The Late Seventeenth Century

The Late Seventeenth Century

Opera in seventeenth-century France

• Absolute monarchy — established by Cardinal Richelieu under Louis XIII

• Académies– 1635 Académie française (for belles lettres) set up

by Richelieu — rationalistic, idealistic, classicistic in sense of restraint, balance

– Académie de musique (1669)• Ballet de cour

– social, participatory with courtiers as dancers– danced in center space in open hall– included instrumental music, spoken narrative and

dialogue, airs• Opera’s arrival in France

– Italian works during regency of Anne of Austria (1643–1653)

– nationalism — exploited by librettist Pierre Perrin (ca. 1620–1675) under Louis XIV

Jean-Baptiste Lully (1632–1687)

• Florentine, moved to Paris 1646• Instrumental composer to Louis XIV from 1653

– member of existing Vingt-quatre violons du roi– Petits violons (sixteen, later twenty-one) under

Lully from 1656 set new performance standards– superintendent of music from 1661

• Comédies-ballets with Molière 1663–1672, e.g., Le bourgeois gentilhomme 1670– fused music, dance, poetry — developing style– influence of Italian pastoral operas, French ballet

de cour• 1672 — took over Académie de musique —

complete control of musical life in France

Tragédies lyriques• Lully and Philippe Quinault (1635–1688)• Mythological plots with allegorical allusions to

France and king• French style

– five acts — Classic model from Greek antiquity– emphasis on ballet derived from ballet de cour

tradition– more chorus than contemporary Italian opera– spectacle — machines, sets– récitatif — carries action, carefully measured,

simple– air modeled on French air de cour —

nondramatic, often employs dance rhythms and forms

– functions of instrumental music• articulative — especially overture• dramatic — accompaniment to singing• dance accompaniments

English music in the late seventeenth century

• Isolation — especially under Cromwell and Commonwealth 1649–1660

• Restoration began to recover court following French model

English church music in the seventeenth century

• Beginning of century continued music of English Reformation– Services– full and verse anthems

• Church musicians abolished under Puritan regime

• Restoration recovered choral music tradition, including concerted compositions

Instrumental music in England

• Keyboard tradition from sixteenth century– dances– variation sets

• Ensemble music – fantasy (fancy) for consort of viols– later, Italian-style sonatas

Musical drama during the Restoration period

• Theater music tradition of court masque– recitatives– songs– choruses– dances

• Theater suppressed during Commonwealth — concerts still permitted

• Opera after the Stuart Restoration still very limited

Henry Purcell (1659–1695)• Time of Stuart Restoration, worked in court

and Westminster Abbey• Sacred works associated with church

employment — anthems, services• Dramatic music for court milieu– opera Dido and Aeneas– semiopera, e.g., The Fairy Queen

• Odes and welcome songs — royal welcomes, weddings, birthdays, St. Cecilia’s Day

• Songs• Instrumental — keyboard, ensemble

(fantasies, sonatas, etc.)

Spanish opera in the seventeenth century

• Based on pastoral court entertainment tradition — use of mythical, allegorical plots

• Solo singing– all female in leading parts — except for

comic male peasant– not separated into distinct style of

recitative and aria but used strophic songs for both dialogue and affective moments

• Spanish instrumentation — continuo uses harp and guitar

• Choruses in familiar style

Neapolitan opera in the late seventeenth century

• Naples as focus of stylistic progress in Italy

• Sharp distinctions– serious vs. comic scenes — later to be

split away– solo almost completely displaces chorus,

mostly displaces ensembles– recitative extremely differentiated from

aria — differentiated as simple, accompagnato; arioso

Da capo aria design

A Ritornello home keySolo modulatingRitornello contrast keySolo modulatingRitornello home

keyB Solo modulating

A da capo — ornamented in performance

Cantata

• Chamber vocal genre (cubicularis) for– voice (possibly voices)– continuo (possibly obbligato instruments)

• Multiple movements• Vocal styles of opera– recitative– aria

Later seventeenth-century instrumental genres

Organ music, Suite, Sonata, Concerto

German organ music in the late seventeenth century

German organ music in the late seventeenth century

Two classifications of organ compositions• Frei — figurational material; free from

contrapuntal texture– prelude, toccata, etc.

• Gebunden — based on established melodic material, follows contrapuntal rules– chorale-based pieces– fugues

Chorale settings for organ

• Chorale fugue — chorale melody treated in fugal texture

• Chorale fantasia — extended elaborations of each phrase with repetitions and interruptions in c.f.

• Chorale prelude — one more-or-less continuous statement of chorale melody as c.f. – c.f. with or without ornamentation —

ornamentation usually only if c.f. is soprano– accompaniment either independent or

derivative — Vorimitation• Chorale partita — series of short chorale

settings in contrasting styles– alternatim usage in service — organ, choir,

congregation

Fugue• Antecedents – sixteenth-century imitative pieces based on

vocal models — ricercar (from motet) and canzona (from chanson)

– early seventeenth-century monothematic fantasia or ricercar

• Theoretical and stylistic principles in mature fugue– monothematicism– subjects more instrumental in melodic and

rhythmic profile, unlike ricercar and fantasia– tonal answer– countersubject– tonal unity and plan for entire piece– pedal point — especially approaching final

cadence– stretto, especially for end of piece

The French keyboard suite (ordre)

• Importance of dance — court ballet tradition

• Harpsichord — intimate style suited to taste of courtly amateurs

• Rhythm — derived from dance styles• Melody — agréments; ornamented

doubles• Forms– binary dance form — variety of midpoint

cadence choices– rondeau

Standard order of dances in the late seventeenth-century

suiteDerived from publication of suites by Johann Jacob Froberger (1616–1667)

• Allemande — duple meter, moderate tempo

• Courante — flowing triple meter (often with hemiola)

• Sarabande — slow triple meter, emphasis on second beat 2 of the measure

• Gigue — fast compound meter

Two important French suite composers

• Elisabeth-Claude Jacquet de la Guerre (1665–1729)

• François Couperin "le grand" (1668–1733) — often used descriptive titles rather than dance names, turning dance movements into character pieces

Sonata• Scoring– violin(s) or other melodic instruments and

b.c.– instrumental idiom, not vocal style

• Ensembles– trio sonata — duet and b.c.• most popular• combines clarity of b.c. texture with

polyphonic interest– solo sonata — solo and b.c.• allows for more virtuosity

• Major composer — Arcangelo Corelli (1653–1713)

Sonata types

• Sonata da camera (chamber sonata)– stylized dances — actually a dance suite

• Sonata da chiesa (church sonata)– abstract movements (at least ostensibly)– alternating tempos, usually slow-fast-

slow-fast

Concerto

• Derived from sonata by reinforcing some passages with multiple instruments

• Two major composers– Giuseppe Torelli (1658–1709) —

established structural principles– Antonio Vivaldi (1678–1741) — worked

out types of material to exploit principles of form

Concerto types

• Ripieno (full) concerto — uses all instruments freely

• Solo concerto — solo vs. ripieno group• Concerto grosso — concertino group

(often trio group) vs. ripieno

Form in the Baroque concerto

• Three movements (usually) — fast, slow, fast

• Outer movements usually in ritornello form:

Ritornello

Solo Ritornello Solo Ritornello

Tutti Solo and b.c.

Tutti Solo and b.c.

Tutti

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Questions for discussion

• How did political structures affect musical life and express themselves through musical style in the late seventeenth century?

• Why would it be appropriate to describe a large Italian opera aria as a concerto movement for voice? What significant differences are there between the two structures?

• How did the idea of affective expression and of key center support large forms in instrumental and vocal music in the seventeenth century?