Introduction
Music can be defined as a form of auditory communication that is artistic in nature that incorporates vocal and artistic tones in a continuous and structured manner. Just like people, the evolution of music has taken place in over thousand years. There has been the growth of human knowledge as well as technology and therefore the taste for more complicated rhythms and sounds. New music is created by each generation of people that either rebels or builds on the music of their parents or grandparents. This means there is always an invention of new types of sounds and music. Special tools that are used in music have also considerably changed over the years from the discovery of the flute.
A number of theories exist with regards to the origin of music with many agreeing that it began before the existence of man. Six periods of music are pointed out by the historiographers and each of these has a specific style that to a great extent contribute to the nature of music today. These include Renaissance, classical, baroque, Medieval or the Middle Ages, the 20 th -century and romantic music. This assignment focusses on the music during the Medieval and Renaissance period and it compares to the modern day music.
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Medieval Music
Medieval music is the western music that was written during the medieval period that began in the 5 th century after the fall of the Roman Empire. There was a spread of the influence of medieval of music until the 15 th century. Music was mainly characterized by romance and courtly love and was highly influenced by the Arabian love songs (Kibler, Zinn & Earp, 2013). Many musical instruments existing in different forms were used during the medieval music era with the most favored being the flute. The flute was made of wood and was played by blowing into the sides. The recorder was the other medieval instrument and it has retained its form throughout history. The gemshorn, which has many similarities with the recorder with the exception of finger holes in front. Many string instruments, for example, psaltery, gittern, and mandore were also used during the medieval music era.
Types of Medieval Music
The common type of Medieval Music was Ballad. Music influences characterized the Middle Ages despite being regarded as a dark era. Many people played musical instruments and sang to make a living. These people are known as trouveres or troubadours often provided entertainment in big houses and played Ballad type of music. Also common during these ages were dances. Circle dance and line dance were the two types of dances during the middle age. The dances were associated with medieval music that required the use of the most popular musical instruments (Boden, 2017). The mass was regarded as the main form of church music since church music was very important at that time. Music instruments were however not used in church music as they were banned by the priest. Written music also existed during the medieval period and majority of them survived the dark times. They were commonly religious kinds of music that were written by the use of neumes that shows the pitch having unclear music.
The early medieval music
According to many historians, pinpointing the origin of the medieval music is a challenge because music transcends time. The various trends which emerged in the 1100's, however, must also be taken into account. There was a relatively large number of written non-liturgical and noted polyphony songs. Some historians were of the opinion that this signified the beginning of medieval music (Kitto, 2017). Traditional Roman music was set during the early Christian period. Under the reign of Pope Gregory I, these kinds of music were organized into official church music.
Late Medieval Music
The beginning of the evolution of music was witnessed when musicians started embellishing the charts with parallel melodies. During the late medieval era, there was the emergence of full polyphonies where rhythm and independent pitch movement were acquired by the lines (Saltzstein, 2013). There was an expansion of a number of lines to include polyphonies of three to four parts. These advances in music eventually resulted in the development of non-religious music, mainly referred to as secular music. These types of music were primarily composed for entertainment purposes
The secular music throughout the middle ages featured love stories and heroic legends and they were popularized by traveling musicians, who were the professional secular musicians. No actual record pertaining the most popular type of music during the medieval ages exist (Saltzstein, 2013). Based on the evolution of medieval music, however, the secular music and the plainchants are considered the most outstanding forms. Secular music has gained a lot of popularity in comparison to the early medieval music since it was widely spread by the professional traveling musicians.
Famous Medieval Composers and Musicians
They include Hilegard von Bingen who was a German author, poet, composer, visionary and abbess. She is popular for a liturgical drama called Ordo Virtutum. Moniot d’ Arras was a 12 th -century French composer (Boden, 2017). All his songs were monophonic, mostly about courtly love and in the form of pastoral romance. However, he was also involved in writing some religious songs. Ce fut en mai was regarded as Moniot's most popular song (Kibler, Zinn & Earp, 2013). Adam de la Halle was a French-born poet, trouvère, and musician. He greatly contributes towards creating secular theaters in France. Guillaume de Machaut was a composer and also the last great poet, with his poetry greatly admired in the 15 th century. Perotin was also a famous medieval musician and was a member of Notre Dame School of polyphony.
The decline of Medieval Music
Before the music could fully evolve into Renaissance music, a style consisting of highly complex rhythm known as Ars subtilior was developed. Changes that eventually led to the Renaissance period intensely influence music (Saltzstein, 2013). There was an attempt by many philosophers and writers to revert to the past to find inspiration for their music. However, composers and musicians embarked on seeking new ways of music expression, and this largely set the tone for Renaissance period.
Renaissance Music
In the Renaissance era, music was regarded as an important part of religious, courtly and civic life. The economic, religious and political events, as well as the rich interchange of ideas, resulted in major changes in methods of disseminating music, composing, musical instruments development and new musical genres(Cumming, 2013). In the early Renaissance, the most important music was mainly composed for use by churches, motels and masses in Latin (Kite-Powell, 2012). Polyphonic was comprised of several simultaneous melodies. As the sixteenth century came to an end, however, there was the broadening of patronage to include Protestant churches, Catholic churches and courts, music printing and wealthy amateurs which were all composer's source of income.
The English and later the Northern European composers dominated the early 15 th century. There was a special influence of the Burgundian court and as a result, attracted musicians and composers from the whole of Europe. Guillaume Du Fay between 1397 and 1474 was identified as the most important (Judd, 2014). Guillaume Du Fay consisted of a variety of musical offerings such as masses and motets for services of the chapel and church with the majority of their large musical structure centered on the existing Gregorian chant. His many small settings of the French poetry depict a sweet melodic lyricism that was unidentified until his era. Du-Fay had command of large-scale musical form as well as attention to secular text-setting (Hammond, 2017). He, therefore, played an important role in setting the stage for the coming generations of Renaissance composers. European art music by 1500 was dominated by Franco-Flemish composers. The most notable was Josquin des Prez who like other composers of her era, widely traveled throughout Europe. He worked for patrons in Paris, Ferrara, Milan, Conde-sur-L'Escaut, and Aix-en-Provence.
The act of exchanging musical ideas among France, Low Countries, and Italy resulted in what could be referred to as International European style. Multivoiced music or polyphony, on one hand, continued to experience development in complexity. At the same time, exploration of harmony that was based on vertical interval arrangement, such as third and sixth (Haar, 2014). These trends were epitomized by Joaquin’s music with an intricate polyphony of the northern-style using preexisting melodies, canons and other compositional structures. Josquin primarily composed Latin motets and masses much like Du Fay, in varied styles that were seemingly endless. The settings of courtly French poetry was included in his secular output just like Du Fay, but in a manner similar to the arrangement of instrumental music, French popular songs and Italian frottole.
The European music experienced a lot of momentous changes at the beginning of the 16 th century. The Harmonice Musices Odhecaton , the first significant collection of polyphonic music, was published by a Venetian printer called Ottaviano Petrucci (Minamino, 2014). The success attributed to Petrucci ultimately resulted in music printing that took place in England, France, Germany and other areas. All music had to be learned by ear or copied by hand; extremely wealthy courts, households, and religious establishments exclusively owned the music books. The books became inexpensive after Petrucci and a significant number of people could easily own them and learn to read music. Music instrument technology at the same period developed viola da gamba which was fretted and bowed instrument. The viol was eagerly taken up by amateur European musicians (Hammond, 2017). They also made good use of the recorder, lute, and harpsichord. The organ and other instruments. The recorder and viola da gamba were played together in ensembles and consorts and were frequently produced in sets or families of varying sizes and playing different lines. For the first time, these players were supplied with notated music by Petrucci’s publications together with those of others.
The 16 th century experienced the development of instrumental music including ricercare, canzona, contrapuntal dance-inspired compositions, variations and fantasia for both ensembles and soloists, as truly independent and distinct genre. The role of music in a Renaissance man’s intellectual life is represented in the musical instruments portrayed in the studiolo of Duke Federigo da Montefeltro or Urbino (Cumming, 2013). Various scientific instruments, weapons, and books were placed alongside the musical instruments, including lutes, cornetti, a tabor and pipe and a portative organ, hunting horn. The polyphonic language of Joaquin’s generation was employed by composers throughout Europe from around 1520 to the end of 16 th century.
The composers explored musical expression through the Italian madrigal, French chanson, the Spanish villancico, German tenorlieder and also in sacred music. The sacred polyphony of these countries was directly affected by the Reformation and Counter-Reformation (Cumming, 2013). There was a varied attitude towards the sacred music by the sacred music by the Protestant revolutions largely in Northern Europe and this resulted in musical changes like the introduction of German language hymn. The ancient Greek treaties concerning Music were widely studied by the 17 th -century humanists and these discussed the close relationship that existed between poetry and music (Burkholder & Grout, 2014). The major characteristics of Renaissance music were that it was based on modes. It comprised of harmony with a greater concern with progression and flow of chords. It was richer in texture in four parts or more. Lastly, the musical texture was blending rather than contrasting.
How the Music Today Compares with Music in the Medieval and Renaissance era
The Music today mainly comprised of a lot of innovative changes when compared to the music in the medieval and renaissance era. For instance, there is the prominence of percussion instruments and noisemakers are used at times (Bennett, 2016). The addition of noisemakers and the utilization of instruments not used before by the composers make the tone color of the music today richer and more interesting (Taylor, 2012). There are new ways of building chord structures as well as combining chords. This can be observed in Arnold Schoenberg’s Piano Suite, Opus 25 applied a 12-tone series. Even the rhythm, melody and meter has developed to become more unpredictable (Bohlman, 2012). Even though the composers during the medieval and renaissance era influenced the composers of today's music, many unique sounds were created in today's music.
The many innovations that characterize the music today contributed to changes in how music was performed or even composed (Chagas, 2014). The public today is now able to listen to music at their own home as a result of technological advances in television and radio (Green, 2017). There is an increased influence of the United States and non-western cultures. The rise of women composers in has also been witnessed in the music today (Mark, 2013). The composers of today’s music in comparison to their counterparts from the medieval and renaissance era have found inspiration from other genres of music including pop or other continents such as Asia. New inventions such as computers and audio tapes and other improved existing technologies are widely applied in today’s music.
Certain compositional rules and techniques used in the past were either rejected or altered, as the composers gain more creative freedom. Today's music gives a lot of voice to the musical themes that were not widely applied in the past. Composers in today’s music have less interest in tonality, with others completely discarding it (Bailey, 2012). The music today has seen the expansion of rhythms and melodies have wider leaps, and this makes the music unpredictable. Lastly, the world today, as opposed to the past, has a well-developed transportation system that allows musicians and their fans to widely travel to perform or listen. Music artist today can easily achieve global influence and recognition since the music is no longer limited to domestic music-making unlike in the medieval and renaissance period (Kaminskas et al., 2013). The inexpensive transmission, reproduction or broadcast of music today gives equal opportunities to the rich and poor to access music performances of high quality.
Conclusion
To conclude, music has greatly transformed and therefore the music today differs from the medieval and renaissance music in many aspects. The evolution of music has seen the growth of technology as well as human knowledge and hence the desire for more complicated rhythms and sounds. Each new generation of people come up with music that is seen to either build on or rebel against the music of the previous era. The transformation of music has also involved the changes of instruments used in music. The music today has made more strides in terms of technology and more people and joining the industry and this has affected the accessibility to quality music.
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