Baroque music originated in Italy, including the cantata, concerto, sonata, oratorio,
and opera. Although Italy played a vital role in the development of these genres, new
concepts of what it meant to be a nation increased the imperative of a ―national
style.‖ Differences between nations are often audible in music from the period, not
only in the way music was composed, but also in conventions of performance;
particularly obvious was the contrast between Italy and France. While certain
countries may seem to claim a larger piece of our experience of Baroque music
today, however, every nation played a role. As musicians and composers traveled all
over Europe and heard each other’s music, the new conventions they encountered
made subtle impressions on them.
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

Some of the best known composers from the period include the following:

Italy: Monteverdi, Frescobaldi, Corelli, Vivaldi, Domenico and Alessandro Scarlatti

France: Couperin, Lully, Charpentier and Rameau
Germany: Praetorius, Schein, Scheidt, Schutz, Telemann, Handel and Bach
England: Purcell

Baroque Composers and Their Well-Known Works

 Giovanni Gabrieli (c. 1554/1557–1612) Sonata pian’ e forte (1597), In

Ecclesiis (from Symphoniae sacraebook 2, 1615)
 Claudio Monteverdi (1567–1643), L’Orfeo, favola in musica (1610)
 Heinrich Schütz (1585–1672), Musikalische Exequien (1629, 1647, 1650)
 Francesco Cavalli (1602–1676), L’Egisto (1643), Ercole
amante (1662), Scipione affricano (1664)
 Jean-Baptiste Lully (1632–1687), Armide (1686)
 Marc-Antoine Charpentier (1643–1704), Te Deum (1688-1698)
 Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber (1644–1704), Mystery Sonatas (1681)
 John Blow (1649–1708), Venus and Adonis (1680–1687)
 Johann Pachelbel (1653–1706), Canon in D (1680)
 Arcangelo Corelli (1653–1713), 12 concerti grossi, Op. 6 (1714)
 Marin Marais (1656–1728), Sonnerie de Ste-Geneviève du Mont-de-
Paris (1723)
 Henry Purcell (1659–1695), Dido and Aeneas (1688)
 Alessandro Scarlatti (1660–1725), L’honestà negli amori (1680), Il
Pompeo (1683), Mitridate Eupatore (1707)
 François Couperin (1668–1733), Les barricades mystérieuses (1717)
 Tomaso Albinoni (1671–1751), Didone abbandonata (1724)
 Antonio Vivaldi (1678–1741), The Four Seasons (1723)
 Jan Dismas Zelenka (1679-1745), Il Serpente di Bronzo (1730), Missa
Sanctissimae Trinitatis (1736)
 Georg Philipp Telemann (1681–1767), Der Tag des Gerichts (1762)
 Johann David Heinichen (1683–1729)
 Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683–1764), Dardanus (1739)
 George Frideric Handel (1685–1759), Water Music (1717), Messiah (1741)
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

What is the philosophy of Baroque music?

Although a single philosophy cannot describe 150 years of music from all over
Europe, several concepts are important in the Baroque period.

A belief in music as a potent tool of communication

One of the major philosophical currents in Baroque music comes from the
Renaissance interest in ideas from ancient Greece and Rome. The Greeks and
Romans believed that music was a powerful tool of communication and could
arouse any emotion in its listeners. As a result of the revival of these ideas,
composers became increasingly aware of music’s potential power, and cultivated
the belief that their own compositions could have similar effects if they correctly
emulated ancient music.

What are the characteristics of Baroque music?

The new interest in music’s dramatic and rhetorical possibilities gave rise to a
wealth of new sound ideals in the Baroque period.

Contrast as a dramatic element

Contrast is an important ingredient in the drama of a Baroque composition. The

differences between loud and soft, solo and ensemble (as in the concerto),
different instruments and timbres all play an important role in many Baroque
compositions. Composers also began to be more precise about instrumentation,
often specifying the instruments on which a piece should be played instead of
allowing the performer to choose. Brilliant instruments like the trumpet and violin
also grew in popularity.

Monody and the advent of the basso continuo

In previous musical eras, a piece of music tended to consist of a single melody,

perhaps with an improvised accompaniment, or several melodies played
simultaneously. Not until the Baroque period did the concept of ―melody‖ and
―harmony‖ truly begin to be articulated. As part of the effort to imitate ancient
music, composers started focusing less on the complicated polyphony that
dominated the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and more on a single voice with a
simplified accompaniment, or monody. If music was a form of rhetoric, as the
writings of the Greeks and Romans indicate, a powerful orator is necessary—and
who better for the job than a vocal soloist? The new merger between the
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expression of feeling and the solo singer come through loud and clear
in Monteverdi’s preface to the Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda from his
Eighth Book of Madrigals (1638), in which he writes: ―It has seemed to me that the
chief passions or affections of our mind are three in number, namely anger,
equanimity and humility. The best philosophers agree, and the very nature of our
voice, with its high, low and middle ranges, would indicate as much.‖ The
earliest operas are an excellent illustration of this new aesthetic.
Along with the emphasis on a single melody and bass line came the practice
of basso continuo, a method of musical notation in which the melody and bass line
are written out and the harmonic filler indicated in a type of shorthand.

Different instrumental sounds

After being ignored for decades, Baroque music has become increasingly
popular over the last fifty years. As part of this new interest, scholars and musicians
have spent countless hours trying to figure out how the music might have sounded to
17th and 18th century audiences. While we will never be able to recreate a
performance precisely, their work has unearthed several major differences between
Baroque and modern ensembles:

Pitch: In 1939, modern orchestras agreed to tune to a’=440hz (the note A pitched at
440 cycles per second), which replaced a previously lower pitch (a’=435hz) adopted
in 1859. Before 1859, however, there was no pitch standard. The note to which
Baroque ensembles tuned, therefore, varied widely at different times and in different
places. As a result, the music notated on a score might have sounded as much as a
half tone lower than how it would traditionally be performed today.

Timbre: While most of the instruments in a baroque ensemble are familiar, there are
several prominent members no longer featured in modern ensembles.
The harpsichord was the primary keyboard instrument (and an important member of
the continuo group), and instruments important in the 16th and 17th centuries like
the lute and viol, still continued to be used. Variations in instruments still popular
today also gave the baroque ensemble a different sound. String instruments like the
violin, viola and cello used gut strings rather than the strings wrapped in metal with
which they are strung today, for example, giving them a mellower, sweeter tone.

Performance technique: A baroque score contains little (if any) information about
elements like articulation, ornamentation or dynamics, and so modern ensembles
need to make their own informed choices before each performance. Mechanical
differences between baroque and modern instruments also suggest that the older
instruments would have sounded differently, so ensembles like Music of the Baroque
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

often adjust their technique to allow for this. Because baroque and modern bows are
structurally different, for example, string players using modern bows often use a
gentler attack on the string and crescendos and diminuendos on longer notes. 17th
and 18th century performance treatises also imply that finger vibrato (a technique in
which a string player rocks his or her fingertip on the string to enrich the tone) was
used sparingly for expressive moments, while bow vibrato (an undulating movement
of the bow) was generally preferred.

What musical forms came to define the baroque era?

While forms from earlier eras continued to be used, such as the motet or particular
dances, the interest in music as a form of rhetoric sparked the development of new
genres, particularly in the area of vocal music. Many of the forms associated with the
baroque era come directly out of this new dramatic impulse, particularly opera, the
oratorio and the cantata. In the realm of instrumental music, the notion of contrast
and the desire to create large-scale forms gave rise to the concerto, sonata and
suite.

VOCAL MUSIC

Opera: A drama that is primarily sung, accompanied by instruments, and

presented on stage. Operas typically alternate between recitative, speech-like song
that advances the plot, and arias, songs in which characters express feelings at
particular points in the action. Choruses and dances are also frequently included.
The advent of the genre at the turn of the seventeenth century is often associated
with the activities of a group of poets, musicians and scholars in Florence known
today as the Florentine Camerata. The first surviving opera was Jacopo Peri’s Dafne,
based on a libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini and performed in Florence in 1598; the
earliest opera still performed today is Claudio Monteverdi’s Orfeo (1607). The
subjects of the first operas are all taken from Greek myth, reflecting the genre’s close
alliances with attempts to recreate the music and drama of ancient cultures, and were
performed solely in aristocratic circles for invited guests.
When the first public opera houses opened in Venice in 1637, the genre was
altered to suit the preferences of the audience. Solo singers took on a sort of
celebrity status, and greater emphasis was placed on the aria as a result. Recitative
grew less important, and choruses and dances virtually disappeared from Italian
opera. The financial realities of staging frequent opera productions also had an
effect. The spectacular stage effects associated with opera at court were greatly
downplayed, and librettos were constructed to take advantage of stock scenic
devices. By the early 18th century (particularly in Naples), two subgenres of opera
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

became evident: opera seria, in which the focus was on serious subject matter and
the da capo aria, and opera buffa, which had a lighter, even comic tone and
sometimes used duets, trios and larger ensembles. The Italian tradition of opera
gradually dominated most European countries. In late 17th century France, however,
the Italian-born Jean-Baptiste Lully and librettist Philippe Quinault created a uniquely
French version of opera known as tragédie-lyrique.

Oratorio: an extended musical drama with a text based on religious subject

matter, intended for performance without scenery, costume or action. Oratorio
originally meant prayer hall, a building located adjacent to a church that was
designed as a place for religious experiences distinct from the liturgy. Although there
are late sixteenth century precedents for the oratorio in
the motet and madrigal repertoire, the oratorio as a distinct musical genre emerged
amidst the excellent acoustics of these spaces in the early 1600s. By the middle of
the 17th century, oratorios were performed in palaces and public theaters and were
growing increasingly similar to operas, although the subject matter, division into two
parts (rather than three acts) and absence of staged action still set it apart. Some of
the composers associated with the genre in Italy include Giocomo
Carissimi, Alessandro Scarlatti and Antonio Vivaldi. The oratorio grew in popularity in
other parts of Europe as well. In Protestant Germany, dramatic music composed for
use in the Lutheran church gradually became fused with elements of the oratorio,
especially in the inclusion of non-Biblical texts. The oratorio passion, as it came to be
called, culminated in the great works of J. S. Bach. Other well known examples
outside of Italy include the English oratorios of George Frideric Handel, who
popularized the genre in London as a result of the English distaste for Italian opera.
Works such as Messiah, Israel in Egypt and Judas Maccabeus remain audience
favorites to this day.

Cantata: an extended piece consisting of a succession of recitatives and set

pieces such as arias, duets and choruses. Originating in early 17th century Italy, the
cantata began as a secular work composed for solo voice and basso continuo, most
likely intended for performance at private social gatherings. Many of these works
were published, suggesting that they were performed by professional musicians and
amateurs alike. By the middle of the century cantatas were published less frequently,
suggesting that performances were increasingly being done by professionals. By the
end of the 17th century, cantatas began incorporating the da capo aria and often had
orchestral accompaniments. Major composers in the Italian cantata genre include
Luigi Rossi, Antonio Cesti, Alessandro Stradella, and in the first half of the 18th
century Alessandro Scarlatti, Handel, Benedetto Marcello and Johann Adolf Hasse.
Outside of Italy, the expanding genre of the Lutheran motet began incorporating
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

many elements of the Italian cantata, especially techniques of dramatic expression

like recitative and aria. Bach’s many cantatas show the wide ranging influence of
their Italian counterparts.

INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC

Sonata: Used to describe several types of pieces in the baroque era, the term
sonata most commonly designated a work in several movements for one or more
instruments (most frequently violins) and bassocontinuo; a sonata for two violins or
other treble instruments plus bass was usually called a trio sonata. By the 1650s,
sonatas were often classified either as sonatas da chiesa (―church sonatas‖), usually
comprised of four movements alternating between slow and fast tempos and
performed in church, or sonatas da camera (―chamber sonata‖), which consisted of a
series of dances akin to the suite. Examples of both types can be found in the late
17th century works of Corelli. In the 18th century, Telemann, Bach andHandel wrote
numerous sonatas modeled on Corelli’s sonatas da chiesa. The rise to prominence of
solo sonatas for keyboard instruments begins late in the baroque period, including
those for organ (Bach) and harpsichord (Handel, Domenico Scarlatti). Other famous
examples of solo sonatas include Bach’s works for unaccompanied violin and cello.

Concerto: Derived from the Italian concertare (to join together, unite), the
concerto took several forms during the baroque era. Until the early 18th century, a
concerto was simply a composition that united a diverse ensemble consisting of
voices, instruments or both. Sacred works for voices and instruments were often
called concertos, while similar secular works were generally termed arie (airs),
cantatas or musiche. While large scale sacred concertos can be found in the works of
Claudio Monteverdi, more intimate compositions for one to four voices, continuo and
additional solo instruments were far more common. In Germany, wonderful examples
of the sacred concerto can be found in the works of Johann Hermann
Schein, Michael Praetorius, Samuel Scheidt and Heinrich Schütz (especially
his Kleine geistliche Concerte, or ―Small Sacred Concertos,‖ of 1636–39).
Later in the seventeenth century, the concerto began to assume its modern
definition: a multimovement work for instrumental soloist (or group of soloists) and
orchestra. Taking its cue from the canzonas and sonatas of the late sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, which used contrasting groups of instruments to great effect,
the concerto grosso alternates a small group of soloists with a larger ensemble. The
works of Corelli, particularly his Op. 6 collection, provide perhaps the best known
examples of the late 17th century concerto grosso. While Corelli’s works were
emulated in the 18th century, most notably in Handel’s Op. 6 collection, many 18th
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

century examples of the concerto grosso show the increasing influence of the solo
concerto (for example, the Brandenburg Concertos of J. S. Bach).
The most dominant type of concerto in the 18th century was the solo concerto,
which featured a single instrument in contrast with an ensemble. The most prolific
composer of the solo concerto was Antonio Vivaldi, who wrote approximately 350
and established the concerto’s standard three-movement form (two fast outer
movements, one middle movement in a slower tempo). While most solo concertos
were written for violin, trumpet concertos were also popular, and concertos were also
composed for cello, oboe, flute and bassoon. In the 1730s, Handel wrote 16 organ
concertos, and Bach also composed several concertos for harpsichord around the
same time (most of these are arrangements of preexistent works).

Suite: Based on the traditional pairing of dances in the Renaissance, the suite
was the first multi-movement work for instruments. The suite was essentially a series
of dances in the same key, most or all of them in two-part form.
Around the middle of the 17th century in Germany the sequence
of allemande, courante, sarabande and gigue became relatively standard, although
other dance movements, such as additional allemandes or
courantes,bourreés, gavottes and minuets, were often inserted. Most suites also
began with an introductory movement such as a prelude, ouverture or fantasia. To
many baroque composers, the different dances embodied specific characters. In
his Der volkommene Capellmeister (The Complete Music Director), 1739, German
theorist Johann Mattheson gave a list of each dance’s character: the minuet was
―moderate gaiety,‖ the gavotte ―jubilant joy,‖ the bourreé ―contentedness,‖ the
courante ―hope,‖ the sarabande ―ambition‖ and the gigue could signify a number of
emotions ranging from anger to flightiness. Baroque suites were scored for solo
instruments as well as orchestra; those written for one or two melody instruments and
continuo are sometimes titled sonata da camera. French suites for keyboard are
sometimes called ordres (as in the works of François Couperin, who inserted many
non-dance movements including evocative character sketches of court personnel.

THE BAROQUE ERA IN THE MODERN AGE

Although the baroque period ended over 250 years ago, vestiges of the era can be
heard everywhere. Some of the most influential and beloved compositions are
regularly performed in concert halls, and a wealth of recordings make the baroque
available on demand. Many of the musical genres still in use today, like the oratorio,
concerto and opera, originated in the period. Twentieth century composers such as
Ralph Vaughn Williams, Igor Stravinsky and Benjamin Britten paid homage to the
baroque in their works. Its influence can even be heard outside the realm of art
 WEEK 2 MODULE MUSIC

music: the free movement between solo and group in jazz is sometimes compared to
baroque music, and snippets of Bach and Vivaldi frequently appear in the solos of
heavy metal guitarists. And the spirit of the baroque—an unwavering belief in the
power of music to touch people’s lives—changed music history forever.

ACTIVITY 3

It’s NET TIME

1. Draw any of the scenes reflected by instrumental Renaissance music shown on

the video.
Link:https://courses.lumenlearning.com/musicappreciation_with_theory/chapte
r/introduction-the-baroque-era-j-s-bach/
2. Describe what you feel while watching the video/listening to the song.
3. Describe provincial memories that come to mind as you listen to the piece of
Renaissance music.
4. Compare the length of the melody of the music piece in the video to that of
present-day instrumental music.
5. Tell something about the emotions that can be elicited by the melody of the
musical piece.

2. I feel like I'm at peaced that all the

problems are gone and only you can feel is
love and being at peaced.
3. The provincial memory that come to my
mind is when I'm only a child
and my cousins are visited our house and we'
re going to the hill and play until sunset and
we're watched it.

4. The length of the melody in the video is long

compared in the present instrumental music
that has a short span of time.
5. The emotion that can be elicited by the melody of t
musical peice is happiness and joy.