Consider the Madrigal

The huge proliferation of the polyphonic madrigal around 1600 raises basic questions that have not been effectively posed, let alone answered, in the scholarly literature. This essay presents these questions and suggests provisional answers for them. In doing so, it describes several dynamics in the...

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Bibliographic Details
Author: Tomlinson, Gary
Format: article
Status:Published version
Publication Date:2017
Country:Brasil
Institution:Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG)
Repository:Per Musi
Language:English
OAI Identifier:oai:periodicos.ufmg.br:article/5198
Online Access:https://periodicos.ufmg.br/index.php/permusi/article/view/5198
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:renaissance madrigal
neoplatonism and musical rhetoric
madrigal renascentista
neoplatonismo e retórica musical
Description
Summary:The huge proliferation of the polyphonic madrigal around 1600 raises basic questions that have not been effectively posed, let alone answered, in the scholarly literature. This essay presents these questions and suggests provisional answers for them. In doing so, it describes several dynamics in the development of the madrigal that seem to oppose the close relation between language and music previously noticed by all commentators. These dynamics create a kind of musical formalism at times, even an anti-linguistic one, where we would least expect it. They point up the opening of a space between sung words and the musical means of their singing that is certainly new in western musical experience.