1. MUH 3211 - Music History I The Renaissance: Prelude
11/13/2018
Part II
The Renaissance: Prelude
DAY 13 (4 Oct 17)

2. The Renaissance “Rebirth” of ideas from Classical Antiquity
c – 1600 (roughly for music)
Fall of Constantinople to Turks (1453) - Scholars of Greek flee west to….
Italy – Center of Western revival - rising population, resources, city-states - e.g., Cosimo de’ Medici (Florence)
“Low Countries” – major source of patronage
HRE – expands powers & influences
Spain – expulsion of Muslims; Empire

3. Humanism Based in pre-Christian thought
Dignity of humanity and human values
Allows religion, but challenges faith w/ reason
Importance of empirical evidence (science) - e.g., Lorenzo Valla, De falso credita…. - D. Erasmus – skepticism
Protestant Reformation (Luther, 1517) - challenges to Christian belief - Counter-Reformation

4. Pietro Perugino (1446/52-1523), Delivery of the Keys (1480-81, Sistine Chapel)

5. Painting and Sculpture
MUH Music History I
11/13/2018
Painting and Sculpture
Realism (vs. Medieval)
Use of linear perspective
Individual character of model
Human figure (nude)
Donatello, David (1430) commissioned by Cosimo de’ Medici
DAY 13 (4 Oct 17)

6. Music
Increase in Secular music and musicians - reflects rising power of courts as patrons - cappella (musicians supported by patron)
Mobility of musicians - Low countries to Italy, elsewhere - contracts of limited duration
Church as major patron
Printing Press increases distribution (post 1501)
New approach to sound: "Quam Pulchra Es“ Anthology I/31

7. Martin le Franc Le Champion des Dames (1440-42)
Tapissier, Carmen, Cesaris Not long ago sang so well that they astonished all Paris and all who came to hear them. But never did they discant such finely wrought melody— so I was told by those who heard them— as G. Du Fay and Binchois. For they have a new practice of making lively consonance in both loud and soft music, in feigning, in rests, and in mutations. They took on the guise of the English and follow Dunstable and thereby a marvelous pleasingness makes their music joyous and remarkable.

8. “The English Sound”
John Dunstable (c ) - in service to Duke of Bedford
Hundred Years’ War ( )
Contact w/ Burgundian musicians, e.g., Du Fay, Binchois, et al.
Preference to: - thirds (consonant interval!) - triadic sonorities (chords!) - melody in top voice
Faburden: Du Fay “Conditor...” Anthology I/32
G. Binchois: “De plus en plus” (Chanson)

9. Guillaume Du Fay (c )
Born in “Low Countries” (Franco-Flemish)
Worked in: Cambrai, Rimini/Pesaro (Italy), Cambrai, Bologna (Italy), Rome (Papal Choir!), Savoy, for Pope (Florence/Bologna), Cambrai, etc.
Sacred and Secular compositions (as jobs require)
Masses (settings of Ordinary) and Motets - cantus firmus technique
Chansons
The leading composer of 15th century

10. Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore (Florence, 1296-1436)