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Chapter 6

Chapter 6 music history

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Chapter 6

Chapter 6 music history

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Nick Macapaz
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a - — ENGLAND AND THE BURGUNDIAN LANDS IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY Dia a The Burgundian musical style cast such a spell that it lingered in Europe long aiter the duchy of Burgundy had ceased to exist as an independent political power. Burgundian composers played a large role in the forma. tion and dissemination throughout Europe of an international musical lan. guage, which had been fused from French, lalian, and English elements, ‘An overly simple description of the new style—but one that does not di tort the truth entirely —might attribute its rhythmic suppleness to the French, its melodic suavity to the Italians, and its clear, cr p harmonies to the English. The full consonant sound of sixths and thirds, sometimes in parallel succession, was adopted on the Continent as fauxbourdon. This new sound strongly iniluenced all types of composition and prompted, composers to w1 sized the similar te homophonic or homorhythmic textures that empha- ty among the parts rather than their differences. After about 1430, then, certain characteristic features of the new style emerged in the Burgundian orbit: predominantly consonant sonorities including, sixth-third successions, control of dissonances, equal importance of the voices, melodic and rhythmic identity of lines, four-part textures, and oc- casional use of imitation. These features represented a departure from the musical style of the late Middle Ages and looked forward to the new age of the Renaissance. THE AGE OF THE RENAISSANCE: Music OF THE Low COUNTRIES aereys The word Renaissance (which appears in the title phrase of this chapter and the historian Jules Michelet in his Histoire de France, then adopted by next) means “rebirth’’ in French. It was first used in 1855 by the istori- ans of culture, by art historians, and eventually by music historians, who applied it to the 150 years spanning 1450 to 1600. The concept of rebirth was appropriate to this period because of the renewed interest in ancient Greek and Roman culture that began in Italy and then spread throughout Europe; scholars and artists of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries wanted to restore the learning and ideals of the classical, pre-Christian civilizations of Greece and Rome. So, the idea of rebirth also involved a rededication to human—as opposed to spiritual—values. Fulfillment in life became a desirable goal, and expressing the entire range of human emotions and en- joying the pleasures of the senses were no longer frowned on. Artists and writers now turned to secular as well as religious subject matter and sought to make their works understandable and appealing to men and women as well as acceptable to God. These changes in outlook deeply affected The Musical Culture of the Renaissance —how people thought about music as well as the way music was composed, experienced, discussed, and disseminated. To be sure, they could see the architectural monuments, sculptures, plays, and poems that were being rediscovered but they could not actually hear ancient music. Yet they could read the writings of classical philosophers, poets, essayists, 99 | 100 0 THE RENAISSANCE: MUSIC OF THE LOW COUNTRIES and music theorists that were becoming available in translation. They learned about the power of ancient music to move the listener and won- dered why modern music did not have the same effect. For example, the influential religious leader Bernardino Cirillo (sce vignette, page 102) ex- pressed disappointment with the learned music of his time. He urged mu- sicians to follow the example of the sculptors, painters, and architects who had rediscovered ancient art, and the scholars who had restored Greek and Roman literature, and to reclaim the power of the classical musical styles and modes. We should think of the musical Renaissance more as a general cultural movement and state of mind than as a specific set of musical techniques. Furthermore, music changed so rapidly during this century and a half— though at different rates in different countries—that we cannot define a single Renaissance style, Still, the beginnings of an international European style had emerged at the end of the fifteenth century, as we have seen, from the variety of compositional techniques practiced in England and on the Continent, Because of the influence of the Burgundian court, it spread chiefly from the Low Countries—regions of northeastern France, Belgium, and the Netherlands—to other areas of western Europe. For the first hun- dred years or so of the Renaissance, Northern Composers and Their Music dominated the courts and chapels of France, Italy, and the Holy Roman Empire (which included Spain, Germany, Bohemia, and Austria). In this chapter the northern composers are referred to variously as French, Franco-Flemish, or Netherlandish, depending on where they were born. Each new generation built on the musical accomplishments of the previ ‘ous one, and composers of the same generation competed with one an- other in writing Masses, motets, and chansons. The chapter will close with a discussion of Josquin and His Contempo- raries. Of the large number of first-rank composers active around 1500, Josquin des Prez (ca. 1440-1521) was surely the greatest.' Few musicians have enjoyed higher renown while they lived, or exercised more profound and lasting influence. Among his contemporaries Martin Luther acknow!- edged Josquin’s complete technical and expressive control of his art by calling him “master of the notes.” Others hailed him as “the best of the composers of our time,” the “father of musicians.’ Cosimo Bartoli wrote in 1567 that Josquin had been without peer in music, even as Michelangelo (d. 1564) was in architecture, painting, and sculpture: “Both opened the eyes of all those who now take pleasure in these arts and shall find delight in the future.” 1. Josquin’s name, like that of many other composers of earlier time: ed in various ways: des Prez, Desprez, Despres; similarly, Dufay’s name is often seen as duu ich flexibility resulted no doubt {rom the different pronunciations, alphabets, and customs in the many coun- tries in which they worked, only after the gradual incr nd from the absence of standardized spelling, which came \d literacy made it an issu bout ise in printing THE MUSICAL CULTURE OF THE RENAISSANCE 101 The Musical Culture of the Renaissance Humanism—the retrieval and revival of the culture of antiquity—was the Humanism most characteristic intellectual movement of the Renaissance, It touched music later than the other arts, but this delay was not so great as some writers have claimed. As early as 1424 at the court of Mantua, students were reading the music treatise of Boethius (see Chapter 2) as a classical text rather than asa basis for professional training. This change in approach marked a rebirth of interest in music theory's Greek past. Over the next half century, Greeks emigrating from Byzantium and Italian manuscript hunters brought the prin- cipal Greek treatises on music to the West. Among these were the music rcatises of Aristides Quintilianus, Claudius Ptolemy, Cleonides, and Euclid, Also newly available were passages by Plato and Aristotle on music. By the end of the fiftcenth century, all of these treatises were translated into Latin, although some of them were commissioned for the private use of scholars and were not in general circulation. Franchino Gaffurio (1451-1522) was one musician-scholar who owned Gaffurio cou Oo NOLOGY End of Hundred Years’ War; fall of Constan- Henry Vill (1491-1547), king of England tinople (1453) (1509-47) Johann Gutenberg (1398-1468) prints Bible Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536), In Praise from movable type (ca. 1454) of Folly (1511) Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527), The SJosquin des Prez singer at Milan Cathedral Prince (1314) (1459-72) Sir Thomas More (1478-1535), Utopia Death of Dutay ‘November 27, 1474) (1516) Battle of Nancy. death of Charles the Bold; Martin Luther (1483-1546), ninety-five tend of duchy of Burgundy (1477) theses (1517) *Johannes Tinctoris (€a. 1435-ca. 1511), Charles V (1500-1558), Holy Roman Liber de arte contrapuncti (1477) Emperor (1519-56) Lorenzo de’ Meslici ("Il Magnifico”) be- comes ruler of Florence (1478) “Death of Josauin des Prez (b. ca. 1440) (August 27, 1521) Tudor dynasty in England (1485-1603) Sack of Rome (1527) First voyagte of Columbus to America (1492) Baldassare Castiglione (1478-1529), The Leonarclo da Vinei, The Last Supper (1495) Courtier (1528) *Franchino Gaifurio, Practica musice (1496) Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543), De revor *Death of Ockeghem (February 6, 1497) Iutionibus orbium coclestiumn (publ. 1543) (ca. 1530) *Petrucci publishes Odhecaton (1501) Leonardo da Vinei (1452-1519), Mona Lisa Council of Trent (1545-63) (1503) *Gioseffo Zarlino (1517-1590), Le istitutioni Michelangelo Buonarotti (1475-1564), harmoniche (1558) David (1504) ey tor OTHE RENAISSANCE: MUSIC OF THE LOW COUNTRIES eo A Critical View of Polyphonic Music Is Expressed by Bernardino Cirillo in a Letter of 1549: GG You know how much music was valued among those good an- cients as the finest of the fine arts. With it they worked great effects that today we do not, either with rhetoric or oratory, in controlling the passions and affections of the soul. With the power of song it was easy ny sage mind from the use of reason and drive it to - With the efficacy of song the lazy and lax would become aggressive and quick, the angry peaceful, the dissolute modest, the afilicted consoled, the joyful sad... see and hear the music of today, whieh is said to have arrived at an ultimate refinement and pei ver was or could be known before. Yet I do not hear oF see any part of those ancient modes. ... Kyrie eleison means ‘Lord, have mercy upon us.” An ancient musician would have expressed this affection of asking God's pardon in the Mixolydian mode, which would have crushed as well as made contrite a heart and soul and moved every stony disposition if not to tears at least to a pious affection. Thus he would have adapted similar modes in keeping with the texts and made the Kyrie different from the Agnus Dei, and the Gloria from the Credo, or the Sanctus from the Pleni, and these from the psalms and motets, Today all such things are sung in a promiscuous and uncertain ge- ' nus... In short, when a Mass is sung in church, I should like the music to consist of certain harmonies and rhythms apt at moving our senti- ments to religion and piety according to the meaning of the words. Today every effort and diligence is bent on making a work in strict fugue so that when one says “Sanctus,” another pronounces “Sabaoth,’ while a third sings ‘Gloria tua,’ with certain wails, bellows, and bleating Letter of February 16, 1549 to Ugoline Gualteruzzi, from Lettere valgari di diversi nol lissimi huomini, ed. Aldo Manuzio, Vol. 3 (Venice, 1564), fols. 114r-115r. Cirillo was the head or archpriest of the famous shrine and destination for pilgrimages, the Santa Casa of Loreto, for them to move fury and rage fection such as n some of these translations and incorporated many concepts of Greek learning, and theory into his own treatises: Theorica musice (Theory of Music, 1492), Practica musice (The Practice of Music, 1496), and, most of all, De harmonia musicorum instrumentorum opus (A Work Con\ sical Instru ring the Harmony of Mu- ents, 1518). Gaffurio’s writings were the most influential of his time. They stimulated new thinking on matters such as the modes, conso- nance and dissonance, the tonal system, tuning, word-music re ations, and the harmony of music and its relationship to the body, the mind, and the THE MUSICAL CULTURE OF THE cosmos. Some of these topics will be taken up briefly here, and new ones will be introduced. Learning what the ancient philosophers had thought about the modes—especially their belief that the choice of mode could affect the tener’s emotions—stirred up interest once again in the Greek modal system. Both Plato and Aristotle had insisted that various modes had different ethical effects (we may recall the discussion about ethos in Chapter 1). But Renais- s mistakenly assumed that the old Greek modes were identical to the similarly named church modes and that the legendary powers of the former could be attributed to the latter. The Swiss theorist Heinrich Glareanus (1488-1563), in his famous book Dodekachordon (The T String Lyre, 1547), added four new modes to the traditional eight: the Acolian and Hypoacolian with the final on A, and the lonian and Hypoionian with the final on C. With these additions, he brought the theory of the modes in line with the practice of compos ing a number of Josquin’s mot sance theorists and compos el crs, who had frequently employed the modes on A and C, By analy 5 Glareanus also demonstrated how the music of des Prez. (see below) utilized the power of the modes. But his claim of having reestablished Aristoxenus’s tonal system was unfounded. Despite the increased use of thirds and sixths, these imperfect consonances sounded rough in the tuning system of the mid—fifteenth century. But by the beginning of the sixteenth century, instrumental tunings were adjusted to make thirds and sixths sound quite acceptable. Until that time only perfect consonances (fourths, fifths, and octaves) were allowed on the final beat of a cadence; in the sixteenth century, triads appeared there more frequently As thirds and sixths became theoretically as well as practically acceptable, a sharper distinction was drawn between consonance and dissonance, and masters of counterpoint devised new rules for controlling dissonance. outstanding fifteenth-century instruction book on counterpoint—composing, melody aga the Liber de arte contrapuncti (A Book on the Art of Counterpoint, 1477) by Johannes ‘Tinctoris (ca. 1435-ca. 1511), a Flemish composer who settled in Naples at the court of King Ferrante I in the early 1470s. He deplored the works of the “older composers in which there were more dissonances than consonance: pref- ace that nothing written more than forty years carlier was worth hearing. Tinctoris devised very strict rules for introducing dissonances, restricting, them to unstressed beats and to syncopated passages (or what we call su pensions) at cadences. These rules were further refined in later treatises by Italian authors and finally synthesized in the great work of Gioseffo Zarlino, Le istitutioni harmoniche (Harmonic Foundations) of 15 Because humanists believed that music and words could derive added 1g Music into closer alliance c of the ancient poet, singer, ed both poets and composers ive goal. Authors became more he inst m jody —wa ” and proclaimed in I force from each other, they succeeded in brin, with the literary arts, especially poetry. The ima and accompanist united in a single person insp of the Renaissance to seek a common expres ENAISSANCE 103 Power of the ancient modes Glareanus Tuning Consonance and dissonance Tinctoris Music and words ra tos OTHE RENAISSANCE: MUSIC OF THE Low COUNTRIES concerned with the sound of their verses, and composers with matching and projecting that sound, The grammatical structure of a text guided the com. poser in shaping its musical setting and in placing cadences (that had more or less finality) according to the text’s punctuation. Inspired by the poet's message and im: s, composers tried new ways to dramatize the content of the text. They made it a rule to follow the rhythm of speech and not to violate the natural accentuation of syllables, whether in Latin or the v acular. Where previously singers had been responsible for matching syllables with the notated pitches and rhythms, composers were now more careful to nsure that the words and music were correctly aligned in the written sources. ‘Music printing During the fifteenth century, every city, court, or chapel compiled music manuscripts to suit the local repertory. Copies of these manuscripts, sump- tuously decorated and illuminated, were il presented as gifts at weddings, anniversaries, and other occasions. This process, althou expensive, did not always transmit the composer's music correctly, But with the advent of printing, much wider and more accurate dissemination of writ- Iso mad h slow and, ten music became possible. In fact, the arrival of the printing process com- pletely transformed the musical culture of the Renaissance—first by printing books and treatises, which helped spread the ideas of antiquity and, later, music. Petrucci The first collection of polyphonic music printed entirely from movable type was brought out in 1501 by Ottaviano Petrucci in Venice (see page 112). Under a monopoly granted by the Venetian authorities, Petrucci went on to publish fifty-nine volumes (including reprints) of vocal and instrumental mu- sic in the next twenty-two years. His publications are models of clarity and accuracy, especially the earliest ones, which show no trace of being at the experimental stage (see facsimile and window, pages 106-7). Why Italy? Why did the Renaissance begin in Italy? One reason surely was geography: Italy was close to, or even at the very source of, the learning and art objects Italy’s commercial domi- nance: its trade with Byzantium, its wealthy families (like the Medici, who were bankers), and its profusion of secular princes all spurred the growth of that inspired the movement. Another rea a worldly culture, as opposed to the ecclesiastical culture fostered by the great monasteries and cathedrals of northern Europe. The Italian peninsula in the tates and small prin- cach other. The rulers, many of whom fificenth century was made up of a collection of cit cipalities that were often at war had gained their positio: their cities by force, sought to glorify themselves and magnify reputations. They di by erecting impres- sive palaces and country houses decorated with newly commissioned artworks and recently unearthed artifacts from ancient civilizations; by maintaining chapels of talented singers and ensembles of gifted instrumentalists; and by lavishly entertaining neighboring potentates. Meanwhile the citi Jonger in feudal service to a lord and free of military duties (wars were fought mostly by mercenaries), accumulated wealth through commerce, banking: and crafts. Although they prayed and attended church, these people g3v® so ina variety of wa entry, 10 NORTHERN Composers AND priority to earthly matters, They wanted prosperity for their fan pad prestigious art for themselves children along classical rather ng, public service, nilies, property and their heirs, and education for thele than religious lines, Personal fulfillment through 1 accomplishment motivated their indi- vidual lives as well as their social contacts and institutions Just as the dukes of Burgundy had made their court a magnet for talented artists and musicians, the wealthy and powerful Italian dukes and princes nd attracted the most accomplished composers and musicians from France, Flanders, and the Netherlands to their cities. Thus the Medica in Plorence, the Este in Ferrara, the Sforza in Milan, and the Gonzaga in Mantua, 0 name only some of the Renaissance ruling families, became patrons to the learned singet-composers who had been trained in the mag. nificent cathedrals and chapels of the north, recruited Northern Composers and Their Music Although the migration of musical talent across the Alps to Italy had already begun in the fifteenth century (and was to continue for another three hundred years), Johannes Ockeghem (¢a, 1420-1497) was one northern composer who was known there only by reputation. More than a half century after his death, the alian writer Cosimo Bartoli paid him a tribute comparable to the one he gave to Josquin des Prez (quoted above, page 100): “I know well that Ockeghem was, so to speak, the first who in these times redise which had almost entirely died out—not in other wise than Donatello, who in his time rediscovered sculpture.” pe Javirulara fontcgana 3 2 for dau ares Gresypernnaagfeiffomene es ee hereto SS perfliciroatsenafical forgo fora IR Music 105 Ockeghem < Title page of Silvestro Ganassi’s instruction book in recorder play- ing. Opera intitulata Fontegara. A recorder consort and two singers pertorm from printed books. In the fore. ground are two cometti and on the wall three viols and a lute | | | ‘ 106 OTHE RENAISSANCE MUSIC OF THE Low cou: rRins Window THE “GUTE G BIBL Th. expanding musical culture of the Renai music from which to ph > of Music PRINTING B nce created a demand for spurred the development Petrucei’s first printed collection of polyphonic music, the Odhecaton of 1501 (sce page 112), consisted not of learned Ma: {although he published plenty of thes forms for a few parts that could and sing, and this in tur of printed music es OF Motets later) but rather of chansons—small y be performed at home or in the com. pany of friends (sce Plate IV, facing page 131). Petrucci had cleverly sized up the market and collected what he judged to be the best secular music of his own and previous generations. If his taste was impeccable, so too was his technology. ‘The Odhecaton and Petrucci’s subsequent volumes were printed entirely from specially st movable type, which meant that notes could be assembled in any order, ed. (Although plainchant had for been printed from movable type, the Odhecaton was the “Gutenberg Bible” of secular music printing.) Each page of music required a triple-impression process, that is, both sides of every shee three times: once to print the staff lines, then to print the notes, and finally to print the words. The procedure was long, difficult, and expensive, and Petrucci soon reduced it to two impressions, one for the staff lines and words and one for the music, Printing from a single impression—using pieces of type that printed staff, notes, and text in one operation—was developed in the early 1520s and first applied on a large scale by the Parisian Pierre Attaingnant in 1528. But any- th in process often resulted in imperfectly joined staff lines that appear broken or wavy on the page. In Germany, movable-type music printing began in 1507 and later in the Netherlands. Venice, Rome, Nuremberg, Paris, Lyons, Louvain, and Antwerp were the principal centers in the sixteenth century Most ensemble music published in the s rearranged, and res went through the pr less than the triple-impre: xteenth century was printed in the form of oblong partbooks—one small volume for each voice, so that a complete set was needed to perform any piece. Partbooks were intended for Ockeghem sang in the choir of the cathedral at Antwerp in 1443. Several years later he turned up in France, serving Charles 1, duke of Bourbon. In the 1450s he was appointed premier chapelain at the royal chapel of the king of France and probably held that position until he retired, having served three kings. A charming miniature in a French manuscript shows Ockeghem in his NORTHERN COMPOSERS AND THEIR yyy Uste loz use at home or in social gatherings (see Plate IV, and illustration, page 105), Most church choirs continued to use the large handwritten choirbooks (see illustration, page 109). New ones were still being hand-copied in the sixteenth century, even as printed collections began appearing, because there was not enough demand for these large books to make printing them economical, Like Gutenberg’s innovation half a century earlier, movable-type music printing had far-reaching consequences. Instead of a few precious manu- scripts laboriously copied by hand and liable to all kinds of errors and vari- ants, a plentiful supply of new music in copies of uniform accuracy (or, for that matter, inaccuracy) was now available—not exactly at a low price, but I less costly than equivalent manuscripts. Moreover, the existence of printed copies meant that many more works would become known more widely ancl would be preserved for performance and study by later genera- .. Petrucci devoted three volumes to the publication of Josquin’s Masses, but no more than one volume to any other composer. For this reason, we might say that Josquin des Prez became the first composer whose reputation was made in his own time by a kind of mass medium—the presses of a discriminating Venetian publisher, interested in commercial gain, but whose good judgment was ultimately confirmed by posterity. This miniature from a French manuscript of about singing a Gloria in the w fashion of the time, from a large manuscript choirbook fon a lector, (Paris, Biblio: thoque Nationale, MS F. 1507, fol, 580.) derives its name from the first two notes of the bass voice, e-A, both of which in solmization were sung to the syllable mi. Some Masses, including Ockeghem’s Missa prolationum and Missa cuiusvis toni, were named for a structural feature, in these cases a canon (see “Mensuration C. Ockeghem Mass,” page 111). A Ma: other identifying peculiarity, or one whose source the composer wanted to keep under wraps, was often called a Missa sine nomine (Mass without a name, the musical equivalent of “untitled” in modern art). Although Ockeghem did not use imitation all that much, he made a con Canon spicuous exception for canons. In the method prevailing at the time, the composer wrote out a single vocal part and left instructions explaining how the singers should derive the additional voices from that part. It was th written instruction itself that was called canon, which means “rule” or “law. For example, the “canon” might tell the second voice to join in with th s after the origi nons in an having neither a cantus firmus nor any ne 1, at the same or it might direct the second voice to invert the first—that melody starting a certain number of bea ata different pitch; is, move by the same intervals but in the opposite direction; or it might require that the second voice join in with the melody sung backward—a type called a retrograde or cancrizans (crab) canon. Another possibility was to instruct the two voices to move at different no OTHE RENAISSANCE: MUSIC OF THE Low Mensuration canons Ockeghem’s chansons cou! ins rates of speed. Canons of this sort are called mensuration nons, and they could be notated by prefixing two or more different mensuration signs to a single written melody, as in Example 6.2a. EXAMPLE 6.2 Ockeghem, Kyrie II from the Missa prolationum = Ryne Trameription In prestige and craft, writing secular music did not lag far behind Mass composition. Composers expanded the miniature proportions typical of the early Burgundian chanson into larger musical forms, Chansons from 1460 to 1480 show more and more use of imitative counterpoint, at first between the superius and tenor voices, later among all three parts. Most of Ockeghem’s chansons, as well as those of his equally famous contemporary Antoine Busnois (d. 1492), made use of the traditional formes fixes of courtly poetry. For example, Ockeghem’s D'ung aultre amer (To love another, NAWM 31) follows the medieval rondeau form, ABaAabAB (see page 71), and is still JOSQUIN AND HIS CONTEMPORAK wh Mensuration| Canons in an Ockeghem Mass >) ckeghem’s Missa prolationim is an amazing technical tour de force O in which every movement is a double mensuration canon (that is, two different mensuration canons go on at once) involving differ- ent intervals and various combinations of time signatures in each section. For the second Kyric, for example, the original notation includes two parts, cach with two mensuration signatures—C and © in the superiuis, © and G in the contra—and two C-clefs (Example 6.2a). Bach singer must figure out and then observe the pertinent clef and mensuration sign at the beginning of one of the two written parts, The soprano reads the notes of the superius part using the sign Cand the C-clef on the lowest line while the alto us Oand the C-clef on the second line. Similarly, the tenor and bass read the contra part. We can sec in the transcription (Example 6.2b) how the four voices are derived and how they fit together. For Ockeghem’s singers, per- forming the Missa prolationum was like working out an claborate puzzle, with each section of the Mass presenting a new challenge, and without hav- ing the “solutions” written down. basically an accompanied love song for one texted voice and two instruments. The chansons of Ockeghem, Busnois, and their successors were immensely popular: certain favorite and prints from many di own and oth- ers’ chansons, r all, the chansons provided an inexhaustible supply of material for Masses, which might be based on either the superius or the tenor of the original. appear again and again in manus jerent countries. Composers freely altered th carranged them, and transcribed them for instruments. Above ripts Josqui and His Contemporaries Many of the next generation of Franco-Flemish composers could call them- selves direct or indirect pupils of Ockeghem. The three most eminent figures were Jacob Obrecht (ca. 1452-1505), Heinrich Isaac (ca. 1450-1517), and Josquin des Prez (ca, 1440-1521). All born around the middle of the century, they received their earliest musical training and experience in the Low Coun- tries. Each one traveled widely, working in various courts and churches in different parts of Europe, including Italy. Consequently, their careers illustrate the lively interchange in musical matters between northern and southern Ockeghem’s pupils a rue RE passANCE: MUSIC OF THE LOW COUNTRIES oO * 2 Europe, that is, between the Franco-Flemish centers and those of Italy and er Spain. Obrecht, from the Dutch town of Bergen op Zoom, died in Italy of the plague (at age fifty-three) while a member of the ducal chapel in Fer- rara, where Josquin was also employed for a time. Isaac, Flemish by birth, also ended his years in Italy serving the Medi hen, that their music mixes and ev rulers of Florence. It is no n combines northern and south- surprise ern elements: the scrious tone, rigid structure, intricate polyphony, and subtly flowing rhythms of the north; the more spontaneous mood, homophonic texture, more distinct rhythms, and more cl phrases of the Italians. ‘The Odhecaton, the first printed anthology of chansons, illustrates how odhecston deeply northern music penetrated into Italy. It contains works dating from about 1470 to 1500 by composers ranging from the late Burgundian cra to the generation of Obrecht, Isaac, and Josquin, Petrucci published the volume in Venice in 1501 under the title Harmonice musices odhecaton A (One Hun- dred Songs [actually there are only ninety-six] of Harmonic Music [that is, part-music, or polyphony]; see facsimile and window, pages 106-7). The letter “A” indicates that this was planned as the first in a series. The publi- cation of two more chanson volumes, Canti B in 1502 and Canti C in 1504, allowed Petrucci to corner the market on the most up-to-date and popular secular music, Over the next half century he and other Italian music printers issued a great number of such anthologies by French and Franco-Flemish composers. More than half of the chansons in the Odhecaton are for three voices, written primarily in the older styles. In the fou! mpler structure, carly articulated jansons here voice chansons, however, we see the genre developing toward a fuller texture, a more completely in counterpoint, clearer harmonic structure, and greater equality of voices. Du- ple meter replaced the more common triple meter of the Burgundian period. Many of these pieces, like the Masses of the time, were based either on a popular tune or on a single voice from some earlier chanson. During the first two decades of the sixteenth century, Franco-Flemish composers at the French royal court in Paris cultivated various types of chanson, Some were entirely original compositions; others incorporated Josquin’s preexisting melodies. By contrast with Ockeghem, Josquin des Prez. virtually chansons abandoned the formes fixes, choosing instead strophic texts and simple four- or five-line poems. The polyphonic fabric of his chansons independent layers, like Ockeghem’s, but is unified and interwoven with im- Instead of the tenor-cantus pair servi with the other voi js not formed from g as the skeleton of the music filling in, all the parts are now equal Every voice is essential in Josquin’s Mille regretz (A thousand regrets, NAWM 32a), because it is not an accompanied song. A pair of voices some- times answers another pair, as at the words “et paine douloureuse” (Example 6.3, measures 20-24), or two voices move in imitation, as the cantus and alto do on “brief mes jours definer” (measures 27-30). All the voices are meant to be sung. Among Josquin’s last chansons, perhaps written for Charles V in JOSQUIN AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES ne 6.3 Josquin des Prez, Mille regretz exw Pai ne dow-low- es brief mes jours de Drief mes jours de = ff Quon ome ver =r rier 1 feel so much sadness and painful distress that soon my days will seem to det Reprinted by permission from The Chanson and Madrigal, ed. James Haar (Cambridge, Mass. Harvard University Press). Copytight © 1964 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. 1520, Mille regret> became one of the most popular after his death. It was reworked in a Mass by a Spanish composer, Cristobal de Morales (ca. 1500-1553), and arranged for vihuela (a plucked and fretted string instru- ment) by another Spaniard, Luys de Narvaez (fl. 1530-1550; see NAWM 32b). Josquin des Prez The greatest composer of his generation, Josquin was born about 1440, prob- ably in France across the border from Hainaut, which belonged to the Holy Roman Empire. He sang at Milan Cathedral from 1459 to 1472 and then joined the ducal chapel of the Sforza family. After that he served at the papal chapel in Rome, then moved to France, perhaps to the court of Louis XII. He was appointed maestro di cappella at the court of Ferrara in 1503, at the highest salary in the history of that chapel, but again left Italy for France the following year, escaping the plague that was to take the life of one of his contemporaries, Jacob Obrecht. From 1504 until his death in 1521, Josquin 113, Career a 14 OTHE RENAISSANCE: MUSIC OF THE Low COUNTRIES resided at Condé-sur-l'Eseaut, in his region of birth, where he was provos of Notre Dame. A large number of sixteenth-centt a anthologies contain his compositions, which include some & ‘one hundred motets, and seventy secular vocal works. the high proportion of motets in Josquin’s output is noteworthy. In his y the Mass was still the traditional form for composers to demonstrate mastery of their craft. But the Mass’s liturgical formality, unvarying text, and established musical conventions lett little room for expe Motets nentation. Motets, je range of relatively unfamilias ‘s for word-music relationships, on the other hand, could be written on a wi texts that offered nteres ing new possibil For a Renaissance composer of Josquin’s stripe, the motet became the most challenging and inviting genre of sacred compos on Text and music In keeping with humanist ideals, Josquin and his contempora make the musi es tried to communicate the meaning of the texts. They carefully fit the to the accentuation of the words, whether Latin or vernacular, and wanted the words to be heard and understood. The highly florid lines of Ockeghem and other Franco-Flemish composers gave way to more direct syllabic settings in which a phrase of text was presented as an uninterrupted thought. Composers turned to the chanson and the Italian popular genres as models for their vocal writing, Hearing the note-against-note harmony of Italian popular music (to be discussed in Chapter 7), with its root-position chords, must have made Josquin particularly aware of the potential that resided in this style. His motet Tu solus, qui facis mirabilia (You alone, who do wonders, NAWM 33), from his early years in Italy, reflects this attraction. Sections of four-part, homo- thmic music in declamatory style alternate with episodes in which pairs Falsobordone _ of voices imitate each other. The homophonie sections (Example 6.4) use a technique practiced in Italy and Spain known as falsobordone, in which the was harmonized by root position triads; such sections appeared typically in psalms, Magnificats, and musical stres: declamatory reciting formula in the top voi Examrte 6.4 _Josquin des Prez, Motet: Tu sous, qui facis mirabilia ui a wt i ae nt Tu So-lus Red - em = ptor, qui rede = JOSQUIN AND HIS CoN the last chapter, describes a northern technique, applied mainly to hymns, in which the chant was accompanied by sixths and thirds expanding to octaves and fifths at cadences.) This homophonic technique allowed listeners to hear and understand the text. During the course of his career, Josquin developed many other ways of setting texts expressively and clearly. In his late motets he explored every resource then available to a composer to enliven the mean- ing of the words, ‘A splendid example, believed to date from the last twenty years of Josquin’s life, is his setting of Psalm 129, De profundis clamavi ad te (English 130: Out of the depths I cried to thee, NAWM 34). Deeply expressive of its text and wedded to it on several levels, the music is appropriately scored for low voices and shaped throughout according to the form, rhythm, accentu- ation, and meaning of the words. Josquin captured the spirit of the whole psalm in the opening line of the superius (Example 6.5). The music outlines 1g down a fifth for the word “profundis” (depths) and reaching up to the minor sixth above for “clamavi’ (I cried out), creating a perfect image of a soul sinking into despair and calling for help, straining to be heard. The other voices imitate the first five pitches and durations exactly. Lamentations. (By contrast, the cognate term fauxbourdon, as we saw a descending minor triad, leay EXAMPLE 6.5 Josquin des Prez, Motet: De profundis clamavi ad te clase De pro > la = wo nn TEMPORARIES —4)5 116 rH ReNatssanc Fugal imitation t MUSIC OF THE LOW COUNTRIES ed to be a portrait from Petrus Op- graphicum, 1611. < Woodeut purporte of Josquin des Prez, meer, Opus chronog I TOSQVINVS PRATENSIS. We can also see Josquin’s typical approach to motet writing in an earlier work, Ave Maria. . . virgo serena, one of the composer's most widely copied pieces. Its main method of construction is fugal imi cach phrase of text is assigned a musical subject that is then taken up by each voice, one after the other. The subject is usually imitated exactly at the unison, octave, fifth, or fourth. The first voices to enter either drop out after stating the subject, as in the opening of this motet (Example 6.6), or continue with free coun- terpoint until they reach a cadence. Before the last voice has finished its phrase, a different voice (or voices) begins the next phrase of text with a new subject. In this way Josquin avoids a cadence and so preserves the continuity of the words in the music. For example, the phrase “Ave Maria” progresses to “gratia plena” without a cadence, then “plena” is linked to “Dominus tecum” through a weak cadence at measure 16, where the two phrases overlap. At “virgo serena,” the final phrase of the sentence, all the voices sing together for the first time, pushing forward to the cadence with increasing rhythmic activity, Not all of Josquin’s work is so forward-looking. As we might expect, he employs conservative styles most conspicuously in his Masses, which abound in technical ingenuity. Most use a secular tune as a cantus firmus. In the Missa L’homme armé super voces musicales, Josquin transposed a familiar ff teenth-century tune to successive degrees (or syllables—voces musicales) of the scale, beginning on C for the Kyrie, D for the Gloria, and so on. This Mass also includes a mensuration canon. Josquin’s Masses employ many of the techniques commonly used in the sixteenth century. The theme of the Missa Hercules dux Ferrariae offers an example of a soggetto cavato dalle vocali, a “subject [theme] drawn from the tio: 2. The Norton Scores: A Study Anthology, Vol. 1, 7th edition, ed. Kristine Forney (New Yor Norton, 1995), pp. 26-33. JOSQUIN AND ts « Orr, , ron , examrte 6.6 Josquin des Prez, Motet: Ave Maria ... vingo serena "ney, rs 1 a > 118 OTHE RENAISSANCE: MUSIC OF THE Low COUNTRIES Imitation Mass vowels” of a word o sentence, or in this case, a name, by letting each vowel indicate a corresponding syllable of the scale, thus: The subject honored Hercules, or Ercole I, duke of Ferrara from 1471 to 1505, and Josquin’s employer at one point in his earcer. Another of Josquin’s works, Missa Matheur me bat, illustrates a procedure ixteenth century. Instead of basing chanson, the composer subjected all its voices to free fantasy and expansion, In the process, such a Mass could take over many attributes of the preexisting work, including its characteristic motives, fugal statements and answers, and even its general structure. Although the resulting composition has also been called parody Mass, it is best termed imitation Mass, which does not imply the use of motivic imitation; instead it acknowledges that in Josquin’s time, this Mass would have been called “Mas in imitation of the music of Malheur me bat.” ‘The amount of borrowing in an imitation Mass varies, as docs the com- poser’s originality in treating the borrowed material. The full-fledged imita- tion Mass not only borrows musical material to a significant extent but also makes something new out of it, weaving its motives into an original contra puntal texture with systematic imitation among all the voices. The imitation Mass replaced the cantus firmus Mass as the dominant type around 1520. eens Bi The Renaissance was an era of rediscovery and rapid change that affected the way educated people lived and thought about their own times and cu! ture. It had far-reaching consequences in alll the arts and brought about new attitudes toward the creation, consumption, and reception of music. The international style that had begun to emerge from the variety of com- positional techniques practiced in England and on the Continent during the 1400s now spread to Italy and the lands of the Holy Roman Empire. Although the Renaissance did not produce a single, specific musical style, it did influence many features of European art music. More and more, composers let the structure of the text determine the structure of the music. Polyphonic parts were written to be sung—even if they ended up being played—and became nearly equal in importance. The quest by composers for full harmonies, singable melodies, and motivic relationshis between the voices influenced the texture of sacred as well as secular common later in the that became more the Mass on a single voice of postiupE 19 pieces. Borrowed melodies, whether sacred or secular, were still used unify large compositions, but the borrowed material was distributed | among the voices rather than confined to the tenor of superius, Although the tenor remained a key voice in the structure, the bass took over the foundation of the harmony. Cadences continued to close in perfect conso- nances, but between them composers strove for full triadic sonorities. Sim- plification and standardization of rhythm favored duple measure organized by the value of the breve (alla breve). The preferred sacred genres were the cyclical Mass and the motet. The chanson, breaking out of the formes fixes, was cast in new shapes and its texture was gradually pervaded by imitation. Hidden and esoteric structural devices, suich as isorhythm and mensuration canon, gave way to transparent textures, principally that of overlapping fugal or imitative sections, relieved occasionally by homo- phonic ones. These trends gave composers greater flexibility than they had had before and, aided by the success of music printing, more opportunity to communicate with a wider audience. Many of the trends discussed in this chapter continued throughout the sixteenth century.

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