Concepts, Institutions and Movements

Question 1

Name the eight church modes, and describe the final, ambitus, and reciting tone (tenor) of each.

Question 2

From the middle ages up into the early Baroque composers were trained according to a sight-singing system devised by Guido of Arezzo that used hexachords. Concisely describe Guido’s system. Make sure to include in your answer the following terms: Ut queant laxis; natural, hard, and soft hexachords; gamut; mutation; the Guidonian han

Question 3

Much of the greatest music of the late Renaissance is unaccompanied vocal music. Name two of the leading composers of the late Renaissance, one of whom was active in Germany, the other whom was the Prince of Venosa. What was the primary aesthetic emphasis of these two composers, both of whom favored complex counterpoint in their sacred and secular compositions? Name some of the musical ways they attempted to realize this aesthetic emphasis.

Question 4

What is the chronology of the early Baroque? What was the primary aesthetic focus of composers active then? What is monody? Who was the principal composer of this time?

Question 5

What is the single most characteristic feature of all Baroque music? What does this feature suggest about the musical style of the epoch? What type of score is used to notate most Baroque music?

Question 6

What is the chronology of the middle Baroque? Characterize the melodic/harmonic style of this time. Identify four prominent composers of this period from Italy, Germany, France, and England.

Question 7

What is the chronology of the late Baroque? How does the melodic/harmonic style change during this time? What type of music becomes increasingly prominent during this time? Identify three prominent composers of this time from Italy, two from Germany, and one from France.

Question 8

How were European national boundaries and political entities in the mid-17th century different from now?

Question 9

What were the two principal branches of Christian religious practice during the Baroque?

Question 10

What is the principal liturgical observance of Catholic worship? From where does the name of this service come? What are the six primary Ordinary elements in this observance, and the six Proper elements? What is the difference between a Proper and an Ordinary liturgical item?

Question 11

Name the eight daily offices of Catholic worship. When did they take place, approximately? How do they differ in content from the Mass?

Question 12

Who started the Protestant Reformation, when did he start it, and where? What are some of the major differences between Catholic and Protestant worship?

Question 13

Describe the Reformation in the following countries: Germany; Italy; France; England.

Question 14

What is the Counter-Reformation, and when did it start? What group was particularly influential in this movement? What war consumed Europe over Europe during the mid-17th century, and when did it run?

Question 15

What are the five rhetorical elements identified by Cicero? What 17th century aesthetician applied them to music? Which element was favored in the early, middle, and late Baroque?

Question 16

What did Joachim Burmeister say about the music of Roland de Lassus in his Musica autoschediastike (1601)? What system did he try to apply to the music of Lassus?

Question 17

What is the historical basis for analyzing the accompanied madrigals of Monteverdi’s 8th book in terms of their use of musico-rhetorical figures? What might one’s thesis be? What are some of the major treatises that list musico-rhetorical figures?

Question 18

Why is an understanding of modes important for analysis of 17th century music? How might one use the modal theory of Giovanni Maria Bononcini (1642-78) for a paper on analysis? What might one’s thesis be?

Question 19

What types of music might lend themselves to hexachordal analysis? Why would one chose this type of analysis over traditional tonal analysis? What might one’s thesis be for such an analytic paper?

Question 20

For what musical repertory might Francesco Gasparini’s “normalized harmonic style” be particularly appropriate? What might one’s thesis be for such an analytic paper?

Question 21

What theatrical/musical genre was the immediate predecessor of early Florentine opera?

Question 22

Identify three individuals who were closely associated with the Florentine Cameratas.

Question 23

What is the name of Vincenzo Galilei’s famous treatise of 1581 on music, and what does it say about “ancient and modern” musics?

Question 24

Name three composers active in Florence ca. 1600.

Question 25

When, where, and why did Peri compose Euridice?

Question 26

Who was Peri’s librettist? From what theatrical traditions did he draw his plot?

Question 27

Peri believed he was creating a new type of singing in Euridice. What did he call this type of singing, and how did he describe its musical style? What determined the movement of the harmony in this new style of singing?

Question 28

What three act work did Cavalieri compose in around 1600?

Question 29

What does the word “oratorio” indicate about sacred pieces composed around 1600?

Question 30

How does the melodic style of Cavalieri’s work differ from Peri’s?

Question 31

Who wrote Le nuove musiche, and when?

Question 32

What was the Concerto delle donne?

Question 33

In what city was Claudio Monteverdi born, and what was this city known for during his lifetime?

Question 34

Identify Monteverdi’s two principal patrons.

Question 35

What differentiates Monteverdi’s madrigal books 1-5 from books 6-9?

Question 36

Who was G.M. Artusi, and what is his relationship to Monteverdi?

Question 37

What do the terms prima pratica and seconda pratica indicate about musical style?

Question 38

What is a basso seguente?

Question 39

Where, when, and for whom did Monteverdi compose Orfeo? Who was the librettist?

Question 40

Identify at least two ways in which Monteverdi’s Orfeo surpasses Peri’s Euridice as a musical masterpiece.

Question 41

What style did Monteverdi claim to have invented for his 8th book of madrigals? How did he create this style in musical terms?

Question 42

Monteverdi’s setting of Hor ch’el ciel from Book 8 lends itself to analysis in what type of terminology? Define at least three specific terms that could be used to analyze this work.

Question 43

What is distinctive about operas composed for Florence between 1621-28, and why? Name an important Florentine opera composer from these years.

Question 44

What three factors heavily influenced Roman operas composed during the first half of the 17th century, and serve to distinguish these operas from earlier Florentine operas? Identify a wealthy Roman family that heavily supported opera during this period.

Question 45

Who was Giulio Rospigliosi? Name one or more literary works that he wrote.

Question 46

What three procedures were followed by Italian musicians during the late 16th century when improvising passaggi?

Question 47

What special considerations applied for singers when improvising within polyphonic works such as madrigals? What late 16th century Italian composer is especially well-known for applying extensive ornamentation to polyphonic works? What is the name of the treatise in which he explains how to do this?

Question 48

What was the first teaching manual for improvising diminutions? Do we have it in our library?

Question 49

In what two ways did composers start to exercise greater control over improvisation during the early 17th century?

Question 50

How did composers such as Caccini often modify the rhythms and placement of passaggi? Why did Caccini do this?

Question 51

What collection of monodies contains one of the fullest explanations of early 17th century improvisatory practice? Does this collection indicate that there is only one way to ornament early 17th century melodies?

Question 52

does one need to add more ornaments to those written by Caccini in Le nuove musiche? In what type of pieces was Caccini most apt to add lots of ornaments?

Question 53

Who was Matthew Dubourg? What can we learn from him about late Baroque improvisation?

Question 54

Identify two sources from the 15th and 16th centuries that speak about proper singing techniques.

Question 55

What is contrapunto alla mente? How does it differ from contrapunto in concerto?

Question 56

Accenti/Affetti vs. passaggi/diminutions.

Question 57

Trillo: tremulo vs. “qui cade in riso naturale” (here one falls into natural laughter)

Question 58

Gruppo Cascata Ribbattuta di gola Intonazione Accento

Question 59

In what two cities did Frescobaldi primarily live? Who was his composition teacher, and what approach to composition would he have learned from this teacher?

Question 60

Where did Claudio Merulo work, and what features typify his toccatas?

Question 61

What is a diminution?

Question 62

What did Frescobaldi say in prefaces to his printed collections about tempo? About how to perform chords?

Question 63

Identify four ostinato bass patterns used in keyboard music of the early 17th century.

Question 64

Identify three types of contrapuntal works written for the keyboard during the early 17th century.

Question 65

What were the two principal theoretical systems used by composers around 1600 to analyze and explain music? What theorist proposed a 12 mode system in 1547, and in what treatise did he do so?

Question 66

In broad terms, how do Banchieri’s 8 polyphonic modes differ from earlier modal formulations?

Question 67

What factor increasingly was used to determine polyphonic mode during the early 17th century?

Question 68

How did Italian church organs differ from modern organs?

Question 69

How was the organ used at Mass?

Question 70

What three types of organ piece were typically played during the Mass?

Question 71

What is the meaning of the word alternatim, and how does it apply to early 17th century organ music?

Question 72

Who was the first to describe a four-stringed violin tuned in 5ths, and when did he do so? How were early violin bows different from modern bows? What region particularly favored the violin at this time? Name three important early violin makers.

Question 73

What is the single most pronounced difference between 16th-century ensemble music and most 17th-century ensemble music?

Question 74

What is the earliest dated work for solo violin and basso continuo? This work can be described as a canzona; describe some stylistic features typical of this genre.

Question 75

How were canzonas used in the Catholic liturgy?

Question 76

How did a Baroque trumpet differ from modern instruments? A Baroque trombone? How is the sound produced in a shawm?

Question 77

Many early 17th century works for violin are titled “sonata.” What were the two favored scorings for the sonata during the Baroque?

Question 78

Highly florid improvised ornaments typical in Italian string music of the early 17th century are called ______________ or _________________.

Question 79

What technique is described in Diego Ortiz’s treatise Tratado de glosas (1553)? What is contrapunto alla mente (also called sortisatio)?

Question 80

Name two Italian violinists who composed sonatas who were active between 1600 and 1645.

Question 81

During the 17th century in Italy, the choir often sang in alternation with the organ in which five movements of the Catholic Mass?

Question 82

What four items in the Vespers service were often set polyphonically during the Baroque? Approximately when did this service take place each day?

Question 83

What were Marco Scacchi’s four categories for sacred church music (1649)? For Scacchi, what was a “concerto”?

Question 84

Who wrote the Cento concerti ecclesiastici (1602)? What does this collection contain? What is their style?

Question 85

Name a leading Roman composer who wrote large scale sacred works for St. Peter’s cathedral during the first half of the 17th century. Name a prominent Venetian composer who worked at St. Mark’s Venice until his death in 1612. Who succeeded this prominent composer at St. Mark’s?

Question 86

Name one of the earliest instrumental sonatas to include dynamic markings. Who wrote this piece?

Question 87

What types of music appear in Claudio Monteverdi’s 1610 “Vespers” collection?

Question 88

What line of kings ruled in France from the 14th century through 1589? What new line came into power after that date? What were the three main organizations at the French royal court that sponsored music and musicians, and what types of music did each sponsor?

Question 89

What was the favored form of theatrical entertainment at the French and English royal courts during the 15th and early 16th centuries?

Question 90

What type of music and poetry was actively promulgated by the French royal court during the second half of the 16th century? What institution was formed specifically to develop this type of music and poetry, and when?

Question 91

Who was Thoinot Arbeau (Jehan Tabourot), and what type of information can one find in his Orchésographie (1588/89)? e. Identify five courtly dances of the late 16th century.

Question 92

Why is French court ballet often described as “ballet à entrées”? What is the purpose of the récits? What is a divertissement? A Grand ballet?

Question 93

What work is usually credited as the first French opera? For what purpose was this written, and when was it first performed? Identify at least 3 people who collaborated on its production. How does it differ from earlier French court ballets?

Question 94

Identify 3 major Italian opera composers who visited France between 1600 and 1660 and helped prepare the French court for the amalgamation of French and Italian operatic styles found in Lully’s tragedies lyriques.

Question 95

What is an air de cour? Identify two composers of such works. What musical/poetic tradition influenced the rhythmic/melodic style of this genre in the first decades of the 16th century? What style began to influence it from the 1620s-‘40s?

Question 96

What is an air de cour? Identify two composers of such works. What musical/poetic tradition influenced the rhythmic/melodic style of this genre in the first decades of the 16th century? What style began to influence it from the 1620s-‘40s?

Question 97

What French court composer is often given credit for helping create the Baroque keyboard suite? When did this take place (approximately)?

Question 98

Distinguish the following dances by style and meter: allemande, courante, sarabande

Question 99

How was the French church organ of the 17th century different from an Italian organ? A German organ? What type of music was it designed to play? Who was the leading composer of French organ music during the 16th and early 17th centuries?

Question 100

For what institution did Eustache du Caurroy work during the late 16th and early 17th century? From our perspective, is his choral music conservative (Renaissance-like), or does it partake of the new concerto techniques of the Italian Baroque (e.g., Monteverdi’s 1610 Vespers concerti).

Question 101

What is distinctive about the sacred vocal works of Guillaume Bouzignac? What about Bouzignac’s biography might have encouraged the development of this particular compositional style?

Question 102

The musical institutions of the English royal court were largely parallel to those at what other royal court during the 16th century? When was Italian-style string ensemble music with continuo accompaniment introduced to the English court, and by whom? When did the English court develop its own string ensemble? What Renaissance instrument retained its popularity in England and France long after it had gone out of style in Italy?

Question 103

What were some of the effects of the English Civil War and the Puritan Commonwealth on music-making in the cathedrals; in the theatres; at the royal court?

Question 104

What type of music and what composers appear in Musica transalpina? What does this title mean? What musical genre largely supplanted this type of music in England during the first half of the 17th century?

Question 105

What was the single most famous lute song? How do we know that it was famous in its time? What are Dowland’s “Seaven Passionate Pavans” (publ. 1604)?

Question 106

What are some of the stylistic features of the English viol fantasia?

Question 107

What is the typical scoring for a broken, or mixed, consort?

Question 108

What is a virginal? What types of music and what composers are represented in the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book?

Question 109

How is a verse anthem different from a full anthem? In what religious observances were such works used? What voice part is a haut-contre?

Question 110

What individual played a formative role in the creation of the Elizabethan/Jacobean masque? What are some of the distinguishing features of his masques?

Question 111

What were the four roots of Venetian opera prior 1637?

Question 112

Who were the Gelosi? The Febiarmonici?

Question 113

What is the significance of 1637 for Venetian opera?

Question 114

How did Venetian opera of the 1640s differ from earlier Florentine operas?

Question 115

What is the name of Monteverdi’s last opera? When did he complete his work on it? What decision do modern performers have to make before they stage this opera?

Question 116

Who was the leading Venetian opera composer after Monteverdi? How many operas did he write? Who was his principal librettist?

Question 117

What types of arias are typical of Monteverdi’s Incoranazione di Poppea? What formal type becomes particularly favored after Monteverdi?

Question 118

How did Venetian opera change between the 1640s and 1670s?

Question 119

What was a “cantata” for Carissimi or Barbara Strozzi? When did the term start to be used? What were its immediate antecedents? Describe the genre.

Question 120

Who was Barbara Strozzi’s teacher? Describe some of the obstacles that faced her as a composer in mid-17th century Venice.

Question 121

What was the normal structure of an oratorio by Carissimi? For what institution did he work, and where?

Question 122

How did Carissimi musically create the following rhetorical affects, and what is the emotional significance of each: palillogia, mutatio modi, pathopoeia

Question 123

What was the reigning political force in Germany and Austria during the 16th & 17th centuries? Was it unified in its religious tendencies during the period? Who were the Habsburgs, and where did they rule? What is an Elector?

Question 124

What was the principal external influence upon the musicians of the Habsburg Empire? When did this influence begin in Germany/Austria?

Question 125

Who fought in the Thirty Years’ War? When did it occur?

Question 126

What is the Florilegium Portense (1603, 1621), and how was it used?

Question 127

What is a Chorale, and how was it used in Lutheran worship?

Question 128

How did the sacred concertos of Praetorius and Schein differ fundamentally from those of Italian contemporaries such as Viadana and Gabrieli?

Question 129

Where and with whom did Heinrich Schütz gain his musical education? At what court did he primarily work throughout his career? What external event dramatically changed both musical performances at the court and Schütz’s compositional output?

Question 130

Describe the musical styles represented in the following collections of Schütz and explain how they mirror his career: Psalmen Davids (1619), Symphoniae sacrae Pt. 1 (1629), Symphoniae sacrae Pt. 3 (1650)?

Question 131

What is the primary source of Sweelinck’s keyboard technique? Who were three of his most prominent disciples? [from class lecture]

Question 132

How did the German organs built in the 17th century differ from Italian or French organs? [from class lecture largely]

Question 133

How did the collection Tabulatura nova (1624) get its name? Who wrote it, and what does it contain?

Question 134

Who was Froberger’s teacher? Where was his primary place of employment? What tradition influenced Froberger’s keyboard suites?