We will study Claudio Monteverdi at this juncture as his music  represents the transition from both the Renaissance and Baroque periods. His music, especially his madrigals, demonstrates the transition from  late Renaissance to early Baroque style.  His first four books of madrigals feature the late Renaissance style that you hear in “Ecco mormorar l’onde.” Starting with the fifth book of madrigals, he adopts the new practices that we’ll come to know as early Baroque style.  Note the discussion of  prima pratica and seconda pratica  later in this topic.  See Evolution of Tonalilty: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/vccs-tcc-music-rford/wp-admin/post.php?post=2013&action=edit

Monteverdi’s  development of the solo song in opera leads  to  the expression  of individual feelings and emotions not characteristic of the Renaissance. The solo song (monody)  gives the music of the Baroque a new dimension of expression. We also  discuss in this module the Florentine Camerata  – a group of  musicians and composers for Florence who promoted monody and the solo song.

Introduction

Figure 1. Monteverdi by Bernardo Strozzi, c. 1630

Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi (15 May 1567 (baptized)–29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, singer and Roman Catholic priest.

Life

Claudio Monteverdi was born in 1567 in Cremona, Lombardy. His father was Baldassare Monteverdi, a doctor, apothecary and amateur surgeon. He was the oldest of five children. During his childhood, he was taught by Marc’Antonio Ingegneri, the maestro di cappella at the Cathedral of Cremona.  Monteverdi learned about music as a member of the cathedral choir. He also studied at the University of Cremona. His first music  written for publication included  some motets and sacred madrigals, in 1582 and 1583. His first five publications were 1582 (a collection of miniature motets); 1583 (a volume of which only the bass partbook is extant); 1584 (a collection of three-voice canzonettes); and the five-part madrigals Book I, 1587, and Book II, 1590. He worked at the court of Vincenzo I of Gonzaga in Mantua as a vocalist and viol player, then as music director. In 1602, he was the court conductor.  In 1612 Vincenzo,   Monteverdi’s employer,  died and was succeeded by his eldest son Francesco who, heavily in debt, released Monteverdi. He then spent a year in Mantua without any paid employment. His 1607 opera L’Orfeo was dedicated to Francesco.

Figure 2. The only certain portrait of Claudio Monteverdi, from the title page of Fiori poetici, a 1644 book of commemorative poems for his funeral

By 1613, he had moved to San Marco in Venice where, as conductor, he quickly restored the musical standard of both the choir and the instrumentalists which . had declined due to the financial mismanagement of his predecessor, Giulio Cesare Martinengo.

In 1632, he became a priest. During the last years of his life, when he was often ill, he composed his two last masterpieces: Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria (The Return of Ulysses, 1641), and the historic opera L’incoronazione di Poppea (The Coronation of Poppea, 1642), based on the life of the Roman emperor Nero. L’incoronazione especially is considered a culminating point of Monteverdi’s work. It contains tragic, romantic, and comic scenes (a new development in opera), a more realistic portrayal of the characters, and warmer melodies than previously heard. It requires a smaller orchestra, and has a less prominent role for the choir. For a long period of time, Monteverdi’s operas were merely regarded as a historical or musical interest. Since the 1960s, The Coronation of Poppea has re-entered the repertoire of major opera companies worldwide.

Monteverdi died, aged 76, in Venice on 29 November 1643 and was buried at the church of the Frari.

Madrigals

Until the age of forty, Monteverdi worked primarily on madrigals, composing a total of nine books. It took Monteverdi about four years to finish his first book of twenty-one madrigals for five voices.
The first eight books of madrigals show the enormous development from Renaissance polyphonic music to the monodic style typical of Baroque music.

http://www3.cpdl.org/wiki/index.php/Cor_mio,_mentre_vi_miro_(Claudio_Monteverdi)    (Sources for translations below)

Italian text
Cor mio, mentre vi miro,
visibilmente mi trasformo in voi,
e trasformato poi,
in un solo sospir l’anima spiro.
O bellezza mortale,
O bellezza vitale,
poiché sí tosto un core
per te rinasce, e per te nato more.

English translation
Oh my heart, while I watch you,
I am patently transformed in you,
and, once transformed,
in a single breath I exhale my spirit.
Oh, mortal beauty,Oh, vital beauty,
because a heart quickly lives again
for you; and for you, if alive, it dies

The Fifth Madrigal Book

Latin text Felle amaro me potavit populus et aceto; non illi dedi amaras aquas in deserto, sed latices suaves. Viri aspide surda surdiores et saeviores, quid a me vultis adhuc? Jam moriar pro vobis. English translation Translation by Carlos Augusto Mourão The multitude gave me bitter gall to drink and vinegar; I did not give them bitter waters in the desert, but sweet fluids. O men, more insensible and savage than a furtive snake, what do you still want from me? Just now, I shall die for you.

The Fifth Book of Madrigals shows the shift from the late Renaissance style of music to the early Baroque. Listen to the madrigals –  Fair  Phyllis and  As Vesta from the previous module   https://courses.lumenlearning.com/vccs-tcc-music-rford/chapter/renaissance-secular-music/  and compare to the selections  by Monteverdi below!  The Quinto Libro (Fifth Book), published in 1605, was at the heart of the controversy between Monteverdi and Giovanni Artusi. Artusi attacked the “crudities” and “license” of the modern style of composing, centering his attacks on madrigals (including Cruda Amarilli, (above)  composed around 1600.  Monteverdi made his reply  with a proposal of the division of musical practice into two streams, which he called prima pratica, and seconda pratica. Prima pratica was described as the previous polyphonic ideal of the sixteenth century, with flowing strict counterpoint, prepared dissonance, and equality of voices. Seconda pratica used much freer counterpoint with an increasing hierarchy of voices, emphasizing soprano and bass. In Prima pratica the harmony controls the words. In Seconda pratica the words should be in control of the harmonies.   This represented a move towards the new style of monody. The introduction of continuo in many of the madrigals was a further self-consciously modern feature. In addition, the fifth book showed the beginnings of conscious functional tonality.

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/vccs-tc-mus121-1/wp-admin/post.php?post=104&action=edit