Download Medieval Music (early music)

In review
• Prehistoric Music: Lasted about 55,000 years. This
time period for music ended approx. 1,500 BCE.
During this time period “music was created” from
sounds in nature and the sounds of man. Some of
the first instruments included rocks sticks, the
voice, and the bone flute. Prehistoric music was
founded in preliterate cultures, before recorded
history ( before 500 AD). We can still hear some of
the origins of this music from South American
Indians and African Natives.
•
In Review
• Ancient Music: Lasted from 1500 BCE to 500 AD.
Ancient Music refers to the various musical systems
that were developed across various geographical
regions such as Mesopotamia, Egypt, Persia, India,
China, Greece and Rome. Ancient music is
characterized by basic audible tones and scales. It most
likely was transmitted orally at first onset, and then
later through written systems. Pythagoras and
Aristoxenus developed systems of theory and written
notation to communicate musical ideas. Ancient music
was monophonic ( having a single melodic line) and
involved Lute, flute, harp or vocals playing the same
Western/ European Art
Music
Early Period
Approx 500AD to 1760AD
1. Medieval Music
• Approx. 500 AD to 1400AD
Medieval Music
• Medieval Music consisted of both secular and non
secular themes. It was comprised of two main
textures; monophony and polyphony.
Secular: Music not subject to or bound by religious rule;
Non-secular:
Religious music
This Time in Music
History
• During Early Period of music, the church played a
main role in the social life, learning and arts of the
people in the western hemisphere. The Medieval
Music period is the longest and most remote of all
of musical history. This time period was also filled
with ignorance, illness and death.
• Pope Gregory (590-640CE) organized a huge
repetoire of chants, developed during the first
century of the Christian Church, known as
Gregorian Chants/ Plainsong.
•
http://comp.uark.edu/~rlee/otherchant.html
•
http://www.christusrex.org/www2/cantgreg/index_eng.html
Gregorian Chant
(non secular)
• Characteristics
• Monophonic
• Pure shapes of melody
• Changed over time (oral traditions and notation
methods)
• Similar to a folk melody (lullaby)
• Learn and follow a Chant
• http://www.gregorian-chant.info/
Notation
• The musical notation of the Early Period did not
resemble modern notation. It evoloved from that of
the ancient greek style using symbols. The symbols
were known as neumes and related to the pitches of
a melody only, not the rhythmic elements of the
song. Other musical notation, such as rhythm didn't
begin until the 12th or 13th centuries. During this
period only non-secular music was written and
saved, because the church could afford to do so.
Polyphony
• Appeared approx 1200 AD
• Music that consisted of two or more melodic lines
that were heard simultaneously
• more difficult to compose than the monophonic
chant, because a composer had to combine multiple
melodic lines in a way that would be pleasing to the
listener
Troubadors
• Troubadours were poet musicians. They did not
write religious poems. They wrote romances about
knights and ladies. These romances were told in the
form of poems set to music. Their songs were very
popular because they were about love and heroes
and chivalry.
• These musicians would go from town to town,
playing love songs. They might also play drums,
harps, and bagpipes, which were all popular
instruments of the times.
Troubadors Con’t
• Troubadours created and memorized their own
music. If they heard a good song, they memorized it
and performed it. Credit was not given to the
composer of a piece they were playing. The church
taught that God would be unhappy if composers
took credit for their work. The troubadors were an
elite group of influencial musicians.
Instruments used
throughout the Early
Period
• Bowed Instruments
• Plucked Strings
• Wind Instruments
• Organs
• Percussion Instruments
• Voice
Instrument Interactive
• http://www.music.iastate.edu/antiqua/instrumt.ht
ml
• Early Composers on smartboard cd (opt)
Match the Instruments
• Bowed Instruments
Shawm
• Plucked Strings
Organetto
• Wind Instruments
Lute
• Organs
Hurdy Gurdy
• Percussion Instruments
Psaltery
• Voice
Serpent
Tabor
recorder
Tambourine
Sacbut
Secular Music
• Characteristics
• monophonic and stylistically more diversified than
plain song
• stronger, and utilized regular rhythms, and had short
rhythmic patterns
• It was generally modal but favored major (Ionian) and
minor (Aeolian) modes
• More difficult to compose than the monophonic chant,
because a composer had to combine multiple melodic
lines in a way that would be pleasing to the listener.
• Mostly non-written orally passed down, and
anonymous
Things to Think About
• 1. Why don't we know the names of the popular Medieval
musicians who played, sang, and wrote songs from town to
town?
• 2. Why do you think music notation began in the Catholic
Church rather than with the traveling musicians?
• 3. Why is it important to write down music?
• 4. Should the rules for writing down music be the same for
everyone?
Thinking Con’t
• 5. Can you identify instruments of the Medieval period that
no longer exist?
• 6. Why do you think some instruments from the Medieval
period disappeared?
• 7. What are some instruments we use today that were not
known during the Medieval period?
• 8. Why do you think non-religious music was becoming more
and more popular?
• 9. Why did it take almost a thousand years for music to
develop rhythm, harmony, and instruments?
Development of Polyphony
• Guillaume de Machaut 1300-1377 wrote the Mass of
Notre Dame (lehman.edu)
• Organun represents the beginnings of harmony and,
ultimately, of counterpoint. (voices move in parallel
motion above the orignial tune- up a 4th or 5th.
• Example played on piano
• http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/musichistory.htm
• http://musictechteacher.com/quiz_help_intervals1.htm
• Moving into the renaissance
• Josquin desprez (lehman.edu)
• Giovanni da palestrina (lehman.edu)
Motets
• a short piece of sacred choral music, typically
polyphonic and unaccompanied.
Liturgical drama
• semi-musical drama in the Middle Ages, involving
acting, speaking, singing and instrumental
accompaniment in some combination
Renaissance
1400 to 1600AD
• Renaissance means rebirth or rediscovery. This
particularly pertains to the Ancient Greek and
Roman arts.
• Music became an expressive art form, rather than a
ordered theory.
• Easier travel enabled a further reach of music to other
areas.
• John Dunstable (naxos.com)
• The increasing reliance on the interval of the third as a
consonance is one of the most pronounced features of
transition into the Renaissance
Madrigals
• a fixed form, consisting of two or three short stanzas
• Imitation: where one melodic line shares, or
"imitates," the same musical theme as a previous
melodic line became an important polyphonic
technique.
Modern Pitch Notation
• The completion of the staff is usually credited to
Guido d’ Arezzo (c. 1000-1050), one of the most
important musical theorists of the Middle Ages.
• The next step forward concerning rhythm came from
the German theorist Franco of Cologne. In his
treatise Ars Cantus Mensurabilis ("The Art of
Mensurable Music"), written around 1280, he
describes a system of notation in which differently
shaped notes have entirely different rhythmic values
• However it was Philippe de Vitry, that came up with
the more modern rhythmic notational system.
The transition from Early
Music
• Baroque