Download The Baroque Era

The Baroque Era
By Liam Priestnall
Arcangelo Corelli
Arcangelo Corelli was born on 17 February 1653
According to the poet Giovanni Mario Crescimbeni, who presumably knew the
composer well, Corelli initially studied music under a priest in the nearby town of
Faenza, and then in Lugo, before moving in 1666 to Bologna.
Corelli’s musical education focused mainly on the violin.
He was an Italian violinist and composer of the Baroque era.
Died on 8 January 1713.
Continued…
The style of execution Corelli introduced when playing the violin was of
vital importance for the development of violin playing.
It has been said that the paths of all of the famous violinist-composers of
18th-century Italy led to Arcangelo Corelli who was their "iconic point of
reference".
Corelli used only a limited portion of his instrument's capabilities when
both playing and writing.
The parts for violin very rarely proceed above D on the highest string,
sometimes reaching the E in fourth position on the highest string.
Corelli died in Rome in possession of a fortune of 120,000 marks and a
valuable collection of works of art and fine violins.
Examples of Corelli’s violin compositions:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TeBw3X--Gc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BECZDIuqEvA
Percussion in the Baroque
Era
Percussion during the baroque era was rarely used and when used did not have much
variety.
Mainly, the only percussion used was the timpani. The timpani would be limited to
the tonic and dominant or sub-dominant notes in a piece and rarely deviate from this
rule.
Until the late 19th century, timpani were hand-tuned; that is, there was a sequence of
screws with T-shaped handles, called taps, which altered the tension in the head
when turned by players.
Thus, tuning was a relatively slow operation, and composers had to allow a
reasonable amount of time for players to change notes if they were called to tune in
the middle of a work.
An example of a typical timpani piece in the baroque era:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luEYuvEwW5o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffBK-EYjs90
Haydn’s symphony no. 104
Passacaglia
The passacaglia is a musical form that originated in early
seventeenth-century Spain and is still used by contemporary
composers.
It is usually of a serious character and is often, but not always,
based on a bass-ostinato and written in triple metre.
Despite the form's Spanish roots the first written examples of
passacaglias are found in an Italian source dated 1606.
These pieces, as well as others from Italian sources from the
beginning of the century, are simple, brief sequences of chords
outlining a cadential formula.
Continued…
The passacaglia was redefined in late 1620s by Italian composer
Girolamo Frescobaldi, who transformed it into a series of
continuous variations over a bass.
Later composers adopted this model, and by the nineteenth
century the word came to mean a series of variations over an
ostinato pattern, usually of a serious character.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWakfufLMbQ - An example
of a passacaglia by Johann Sebastian Bach.
Recitative
Recitative is a style of delivery in which a singer is allowed to adopt the
rhythms of ordinary speech.
It was used frequently in operas, oratorios and cantatas.
Recitative does not repeat lines as formally composed songs do. It
resembles sung ordinary speech more than a formal musical composition.
In the baroque era, recitatives were commonly rehearsed on their own by
the stage director, the singers frequently supplying their own favourite
baggage arias which might be by a different composer.
A recitative composed by Handel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVUHlIo2W28
Ground Bass
Ground bass is a short, recurring melodic pattern in the bass part of a composition
that serves as the principal structural element.
With the rise of idiomatic instrumental music in the 16th century, the practice of
improvising or composing new melodies above a repeated bass pattern became
widely popular, especially in music for the lute and guitar and harpsichord.
In the Baroque era the melodic basso ostinato became incorporated into more
rigorously structured forms of continuous variation, such as the chaconne and
passacaglia.
An example of ground bass being used can be heard in “Pachelbel's canon in D”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvNQLJ1_HQ0