prima vs. seconda prattica
jmaryj...@my-deja.com
I'm curious of others views concerning the Monteverdi's distinctions
between 'prima' and 'seconda' prattica. Simplistically, it could be
discussed as the difference between the old style of polyphony and the
new style of monody (right?), but that can't be where it stops. In the
Artusi-Monteverdi dispute, what most often becomes an issue between the
old and new schools is the treatment of dissonances--what I'm unsure of
is what the exact distinction is in this light. Help?
JMJ
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
Sybrand Bakker
dissonance is allowed as
a) a passing note
b) a suspension
The seconda prattica allows and calls for *un*prepared dissonance both on
accented and unaccented beats for reasons of expression.
A typical example of this (albeit much later) is the chorus singing a 7 5
chord on the word "Barabbam" in the St. Matthew Passion.
Regards,
Sybrand Bakker
<jmaryj...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
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M. Schulter
: Hi there,
: I'm curious of others views concerning the Monteverdi's distinctions
: between 'prima' and 'seconda' prattica. Simplistically, it could be
: discussed as the difference between the old style of polyphony and the
: new style of monody (right?), but that can't be where it stops.
Hello, there, and I would say that the Seconda Prattica actually includes
much of the later 16th century, including madrigals in the usual vocal
format with progressive stylistic features, as well the new textures and
forms developing around 1600. The Monteverdi brothers themselves make this
clear when they name Cipriano de Rore (1516-1565, if I recall correctly)
as the founder of this practice, and mention various composers of the
middle to late 16th century including Wert, Ingegneri, and Marenzio, as
well as members of the Florentine Camerata and madrigalists of the new
generation such as Luzzasco and Gesualdo.
The distinction is not one between ensemble and monodic textures, but
rather one between styles which permit easily "intelligible" declamation
of the words and those felt to make the music the "mistress" rather than
servant of the words. The expressive use of chromaticism, dissonance,
unusual leaps, and the like, is part of the picture, but in my view
Seconda Prattica music can be and was written within the limits of the
usual 16th-century dissonance conventions as well as outside of them.
For example, Ingegneri -- Monteverdi's teacher -- wrote some Passion Week
settings in a clear declamatory and expressive style, but within the norms
of 16th-century practice.
It is interesting that Wert is claimed both by the Monteverdi brothers as
an exponent of the Seconda Prattica, and by Monteverdi's famous critic
Artusi as a composer who used many dissonances ("asperities"), but in an
acceptable way -- as opposed to the allegedly indefensible style of
Monteverdi.
The madrigals of Rore cited by the Monteverdi brothers as examples of the
Seconda Prattica are for the usual ensemble of voices; it is the
expressive technique that gives them their distinguishing quality.
From a theoretical point of view, I might argue that the Seconda Prattica
begins with Nicola Vicentino (1511-1576), who in his treatise of 1555
advocates such techniques as changes of mode, unusual leaps, chromatic and
enharmonic steps, and special dissonances to express a text. Although the
Monteverdi brothers do not mention him or his treatise, this composer and
author from Rore's era eloquently articulates the musical values of the
Seconda Prattica, values expressed for example in the unusual melodic
intervals of Wert as well as the new textures around 1600.
: In the
: Artusi-Monteverdi dispute, what most often becomes an issue between the
: old and new schools is the treatment of dissonances--what I'm unsure of
: is what the exact distinction is in this light. Help?
Interestingly, while dissonance is indeed the issue immediately focused,
the two sides in this debate draw the lines differently, as when both
claim Wert as a member of their camp.
For Artusi, both the composers of the Monteverdi brothers' Prima Prattica
(e.g. Josquin, Gombert, Willaert) and the "tasteful" ones assigned by
these brothers to the Seconda Prattica (e.g. Wert) follow certain
dissonance conventions which the "moderns" either ineptly or perversely
violate. From this point of view, dissonance _is_ the primary issue.
For the Monteverdi brothers, dissonance is _one_ technique for clearly
expressing the words, but the distinguishing mark of the Seconda Prattica
is more generally an approach to music focusing on such expression of the
text, whether or not it happens to comply with, stretch, or clearly exceed
the traditional dissonance conventions. Thus Rore and Wert and Ingegneri
are included, as well as Monteverdi himself and Gesualdo.
Part of the debate concerns the interpretation of the Prima Prattica as
well as Seconda Prattica traditions of theory and practice in the 16th
century, including the writings of Zarlino himself, taken by the
Monteverdi Brothers to be the pre-eminent exponent of the Prima Prattica.
For example, Artusi criticizes Monteverdi for failing to maintain unity of
mode in some of his pieces, and the Monteverdi brothers reply that the use
of "mixed modes" is discussed by Zarlino and is a feature of the Prima
Prattica as well as the Seconda Prattica in the late 16th century as well
as with the new forms and textures of around 1600.
Here I would say that the Monteverdi brothers actually may have a better
understanding of Zarlino's concept of mixed modes in his Book 4 of the
_Musical Institutions_. Zarlino notes an affinity between modes sharing
the same pentachord or tetrachord, for example Mixolydian (G-A-B-C-D) and
Ionian (C-D-E-F-G), both T-T-S-T-T (T showing a whole-tone, S a semitone).
Artusi, however, argues that Zarlino's "mixed modes" refer to pieces using
the authentic and plagal versions of the same mode in different voices --
an interpretation which in my view is contrary to Zarlino's own statements
on this point, as the Monteverdi brothers also argue.
Thus Artusi focues on "the imperfections of modern music" which breaks the
traditional dissonance conventions, as opposed to music which observes
these conventions, however traditionally or innovatively.
The Monteverdi brothers focus on music which seems new methods of
expressing a text clearly in a way which can move the affections --
whether with the early Seconda Prattica technique of Rore, the later
madrigal technique of Wert or Marenzio, or the "revolutionary" technique
of Monteverdi and Gesualdo in the setting of the multi-voice ensemble
madrigal, or the monodic forms of the Camerata which Monteverdi is just
adopting in the years around the 1607 "Seconda Prattica" manifesto. (His
first pieces calling for an obligatory continuo are in his Fifth Book of
Madrigals of 1605, and _L'Orfeo_ dates to 1607 if I am correct).
Generally I might take Seconda Prattica as synonymous with what recent
authors such as Maria Rika Maniates term the "Manneristic Era" of
something like 1540-1640, the era roughly from Rore (and Vicentino I might
add) through Monteverdi and Frescobaldi.
The older tradition of musical historiography focusing on the continuo and
monody tends to take 1600 as the "great divide," but it is interesting
that the Monteverdi brothers seem to make distinction similar to that of
Maniates. Incidentally, as Todd McComb has remarked, people who are
concerned that the term "Mannerism" might be read negatively might favor
another term such as "Fantastical" or the like.
This Prima/Seconda Prattica distinction leaves some interesting
issues. For example, is Lasso's _Prophetiae Sibyllarum_ a work of the
Seconda Prattica because of its experimental chromaticism? Can a routine
setting of a Psalm in _falsobordone_ (a four-voice note-against-note
declamatory style) be considered in this category?
Also, there is a question of divergent uses of the same term in differen
settings. Thus _musica ficta_, as Peter Urquhart for example has
emphasized, means in its original usage accidentals outside the regular
gamut, whether written or unwritten -- a notated C# (i.e. C-mi), but
not an unwritten Bb, a note integral to the gamut or _musica
recta_. However, in modern usage, the term is constantly used to mean
"unwritten or inferred accidentals, including Bb."
Similarly, while I would prefer to follow the usage of the Monteverdi
brothers and define the Seconda Prattica as beginning around the time of
Rore, others have used it specifically to define the changes around 1600.
Maybe the best solution is for people to make it clear which usage they
are following.
For a rhetorician such as Bernhard, Monteverdi's dissonance idioms _are_ a
defining element of the new "theatrical" style, and maybe his typology
could be used to distinguish the Seconda Prattica in the general sense of
Rore-Monteverdi from the specific "theatrical" or "representative" idioms
introduced in the decades around 1600.
Thus the year 1600 would remain an important rough marker of a stylistic
tradition -- between the Early and Late Second Practice, one might say.
Most respectfully,
Margo Schulter
msch...@value.net
M. Schulter
: The seconda prattica allows and calls for *un*prepared dissonance both on
: accented and unaccented beats for reasons of expression.
Hello, there, and I would say that this is indeed one defining
characteristic of what I would call the Late Seconda Prattica, if define
the Seconda Prattica as roughly Rore-Monteverdi.
One idiom mentioned by Bernhard, to which you may be referring, is the use
of a stressed seventh sonority where the seventh contracts to a fifth, for
example (with C4 as middle C):
C4 B3 C#4
A3 G#3 A3
D3 E3 A2
7 5
5 4 -3
Bernhard calls this kind of bold antepenultimate cadential dissonace
something like a _diruscula_ or "little roughness or asperity" -- the
Italian term _durezza_ for "dissonance" might be related, I guess. It
occurs in various pieces of Monteverdi, and may occur in similar but
subtler forms (e.g. with a suspension or as a semi-ornamental sonority) in
various genres around 1600 including instrumental pieces.