Transcript Music Image Text middle ages

Music Image
Text
Dark Ages
600-1000 AD
Broad statements about
general trends
Dark, but not completely
Book of Dimma, 8th century pocket gospel
St. Patrick converts the
Irish to
Christianity in 5th century
The Irish take very well to
Christianity.
Later the Irish missionaries
will be influential in
converting the Germanic
people on the continent
Monasticism and Ireland
Remote, pre-Christian
In Irish myth, the king of the
world lived here
Beehive hut of Irish monks at Skellig Michael
visit skellig Michael
Hiberno-Saxon
Ireland never a Roman colony
No history of literacy
Monastic system rather than
bishopricsSt. Columba established
monasteries in Scotland,
Europe
Colonies of married monks
Oratory of St. Columba, 9th c.Crosses of Kells
St. Columbs house
Rise of Manuscript
Coincided with spread of Christianity
Useful for conversion
Importance of Irish monasteries
Scriptoriums were commissioned to
produce
small pocket gospels
books for study
display bibles
Book of Durrow, Carpet Page
660-80
The interlace patterns of the Irish Celts
combine with the Zoomorphic patterns
of the Anglo-Saxons – Germanic tribes
settling in England at the demise of the
Roman Empire
Below, Sutton Hoo purse-ship burial,
Suffolk 6th century
Lindisfarne Gospel, Carpet Page
698 CE
Lindisfarne Gospel, Carpet Page
698 CE
Lindisfarne Gospel, Gospel of
Matthew
698 CE
Book of Kells
documentary Kells
Pocket Gospel
Chi-rho page
Irish spirituality does
not see division of
material and spiritual
Chi-Rho
Page of Book of
Kells
Detail
Documentary
Anglo-Saxons and their Poetry
Venerable Bede- 8th c. Latin Historian:
they came from Angeln, Saxony and
Jutland. Now it is thought they also
came from the region of Holland and
Scandinavia
Invaded England at end of Roman period
Brought with them a rich literary
tradition
Anglo-Saxons – used as mercenaries to defend RomanoBritain against the Picts (fierce people in present day
Scotland)
Along with literary tradition, brought metal work
Sutton Hoo ship burial, 7th century. Purse cover. Cloisonne enamel, glass, ivory, gems. gold
Anglo-Saxon culture
Tribal/ greatest
bond between lord
and his kin
Sense of loss when honor is
broken
Mournful poetry – reflective of
harsh living conditions
The first two lines of the seventh century poem called
"Caedmon's Hymn" illustrate the metrical structure of
Anglo-Saxon poetry:
[HE AERest sceop // AELda BEarnum]
(He first made // for the children of men)
[HEOfon to HROfe // HALig SCYPpend]
(Heaven as a roof // Holy Creator)
reading Anglo-saxon
Literary devices (later supplanted by FrenchNormans)
Alliteration – repeating of consonant sounds
Two half lines, 2 stresses per half line
# of unstressed syllables vary, alliteration occurs on
stressed syllables
Kennings – compound descriptive phrases standing for
a thing –
concrete
Interesting, evocative, mysterious, visual,
ambiguous ex: “Whale –road”
I'm a strange creature, for I satisfy women,
a service to the neighbours! No one suffers
at my hands except for my slayer.
I grow very tall, erect in a bed,
I'm hairy underneath. From time to time
a good-looking girl, the doughty daughter
of some churl dares to hold me,
grips my russet skin, robs me of my head
and puts me in the pantry. At once that girl
with plaited hair who has confined me
remembers our meeting. Her eye moistens.
Standardizing Church Music
Pope Gregory – 6th century
Called for missions to England and to
Europe
Standardized music- called for a
collecting of chants
“Gregorian Chant” or “plain song”
Ave Maria Star of the Ocean
Monastery of St. Gall, founded in the 7th century. St. Gall was an Irish monk and
follower of St. Columb. Switzerland. Part of Carolingian Renaissance.
The oldest preserved plan for an
abbey
This plan for St. Gall dates from
the 11th century
From the Carolingian period, this
Abbey’s library was rich in
manuscripts – now has 130,000
books
The text to a 9th century plain
song was found there
Ave Maria Star of the Ocean
Plain song: single melody line, monophonic
Simple, repeated - Conducive to meditation and prayer
Used during the offices of the monks daily routine: 8-10 small services
Unadorned, unaccompanied
No regular beat (Church frowned upon)
Plain song
Thousands of musicians, writing anonymously
Not the only kind of music in the Dark Ages, but only recorded
music
Greatest single body of musical work in western music
High Middle Ages 1000-1400 C.E
Trade resuming
Safety returning
Technologies make specialization and urbanization
possible
Fall of Toledo in 1085 – Islamic Spain
provided Christian Europe with a treasure of
information
High Middle Ages 1000-1400 C.E
Interdependence of Cities
University of Paris, Cambridge – independent from
monasteries and Feudal system
Growth of secular courts – before only Church or Feudal
Translation of Greek and Latin texts into Vernacular
Invention of polyphony:
900-1000
2 or more principle melodies
heard simultaneously
Quantum leap from monophony
New concept of “composer”
Need universally understood
system of musical notation
Leonin pascha nostrum
Organum: two part polyphonic
composition
Plainchant in the lower, and stretched
out voice-Voice of God
Tenore (to stretch out) Gothic Music
Documentary 11 minutes in
University of Paris – Ars Antiqua
Florid style
Complexity of divisions of syllable
Sung over several notes
Halleluiah is the only word sung in the
plain chant
Decorative higher voice – man’s
embellishment- ego of the composer
11th and 12th c. contact with
foreign traditions, through trade
stimulated by crusades
The ballad style, musical instruments
and ensemble traditions of Islamic
cultural centers influence the poetry
and songs of the troubadours and
minnesingers.
Combination of sensuality and spiritual
devotion
When I behold the lark
Themes of unrequited love, the
passages of time, joys of spring
When I behold the lark upspring
To meet the bright sun joyfully,
How he forgets to poise his wing
In his gay spirit's revelry,
Alas! that mournful thoughts should spring
E'en from that happy songster's glee!
Strange, that such gladdening sight should bring
Not joy, but pining care to me!
I thought my heart had known the whole
Of love, but small its knowledge proved.
For still the more my longing soul
Loves on, itself the while unloved:
She stole my heart, myself she stole,
And all I prized from me removed;
She left me but the fierce control
Of vain desires for her I loved.
All self-command is now gone by,
E'er since the luckless hour when she
Became a mirror to my eye,
Whereon I gazed complacently.
Thou fatal mirror! there I spy
Love's image; and my doom shall be,
Like young Narcissus, thus to sigh,
And thus expire, beholding thee.
Troubadour songs, put to music, are
monophonic
(consisting solely of unharmonized
melody) and comprise a major extant body
of medieval secular music. Somewhat
fewer than 300 melodies survive.
14th Century – Late Middle Ages
Well ordered world of Feudalism and Catholic Church
coming to an end – theocratic age of Christian centuries lasts
800 years
Catastrophies:
Church losing power to cities and secular kings
Great schism 1305-75 (3 popes)
High living of Clergy
Plague
Peasant Insurrections
14th century
Chaucer
Canterbury Tales in Middle English
Dante’s Inferno (Divine Comedy) in
Italian
French Courtly Style
becomes the International
style of Illustration
Book of Hours – devotional
books interpreted in very
worldly terms
The Very Rich Hours of Duc de Berry,
Burgundian King
Notre Dame and University of Paris -birth of Secular
Ars Nova – the new art of song
Complexity carried to the extremes
Isorhythms – two songs, independent of each other
Rhythm and pitch treated as separate elements
Consonance, dissonance
2 separate love songs: male soprano/80 notes –repeated
tenor/40 notes –repeated
instrumental plainchant holding it
together
Motet
Lai
Machaut Motet Notre Dame Mass
Ars Nova Guillame de Machaut (Mah-sho)
Developed secular musical forms: ballade, motet (also used
in religious music), and the lai.
The motet form is often uses secular ballades and love songs,
but it also relies on the structure of the medieval plain song.
The layering of voices singing at different rhythms, pitches
and often in different languages delighted the late medieval
intellectual mind. Compositions became puzzles.
Machaut composed first complete Mass in a unified setting
that we know of. His Mass of Our Lady combines the various
songs, yet does not have a unified melodic theme or a tonal
center. Different parts are sung in different modes.
virtual piano
Messe de Notre Dame
Parts of a Mass
Mauchat’s unified mass was not the first, but was the first
by a known composer
Kyrie eleison ("Lord, have mercy")
Gloria ("Glory to God in the highest")
Credo ("I believe in one God"), the Nicene Creed
Sanctus ("Holy, Holy, Holy"), the second part of which,
beginning with the word "Benedictus" ("Blessed is he"), was
often sung separately after the consecration, if the setting was
long. (See Benedictus for other chants beginning with that
word.)
Agnus Dei ("Lamb of God")
Messe de Notre Dame
Power of the Past Documentary