Full Answer
What was the purpose of the Florentine Camerata?
The Florentine Camerata, also known as the Camerata de' Bardi, were a group of humanists, musicians, poets and intellectuals in late Renaissance Florence who gathered under the patronage of Count Giovanni de' Bardi to discuss and guide trends in the arts, especially music and drama.
How did the Camerata contribute to the development of dramatic music?
While propounding a revival of the Greek dramatic style, the Camerata's musical experiments led to the development of the stile recitativo. In this way it facilitated the composition of dramatic music and the development of opera .
How did the Camerata revive Greek tragedy in Italy?
…out of experiments by the Camerata, a Florentine society of poets and musicians that at the end of the 16th century sought to revive Greek tragedy. The men who formed the Camerata believed that the Greeks had originally recited or chanted their plays to music, and in setting out to…
Who were some of the members of the Camerata?
Less prominent members of the Camerata may have included the musicians Emilio de' Cavalieri, Francesco Cini, Cristoforo Malvezzi, and Alessandro Striggio. Literary figures included Giovanni Battista Guarini, Gabriello Chiabrera, and Giovanni Battista Strozzi the younger.
What genre did Florentine Camerata create?
opera3 The Florentine Camerata, 3. Tendencies. Therefore, the Camerata's attempts to infuse polyphonic compositions with ancient Greek dramatic elements were never intended to establish a new genre of music: opera; rather to make better polyphonic music of the day.
What was the purpose of the Florentine Camerata?
About 1573 he founded the Florentine Camerata, a group that sought to revive ancient Greek music and drama. Among the members were the theorist Vincenzo Galilei (father of Galileo) and the composer Giulio Caccini. Bardi collaborated with these and other Florentine musicians in court entertainments from 1579 to 1608.
Which style of music was developed by the Florentine Camerata during the Baroque era?
The group of early Baroque writers, artists, and musicians whose aim was to resurrect the musical drama of ancient Greece was known as: the Florentine Camerata. The ideas and music of the Florentine Camerata led the way directly toward: the development of opera.
What was the model that the Florentine Camerata used for early operas?
The musical style which developed from these early experiments was called monody. In the 1590s, the monody developed into a vehicle capable of extended dramatic expression through the work of composers such as Jacopo Peri, working in conjunction with poet Ottavio Rinuccini.
Why were Castratos important and unique in baroque opera?
Why were castratos important and unique? They had the lung power of men and vocal range of a woman.
Why were castrati used in Baroque music?
In full regalia, with the grandest orchestras, the greatest composers, and in the finest operas of the time, these singers were the at the pinnacle of baroque and classical music. These were the castrati, boys who had been castrated to prevent natural human growth and preserve their high voices.
What are some reasons why arias became the most popular part of operas?
Arias became the focal point of operas because they... are more expressive than recitative. Which of the following terms does not describe some aspect of a system for improvising an accompaniment? Why were castrati used in baroque music?
Who was the founder of the Florentine Camerata?
About 1573 he founded the Florentine Camerata, a group that sought to revive ancient Greek music and drama. Among the members were the theorist Vincenzo Galilei (father of Galileo) and the composer Giulio Caccini. Bardi collaborated with these and other Florentine musicians in court entertainments ...
What was the influence of the Camerata on opera?
influence on opera. In Western theatre: Opera. …out of experiments by the Camerata, a Florentine society of poets and musicians that at the end of the 16th century sought to revive Greek tragedy. The men who formed the Camerata believed that the Greeks had originally recited or chanted their plays to music, and in setting out to….
What was the Venetian opera like?
Venetian operas were very spectacular; never in theatrical history have scenic artists and engineers shown greater cunning. Fantastic transformations from one scene to another took place before the audience’s eyes; gods descended from what looked like real clouds, or appeared from apparently real sea. All this, added to wonderful Italian voices and superb music, made opera spread through Italy and much of Europe like wildfire.
What was Monteverdi's position in Venice?
So, in 1613, when he was offered the post of Master Musician of St. Mark’s Cathedral in Venice – the most important musical post in Italy – he took it eagerly.
What is an aria in music?
An aria is simply an elaborate song, and in the hands of great composers, from Monteverdi to Verdi, it has been a way of making music, through the human voice, express drama, pathos and, sometimes, comedy – a sort of miniature opera in itself. But at this time arias, however beautiful, had become undramatic and rigid in shape. No wonder the great English writer, Doctor Johnson, called the Italian opera of his day ‘an exotic and irrational entertainment’. Only in the brilliant comic operas of Naples, in Italy, was there to be found real vitality and humanity. Fortunately, as we shall see, these influenced operatic history.
Why did opera survive?
Opera survived because of the popularity and brilliance of the singers, especially the male sopranos and altos, whose voices were likened to silver trumpets. On one occasion, in fact, one of them, the great Farinelli, left a famous trumpet player gasping for breath as he continued to trill, crescendo and soar with undiminished vigour.
Why were words important in opera?
Words were at first still more important than the music, the singing being in the form of ‘recitative’, or musical declamation, which heightened the dramatic effect of the story.
Which country gave the world a new form of art?
Yet it was Italy , leader of the revival of interest in art, politics and learning known as the Renaissance Movement, that once again gave the world a new form of art – the form which today we call opera.
Who was the first opera composer?
Monteverdi, the first great opera composer, died in 1643, only 46 years after the ‘invention’ of opera in Italy, and opera then entered a most extraordinary period. It was enormously popular in much of Europe, yet nearly all the operas of this time seem to us today to be dry museum pieces. What went wrong, and how did opera survive?
What style of music did the Camerata use?
Largely concerned with a revival of the Greek dramatic style, the Camerata's musical experiments led to the development of the stile recitativo. Cavalieri was the first to employ the new recitative style, trying his creative hand at a few pastoral scenes. The style later became primarily linked with the development of opera.
What was the Camerata's criticism of contemporary music?
The criticism of contemporary music by the Camerata centered on the overuse of polyphony at the expense of the sung text's intelligibility. Excessive counterpoint offended so the ears of the Camerata because it muddled the affetto (the "affection") of the important visceral reaction in poetry. It is the job of the composer to communicate the affetto into an audible, comprehensible sound. Intrigued by ancient descriptions of the emotional and moral effect of ancient Greek tragedy and comedy, which they presumed to be sung as a single line to a simple instrumental accompaniment, the Camerata proposed creating a new kind of music. Instead of trying to make the clearest polyphony they could, the Camerata voiced an opinion recorded by a contemporary Florentine, "means must be found in the attempt to bring music closer to that of classical times."
What was the Camerata de Bardi?
The Florentine Camerata, also known as the Camerata de' Bardi, was a group of humanists, musicians, poets and intellectuals in late Renaissance Florence who gathered under the patronage of Count Giovanni de' Bardi to discuss and guide trends in the arts, especially music and drama. They met at the house of Giovanni de' Bardi, and their gatherings had the reputation of having all the most famous men of Florence as frequent guests. After first meeting in 1573, the activity of the Camerata reached its height between 1577 and 1582. While propounding a revival of the Greek dramatic style, the Camerata's musical experiments led to the development of the stile recitativo. In this way it facilitated the composition of dramatic music and the development of opera.
Who was Vincenzo Galilei trained in?
In his formative days, Vincenzo Galilei was trained in music theory by the famed Gioseffo Zarlino. In 1582 Vincenzo Galilei performed a setting, that he composed himself, of Ugolino's lament from Dante 's Inferno. Caccini also is known to have performed several of his own songs which were more or less chanted melodically over a simple chordal accompaniment. The Camerata composers sought to recreate the style of Greek music, even though actual transcribed Greek music had been lost for centuries.
What was the first opera?
In 1598, Peri and Rinuccini produced Dafne, an entire drama sung in monodic style: this was the first creation of a new form called "opera". Though Peri's Dafne was the first performed opera, its music has been lost to the centuries. Instead, L'Euridice, his second opera is most-often heralded as the history-making work. The new form of opera also borrowed, especially for the librettos, from an existing pastoral poetic form called the intermedio; it was mainly the musical style that was new. The instrumentation for an opera from the Camerata composers (Caccini and Peri) was written for a handful of gambas, lutes, and harpsichord or organ for continuo.