The most important Renaissance composers

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1. John Howell says

   January 27, 2012 at 11:06 am

   Philip et al.:  The “significance” of any individual composer is of course a matter of opinion, and therefore reflects the many opinions of the many scholars who have considered the matter and actually expressed their opinions.  If you want to list little-known composers just go back to Gustave Reese’s formidable tome on Renaissance Music (now replaced in Norton’s lineup with the infinitely more readable study by Alan Atlas).

    

   But it’s also true that composers were significant for very different reasons.  Some simply lived through tranistion points when styles were going through radical changes, well-trained and capable of working in the older styles but pioneering the newer.  Those would include DuFay, Monteverdi, and later on Beethoven.  Others worked within the existing style but brought it to a high point through their own creative gifts, like Josquin summing up the early Renaissance style, Palestrina the later Renaissance, Bach the Baroque, and so on.  And some were kept on artificial life support past the natural span of their music’s influence through extrinsic factors:  Josquin when his music’s popularity coincided with Petrucci’s pioneering work in music publishing; Palestrina when he became the darling of music theorists.  While others’ music fell completely out of fashion and was forgotten until being “rediscovered” by later generations, Bach being the most prominent and being helped along by the German philosophers’ concentration on the idea of society moving forward solely through the work of “Great Men.”

    

   And some, like Telemann, have been remarkably slow to be rediscovered in spite of having huge reputations in their own lifetimes, but were highly significant simply because they WERE working within an existing style matrix and turning out large amounts of very excellent music, year after year, in many DIFFERENT styles that demonstrated a thorough grasp of the music of their time while not being especially pioneering, working musicians like Lasso and Telemann whose total output was of remakably high quality.

    

   The problem with Survey courses–and I teach them too!–is that we have to hit just the high spots and often forget to emphasize that the composers we mention are often known to us only by historical accident, and really represent not just hundreds but thousands of working musicians who were turning out reams of new music every week to fill the needs of church, court, and society in general. 

    

   And a problem for us as teachers is how to present this material.  A music theory approach will search for perfect single examples of each separate type of music that they (or we) consider important.  A music history approach will be more concerned with how that music fits into its existing society, into that composer’s total output, or how it did or did not inspire and influence the next generations.  When Frederich Chrysander coined the term “Musikwissenschaft” (Music Science) in 1863 to describe the work being done by the Bach Gesellschaft, he didn’t divide it into music theory and music history the way we do today; they were simply studying the MUSIC, and along the way also studying the musician!

    

   But looking for “popularity” is a losing proposition, because there’s really nothing to measure that represents true popularity.  The modern concept of “Greatest Hits” depended on the sales of sheet music and the number of plays on juke boxes and on the radio, all of which could be measured with reasonable accuracy.  There are no such figures available when probably 50% of the music ever printed has been lost, and more like 90% of music created before music printing became possible.  And I forget who said it, but there are “lies, damn lies, and statistics,” because statistics can be perfectly true but the implications twisted to support pre-existing beliefs.  And Dennis obviously understands that perfectly well.

   All the best,

   John

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2. Sig Rosen says

   January 27, 2012 at 8:25 am

   How to define ‘significant’?

   Not familiarity, nor popular appeal, which leaves progressive /pioneering/historical/artistic importance.

   Think most will forward their own such lists based upon -predilictions and- like marriages- propinquity.

   Suggest assigning a research based upon discovering one/four NOT so listed!

   Those deemed significant by the students to be shared with all. The process will grow them.

   SIR

   http://www.renaissancechorus.org

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