THE BAROQUE ERA1

Between c. 1600 and c. 1750

Outside Musical World2

● Age of Absolutism; Kings and Queens are all powerful

● known for Extreme decadence and extravagance of aristocracy
● 1607 - English settle Jamestown
● 1610 - Galileo confirms the Earth is round
● 1643-1715 - Louis XIV rules France
● 1687 - Sir Isaac Newton publishes his Laws of Universal Gravitation
● 1732- George Washington born
● 1744-1748 - French & Indian War

Baroque

 Derivative of Portuguese borroco (an irregular shaped pearl)

 The contrast of musique chantante and musique baroque
 “A baroque music is that in which the harmony is confused, charged with
modulations and dissonances, the melody is harsh and little natural, the intonation
difficult, and the movement constrained.” – Dictionnaire de musicque
 Thorought-bass Period, Figured-bass Era, Concertato-style Period, or the Third
style Period
 In c. 1940, Baroque was accepted as the name for this musical period

Two Practice, Three Styles

 Style
1. Stile antico (old style)
2. Stile moderno (modern style)
1. Stylus gravis (severe [strict] style)
2. stylus luxurian (luxuriant [ornamented] style)
 Claudio Monteverdi (Il quinto libro de madgrigal)
1. Prima prattica
▪ a style of vocal polyphony (Le istitutioni harmoniche)
▪ Beauty of contrapuntal writing (the music dominates the text)
▪ “Harmony is mistress of the text” (Scacchi)
2. Seconda prattica
1 K. Marie Stolba and K. Marie Stolba, The Development Of Western Music Dubuque, IA: Wm. C. Brown
Publishers, 1990.
2 James Frankel, The Baroque Era, ebook Frankel Consulting Services, Inc., 2005,
http://bpi.enschool.org/ourpages/auto/2014/2/5/67732499/Baroque%20Era%20_detailed_.ppt.
 ▪ new style of vocal polyphony
▪ text dominates the music (Plato’s statement “in the Republic”)
▪ “the text is mistress of the harmony” (Scacchi)

The Affections
 The result of widespread interest in the writings of the ancient Greeks
 Throughout the Baroque era, composers endeavored to represent musically the
various affections. This may well have been the feature of the music that 1st
caused it to be called baroque, in the original sense of that word.
 Composer depicted anger, fear and other affection boldly, even violently, for
passions were no longer viewed as human weakness, and the ability to feel
emotion deeply was appreciated.
 Composers endeavored to express in their vocal music the basic affection related
to the text, not their own feeling,
 Figures (common repertoire of musical devices);
◦ a rapid scale passage
◦ an undulating serpentine melodic line
◦ a complex and unobtrusive combination of melody, rhythm, harmony, and
texture.

Texture: Basso Continuo

 the novelty was the texture
◦ a polarity of florid treble and firm bass with unobstrusive accompaniment.
◦ Basso seguente (from bassus pro organo in Italy)
▪ formed by notating the lowest pitch to be sung at each successive point
throughout the piece.
▪ It was 1600 that independent bass line was replaced vocal pitches.
◦ Basso continou (continuous bass) or thoroughbass (bass [played] thoughout)
▪ figured bass
▪ Realization, the process of impovising the accompaniment
▪ “Realizing the basso continou for accompaniment were classified as
fundamental, and those providing the melody were ornamental.
◦ Ludovico Grossi da Viadana
▪ claimed inventor of basso continuo
◦ The use of basso continuo did not cease when the Baroque era came to an end
but continued to diminishing extent until c. 1800
Key Tonality
 a system of chordal relationship based on the attraction of a tonal center, the tonic
chord.
 The evolution of the system of major-minor key tonality was a slow process that
began in the Renaissance and was not completed until late the Baroque era.
 It started as a triad harmonic unit
 Galreanus
◦ recognized Ionian and Aeolian as part of the modal system.
 Figured-bass indicate that composers were thinking chordally.

Rhythm
th
 At the beginning of the 17 century, composers writing sacred music in stile
antico continued to use the even rhythmic flow of the tactus that characterized
Renaissance counterpoint.
 2 type of rhythmic organization
a) a regular metrical rhythm derived from definite patterns of strong and weak
beats that were vital to dance musically
b) a flexible unmetrical rhythm that was founded on speech.

Notation
● Near end of the 17th century, bar lines were used as a matter of convenience in
coordinating the various parts. They used bar lines to mark off- or measure-the
definite patterns of strong and weak beats used in their music.
● The use of modern time signature.
● Three movable clef sign, f, c, and g was stylized
● the used of key signature that the beginning of the piece. But not until the late 18th
century the realization of certain Key.

Music Printing III

● Because of the decline of quality in printing score the use of copper plates, tho it is
still experimental, was used by Francesco da Milano in his vol. Of lute tabliture.
● 1st successful print was Simone Verovio (1575-1608).
● there are to types of printing, letterpress and manuscript printing.
● The appearance of pear- or teardrop-shaped notes.
● John Heptinstall, the innovator of type with oval or roundish note heads with stem
placed either to the left or right, a london printer, who first used it in 1687.
BAROQUE INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC
  17th century, production of instrumental music increased, it was par with vocal
music in both quality and quantity.
 4 principal types of instrumental works;
1. Dance music
2. Quasi-improvisatory works
3. Variations
4. Pieces in imitative counterpoint
 These category are not mutually exclusive

Instrumental Music Types

Pieces in imitative counterpoint

 Ricercars
◦ Motetlike character with thematic material treated in
◦ Piece is short to moderate length
◦ Most are monothematic, but some polythematic exist.
◦ Terminology was not precise. Sometimes the kind of composition might be
labed in some other names.
 Fantasia (imagination)
◦ frequently applied to a ricercar-type composition, considerable length and
complex formal organization.
◦ Sweelinck’s Fantasia Chromatica (Chromatic Fantasia)
◦ Many of the technical devices common to fugue are present
◦ Same with Ricercar, hard to classify because of the mix
 Canzona
◦ Structured classification
1. several contrasting section, each have its own theme treated imitatively
(like a chanson with final cadence). e.g.,. “Epistle Canzona; DWA101”
Canzona per l’epstola
2. Variation Canzon, which variation or transformations os single theme
serve as subject matter for several sections. e.g., “G. M. Trabaci’s “French
Canzona”
3. serveral contrasting sections that are unrelated thematically and that vary
considerably in length and musical style. e.g., Frescobaldi’s Canzona
◦ composer’s gradually altered the canzona by writing fewer sections but
increasing their length; contrasting meters and tempos were designated.
Variation
 Rooted in Renaissance compositional procedures.
 These types are cantus firmus variation, melodic paraphrase variation and
variation over an ostinato bass or chordal framework.
 Theme and varation, harpsichord music on song varation, secular songs
1. Cantus firmus variation
◦ considerable use in organ music, especially in chorale varation.
◦ E.g., Samuel Scheidt’s Tabulatura nova (New Tabulature; 3 vols.; 1624)
◦ 1st and 2nd vol. Based on Lutheran chorale
◦ 3rd vol. Contains a repertory of liturgical music for the church year
2. Paraphrase variation
◦ The contrapuntal harmonies remain constant, and in each variation the melody
is given different embellishment.
◦ Repeated chordal schemes with bass line that were fixed successions of root-
position triads served as the basis for some dance music.
◦ Each repetition of the harmonic pattern formed a parte or variation section;
the entire composition was a partita, or set of variations.
3. Basso ostinato
◦ the polarized concentration on bass line and melody during the Baroque era
resulted in emphasis being placed on the bass line itself as a ground for
varition.
◦ Passacaglia and chaconne, foundation for continuous-variation pieces.

Dance Music
th
 A wealth of dance music was produced during the 17 century
 most of the dance music were in Binary form, (ABACADA)
 Dancing was cultivated by the nobility
 Ballroom dancing was a daily pastime
 Type of dances
◦ stately processional dances
◦ leaping dances
◦ circle dances
◦ progressive long dance
1. Dances
A) Pavane
▪ basse danse, was overtakened
▪ paired with galliard, lively but not rapid dance
▪ rare in Italy
B) Allemande and courante
▪ slow in tempo
▪ dance for inaugurating a court ball
C) Zarabanda (sarabande)
▪ in Spain 1580 and by 1620 in Italy
 ▪ originated in Latin America
▪ Chacona
 Passionate, sensual, and wild. Sung and dance in Mexico 1590s
 become slow in tempo and dignified
D) Jig
▪ sung and dance as court entertainment during the reign of Elizabeth I
▪ written for instrumental ensembles
▪ Intruduced to France by Jacques Gaultier
▪ “gigue” France name.
2. Suites
◦ Pieces following one another
◦ grouping of dances
◦ J. H. Schein’s Banchetto musicale has 20 groups of dances
◦ Suites for keyboard or lute in 3 stages
▪ 1620s. Allemande, courante, and sarabande – formed the core of the suites
▪ 1650. Gigue was included, but without order
▪ 1680. standard pattern has been established for the order of the core
◦ Johann Jakob Froberger, illustrate this stage
▪ wrote Tombeau, Lamentation, or Lamento
◦ the movement of a suite contrast in meter and tempo, but all movements are
the same key, and in binary form.

Quasi-Improvisatory Composition
 Pieces in improvisatory style were written for solo keyboard or solo lute and were
called fantasia, toccata, or prelude.
 Fantasia
◦ “employ whatever inspiration comes to him, without expressing the passion of
any text.” - Mersenne
 Prelude
◦ evolved from short improvisation.
◦ Used to establish the mode and pitch of music for the liturgy
 Toccatas
◦ composed in late 16th century by Diruta, Gabrieli, and others
◦ vary from context and designate
◦ Merulo’s toccata. One hand play brilliant runs and ornamental figuration,
other hand plays predominantly chordal material
◦ Frescobaldi’s toccata. Reserve and mystical, suited for Mass
French Lute Music
 Earliest account Francois Chancy’s
 Lute and harpsichord are incapable of sustaining tones.
◦ They break the chord into arpeggiation and figuration
◦ each sound for melody, harmony, and bass
◦ Style Brise (broken style)
◦ Agrements (graces, i.e., little ornaments)