Music in the renaissance

In the renaissance, building from the previous generations of music and continuing in their paths to give each of the parts of music a more individualistic personality. That is to say, that each part of the four parts in the range of the vocal resulting in polyphony in contrast to the more homophonic texture of the baroque. From Monteverdi’s 8 books of madrigals we see a change from stile antico to stile moderno, which gave more emphasis to the text than to the music. This gave way to the idea that text was king from which sprung the ideas of single affect, which so pervaded the compositions of the 17th century that baroque music is easily distinguished. Pieces such as the , Marais’ painful look at a gall bladder operation, and certain Scarlatti works all demonstrate how music could be used to describe words, feelings, emotions. Emotions of the 17th century were known as affects.
Instrumental music of the 17th century was heavily influenced by vocal music. Froberger took lute music and transcribed it for harpsichord at a time when stile brise was popular and the fashionable ‘in’ music thing of the day was to play the harpsichord like a lute.
The echo effect found in Biagio Marini’s echo tunes from Willaert, Monteverdi, and Gabrielli’s use of St. Mark’s Cathedral the idea of choir against choirs or in other terms what we can call the echo effect, influenced much of the instrumental music of the 17th century.
Dancing is also, and has been since the foundation of human recreations, being an inseparable part of music gave way to comparisons in the suite style found so often in music of this period. The ouverture or opening being stately and pompous, with the lilted dotted eighths connected to a 16th note was followed by fugal imitative sections born from the ricecare of the old style. The musical form of the sonata developed from the divisive sections of the canzona becoming a cantata to be sounded. The concerto in the same vein, was born out of a desire to bring diverse factors,… together, a tutti.

Music in the court of Louis the XIV

Like other rulers of nations, Loius XIV wanted a more united kip-[oooooooooooooooto rule over, that had as little threat of insurrection as possible. King Louis often used music and dance to his advantage. We see this from the fact that he required the members of his court to be skilled in both music and dancing. By keeping the nobility engaged in aesthetical endeavors such as dance and music, he also knew that this would keep at least his upper class from forming rebellious or non-loyal parties that detracted from his overall power as king.
Jean Baptiste Lully was in charge of all aspects of music while alive during the reign of Louis XIV. All of the composers within France were responsible for the strong heritage which they carried down from the many musical forefathers, carrying the tradition onward of Leonin and Perotin was no small feat. The composer’s works had to be inspected for content in regards to the French state. Lully himself was afforded more freedom in his own compositions due to his closeness to the king.
During the reign of Louis the 14th, the violin consort became most eminent. The king had in his personal orchestra exactly 24 violins. This in itself is proof as to the importance of music in French and this king’s sphere of influence. Upon the death of Lully, who died after accidentally stabbing his foot with his conductors stick which turned gangrenous. It was Michel Laland who succeeded Lully, and who also served the king being accountable for the music of the court.
The problem was to make French operas. To give French pride in their language. To use the recitative like the Italians, and make it their own. The recitatif. What the French did was to change meters occasionally to emphasize the text so that important syllables of important words came on te down beats correctly, thus the music changed meter accordingly 4/4 to ¾. Since Louis XIV himself was also a part of plays, dramas, skits etc, we can see how important he viewed music as pertaining to his kingdom and nobility.