Renaissance music

Renaissance music is classical music written during the Renaissance, approximately 1450 to 1600. Defining the beginning of the era is difficult, since there were no abrupt shifts in musical thinking during the 15th century, and since the process by which music acquired "Renaissance" characteristics was a gradual one, but 1450 is used here.

Overview

Style and trends

The increasing reliance on the interval of the third as a consonance is one of the most pronounced features of early Renaissance European art music (in the Middle Ages, thirds had been considered dissonances: see interval). Polyphony, in use since the 12th century, became increasingly elaborate with highly independent voices throughout the 14th century: the beginning of the 15th 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, which also made it necessary to write highly contrasting parts.

Related Topics:
Middle Ages - Interval - Polyphony

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Renaissance music was modal as opposed to tonal. Modality began to break down towards the end of the period, with root motions of fifths, one of the defining characteristics of tonality, becoming common, especially near cadences.

Related Topics:
Modal - Tonal

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Genres

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.

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Common sacred genres were the mass, the motet, the madrigale spirituale, and the laude.

Related Topics:
Mass - Motet - Madrigale spirituale - Laude

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During the period, secular music had an increasingly wide 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 included songs for one or many voices, forms such as the frottola, chanson and madrigal.

Related Topics:
Printing - Frottola

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Secular vocal genres included the madrigal, the frottola, the caccia, the chanson in several forms (rondeau, virelai, bergerette, ballade, musique mesuré), the canzonetta, the villancico, the villanella, the villotta, and the lute song.

Related Topics:
Madrigal - Frottola - Caccia - Chanson - Rondeau - Virelai - Bergerette - Ballade - Musique mesuré - Canzonetta - Villancico - Villanella - Villotta - Lute song

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Purely instrumental music included consort music for recorder or viol and other instruments, and dances for various ensembles.

Related Topics:
Consort - Recorder

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Common genres were the toccata, the prelude, the ricercar, the

Related Topics:
Toccata - Prelude - Ricercar

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canzona, and intabulation (intavolatura, intabulierung). Instrumental ensebles for dances might play a basse danse (or bassedanza), a pavane, a galliard, an allemande, or a courante.

Related Topics:
Canzona - Intabulation - Basse danse - Pavane - Galliard - Allemande - Courante

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

Related Topics:
Madrigal comedy - Intermedio

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Theory and notation

According to Margaret Bent (1998), "Renaissance notation is under-prescriptive by our standards; when translated into modern form it acquires a prescriptive weight that overspecifies and distorts its original openness."

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Renaissance compositions were notated only in individual parts; scores were extremely rare, and barlines were not used. Note values were generally larger than are in use today; the primary unit of beat was the semibreve, or whole note. As had been the case since the Ars Nova (see Medieval music), there could be either two or three of these for each breve (a double-whole note), which may be looked on as equivalent to the modern "measure," though it was itself a note-value and a measure is not. The situation can be considered this way: it is the same as the rule by which in modern music a quarter-note may equal either two eighth-notes or three, which would be written as a "triplet." By the same reckoning, there could so two or three of the next-smaller note, the "minim," (equivalent to the modern "half note") to each semi-breve. These different permutations were called "perfect/imperfect tempus" at the level of the breve-semibreve relationship, "perfect/imperfect prolation" at the level of the semibreve-minim, and existed in all possible combinations with each other. Three-to-one was called "perfect," and two-to-one "imperfect." Rules existed also whereby single notes could be halved or doubled in value ("imperfected" or "altered," respectively} when preceded or followed by other certain notes. Notes with black noteheads (such as quarter notes) occurred less often. This development of white mensural notation may be a result of the increased use of paper (rather than vellum), as the weaker paper was less able to withstand the scratching required to fill in solid noteheads; notation of previous times, written on vellum, had been black. Other colors, and later, filled-in notes, were used routinely as well, mainly to enfore the aforementioned imperfections or alterations and to call for other temporary rhythmical changes.

Related Topics:
Barlines - Note value - Beat - Semibreve - Whole note - Ars Nova - Medieval music - Breve - Quarter note - White mensural notation - Paper - Vellum

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Accidentals were not always specified, somewhat as in certain fingering notations (tablatures) today. However, Renaissance musicians would have been highly trained in dyadic counterpoint and thus possessed this and other information necessary to read a score, "what modern notation requires would then have been perfectly apparent without notation to a singer versed in counterpoint." See musica ficta. A singer would interpret his or her part by figuring cadential formulas with other parts in mind, and when singing together musicians would avoid parallel octaves and fifths or alter their cadential parts in light of decisions by other musicians (Bent, 1998).

Related Topics:
Tablature - Dyadic counterpoint - Musica ficta

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Interestingly, it is through contemporary tablatures for various plucked instruments that we have gained much information about what accidentals were performed by the original practitioners.

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For information on specific theorists, see Johannes Tinctoris, Franchinus Gaffurius, Heinrich Glarean, Pietro Aron, Nicola Vicentino, Tomás de Santa Maria, Gioseffo Zarlino, Vicente Lusitano, Vincenzo Galilei, Giovanni Artusi, Johannes Nucius, and Pietro Cerone.

Related Topics:
Johannes Tinctoris - Franchinus Gaffurius - Heinrich Glarean - Pietro Aron - Nicola Vicentino - Tomás de Santa Maria - Gioseffo Zarlino - Vicente Lusitano - Vincenzo Galilei - Giovanni Artusi - Johannes Nucius - Pietro Cerone

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Composers of the Renaissance

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