Dr Jonathan Le Cocq; Musicology Essay, M2.

Matthew LJ Wootton, 22/2/1999.

This essay will begin by defining the terms seconda prattica and stile rappresentativo, using examples from music by Monteverdi.

These terms and examples will then be used to discuss their place and significance in the development of musical style and to asses any claim of a revolution in the period concerned.

"The dispute [between Claudio Monteverdi and the traditional reactionary critic Artusi] was about two things: the treatment of dissonances and changing the mode" (Leopold, p 46). In his Dichiaratione published in the Scherzi musicali of 1607, Giulio Cesare Monteverdi clarified his brother's thoughts on the term "Second Pratice" thus: "one that turns on the perfection of the melody, that is, the one that considers harmony not commanding, but commanded, and makes the words the mistress of the harmony". In this, Monteverdi followed Plato: "Rithmus et Harmonia orationem sequitur non ipsa oratio Rithmum et Harmoniam sequitur" (Republic, 400D in Monteverdi, Scherzi Musicali, 1607) to further a theory of music expressing the meaning of the text.

This is the underlying foundation of the seconda prattica.

This expression pushed back the boundaries of what was harmonically acceptable and its impact can therefore only really be appreciated with the rules of Zarlino's (1517-1590) Istitutioni harmoniche (Venice, 1558) in mind. Based on the need for expression, it used such novel devices such as intervals of 2nds (e.g. in b 22) and 7ths (e.g. bb 13 and 19) for dissonant effect (see Example 1, from "Cruda Amarilli"), free use of unprepared 7ths, diminished 5ths (bar 21), and in melodies the descending diminished 8th, 4th, and the minor 7th. This freer use of chromaticism for purposes of expressive/descriptive dissonance and also the "irregular" use of cadences are attributed to the seconda prattica in L'Artusi in Fabbri, p 36. In Example 2, "O Mirtillo", Artusi's complaint of an "impertinentia d'un pricipio" is of the progression from B flat to a naturalised B in a G major chord within 5 bars (irregular cadence), the B in the tenor versus the bass B flat in the fourth bar (dissonance), and doubtlessly the F in the quintus sandwiched between two Gs in the soprano and alto parts. Further examples of unprepared dissonance/chromaticism can be seen in Examples 3 (from Act II of L'Orfeo), 4 (from Non havea Febo ancora from Lamento della Ninfa in Madrigali Guerrieri ed Amorosi), and examples 5 and 6 (from Act I of L'Incoronazione di Poppea).

Monteverdi also utilised ornaments (which were unpopular with Artusi...) under the banner of the seconda prattica. These grew out of playing around with dissonance to create effect. However, they can also be seen in the broader light of a move away from Renaissance principles towards the rhetoric of the Baroque where their important was supreme (see Leopold p 34.8-35.3). For example, see ex. 9, "Possente Spirto" from "L’Orfeo" (1607), which will be discussed nearer the conclusion.

Although the term was first used in reference to Monteverdi (by the anonymus L'Ottuso Academico in Seconda parte dell'Artusi (1603), it is clear that Monteverdi did not "invent" the second practice. There was already "recognition of two diverse approaches to composition" ("Prima Prattica", Grove) at the time- one that adhered to the old rules of Zarlino, and one which sought increased expression. This underlying foundation first found sprouted shoots in Vincenzo Galilei's "Dialogo della musica antica, et della moderna" (1581) (Leopold, p 44). Through the preoccupation of Bardi's Florentine Camerata with both music and the ancient world, Vincenzo developed the "primary requirements for the development of the solo song ... monody, and the union of a recitation of the text with it affective content" (ibid.) (In fact, in "Le istitutioni harmoniche" Zarlino had argued 23 years earlier that the music should express the idea (il concetto), the passions (le passioni) and the affections (gli effeti) by means of the harmony (l'armonia) (from "Word-Painting", New Grove)). This was taken up in L'Euridice of Jacopo Peri (1600) and "Le nuove musiche" of Giulio Caccini (1601), amongst others. (In his Dichiaratione, Giulio Cesare traces its origins back to Cipriano De Rore (1516-1565)).

As stated above, the underlying foundation of the seconda prattica was expression (of the text). This fundamental principle more so than any audible or visible differences between it and the prima prattica, make the two approaches disparate. The main departure from Zarlino's view-point (and in some ways the difference between the assured rationality of the Renaissance and the antithetically and emotionally-preoccupied Baroque (Leopold pp 34.5 and 42.4)) was not ultimately-

the unprepared entrance at a ninth ... [but]

nothing less than a change in the concept of art

Leopold, p 48

This is the importance of the seconda prattica- its underlying foundation is the aesthetic principle by which all artists have worked since-

Within the idea of the seconda pratica are found

the origins of the later aesthetic theory of genius in

which the genius breaks the shackles of tradition

and creates his own rules. Ibid., p 49

Indeed, the constrictions to which Artusi subscribed and attacked Monteverdi for breaking away from grew entirely from the earlier and stalwart Renaissance principle of music being rationally understandable as "sounding number" ("musica speculativa" (Carter, p 47.6))-

Up until then scholars were in agrement that the

intellect (intelleto) and not the feelings (senso)

were the last resort in judging a work of art.

Monteverdi, however, perceived the goal of music as

being an appeal to the emotions of the audience, not

to their understanding ....

The true art ... , the veritá dell'arte ...

lay in practice and not in theory.

Leopold, p 48

The beginnings of the seconda prattica thus gave history the precepts on which art ever since has built. Its importance is, therefore, supreme.

However, although Monteverdi continued throughout his life to stretch the ideal behind the seconda prattica, it was this ideal of expression which continued through his time and on to today, and not the compositional style itself. The madrigals in which he formulated the seconda prattica were all but anachronisms by 1630 ("Monody", New Grove), and the other ideal that Vicenzo Galilei reserrected, that of the accompanied solo song- the monody- supplanted them. The seconda prattica style therefore incorporated itself, especially through the work of Monteverdi, into semi-monodic forms, as is shown in the section on stile rappresentativo, below.

Monteverdi built on the techniques of the seconda prattica througout his life, integrating dissonance more and more into the shape, meaning and "life" of the madrigal (et c.)- and not just using dissonance for word-painting or as a tagged-on effect, but as "a delineation of the affective content by means of these dissonant progressions" (Leopold, p 45.2).

For example, see "Amor, diceva" from the "Lamento della Ninfa", Example 4b, where the dissonance in the Nymph's melody is absolutely crucial and integral to the life of the lament and to the expression of the meaning and emotions of the text.

Also, the seconda prattica style was eventually worked into church music, where "by his application of methods first explored in secular music [Monteverdi] helped to prevent the ossification of style increasingly encouraged by the Roman School with their preference for the stile antico ("Monteverdi, Claudio", %8: Sacred Music; New Grove).

In conclusion therefore, the underlying foundation of the seconda prattica (which "shook the foundations of all traditional musical values" (Leopold p 48.7) was crucial to the continuing ideological development of music. This cleared the way for the practical application, which was so richly developed by Monteverdi, to expand the boundaries of acceptable harmony: giving the composers of the time the ready harmonic tools for increased expression in music.

Stile Rappresentativo- definition

"Theatrical style": generically implying the solo vocal style of the early operas (it was first used in Caccini's "L'Euridice" (1600)).

Giovanni Battista Doni's "Annotazioni sopra il Compendio de' generi, e de' modi della musica" (Rome, 1640) distinquished three types of musical settings in the early pastorals³-

1) the narrative style, which uses many repeated notes and fast speech-like rhythms over rather static harmony (see example 6/7);

2) the expressive style, such as in Arianne's lament in Monteverdi's "Arianna" (Mantua, 1608), with a more marked melodic profile, free dissonance and more frequent changes of harmony (see example 8);

3) and the recitation style (speciale recitativo), patterned after the aria da cantar rime once used to chant heroic poems (New Grove), with melodic formulae of narrow compass strophically repeated or varied and coordinated rhythmically with the bass, and with broad cadences at the ends of line- this is properly called the "strophic aria" and in addition it sometimes offered a vehicle for virtuoso improvisation (see example 9, "Possente spirto" from "L'Orfeo" (1607)).

The New Grove continues: "In addition, dance songs or canzonettas, sometimes with chordal refrains or instrumental ritornellos, also figured in the early pastorals and sacred plays". The stanzas in "Possente Spirto" are seperated by virtuosic instrumental ritornellos that represent the three main types of Renaissance instruments: bowed strings (violins), wind (trumpets) and plucked strings (harp)- in this way the impression is given that Orfeo is conjuring up all the forces of music to aid his plea to Caronte (from "L'Armonia Sonoria", Pickett).

The accompaniment in stile rappresentativo was improvised by a group of chordal instruments (e.g. organ, theorbo, harpsichord) over a figured bass.

When Vicenzo Galilei wrote of re-viving the songs of the ancients (see above) he mentioned "‘monody’" and the "union of a recictation of the text with its affective content. If the seconda prattica- in practice an extension of the prima prattica- explored the latter- the text's affective content- then the stile rappresentativo was the outgrowth of the former: the "new" ancient form of solo song, ‘monody’. In his Le nuove musiche, Caccini writes

I had the idea of introducing a kind of music

in which one coould speak musically as it were

[in armonia favellare], employing in it ... a

certain noble nonchalance [nobile sprezzatura]

of song, sometimes passing through some forbidden

intervals while holding, however, the bass note.

Leopold p 44

Caccini writes, in the last clause, of using dissonance, something which the seconda prattica allowed him to achieve, to compose a piece in, effectively, stile rappresentativo.

While the genere rappresentativo and the seconda prattica share (naturally) the same formative conditions and both strive in their way for expression, they diverge, and are not neccesarily compatible. In some ways, the stile rappresentativo and the seconda prattica were, in their stated aims, at odds: the overwhelming concern of the former was to imitate spoken recitation, while the latter would happily sacrifice the clarity and "nonchalance" of the words for their affect, either the imitazione della natura or imitare le parole⁴.

This is essentially the same issue as the divergence of recitative and aria that polarised the two so markedly in the late 18th century.

The "unnaturalness" of the madrigal, from this point of view, led to its waning and to the rising primacy of monodic forms.

So, the seconda prattica style had to uproot from its madrigalian beginnings and was transplanted into the monodic songs, along-side its sister stile rappresentativo.

Although the two styles might seem when set out as above to be in some opposition, in practice they enhanced each other, especially in Monteverdi’s music.

This was partly because they could co-exist without compromise (as in example 6 where the recitative is coloured by the dissonance on "ahi, perir, ahi, mancar" (the line also falls a minor third during that time- a typical madrigalian device on "ahi"!)), and also because their "mission statements", of natural recitation and expressiveness respectively, were manifested differently in different practical contexts, mutually accomodating each-other, and surpassing the strict three categories above: the Lamento d'Arianna, for example, includes many different paces and characters of recitation and still the imagery and expression are not compromised. Monteverdi created an angry section (ex. 8b, with fast, repeated notes "closest to the aesthetics of Sprechgesang" (Leopold p 133), in the vein of G.B. Doni's first category, above). He created a motto on "O Teseo, o Teseo mio" with which Arianna repeatedly calls herself to order: "It appears with and without modifications" and "in several places it brings the swelling and falling of the melody and of the declamatory tempo to a close" (Leopold pp 131/132). The lament was, of course, meant for the stage, and in the same book (VII) he juxtaposed this chamber-music like theatrical piece with pieces of chamber music in the theatrical style (i.e. rappresentativo). For example, in the "Lettera amorosa" (ex. 10), the declamation is dominanted by "the typical recitation pattern on a single note" (Leopold, p 66). In this way, both the genere rappresentativo and the devices and underlying principle of the seconda prattica moved music on, integrating more completely into a persuasive performance.

Amor diceva, which Monteverdi himself characterised as "Rapresentativo" in the preface to Madrigali Guerrieri ed Amorosi, is an impenetrably coherent example of the synthesis of the second practice and the stile rappresentativo. In addition to the seconda prattica dissonances and imagery in the lament referred to above, the stile rappresentativo elements in the Lamento della Ninfa include the asides from the men, recitation on a single note, the limited melodic material, and the instruction that the Nymph's part should be sung "a tempo dell'affetto dell'anima" and not in the tempo beaten with the hand (the regularity of the men's parts (and of the ostinato bass) serving to increase the emotional effect of the Nymph's declamation. In "Possente Spirto", too, as shown above, Monteverdi developed the style to a high level, integrating the instruments to affective effect, and utilising the strophic variations style to both imitate vocal declamation and by extension to show Orfeo’s vocal virtuosity to Caronte. In addition, the plainly-sung last verse preceeding the time-suspending harp cadenza serves to heighten the dramatic and emotional effect- a point where "the scene and the music blend together" (Leopold, p 95). Where the carefully proscribed ornaments contain a "meaningless virtuoso flurry" (ibid.), the "utmost that the vocal art could offer then was used to illustrate the power of music; for Monteverdi, however, this non plus ultra had a function only when it remained within the confines of the dramatic statement" (Leopold, p 96).

In conclusion, therefore, the outgrowths of the seconda prattica enhance the dramatic conventions evolved with the stile rappresentativo.

However much an evolution occured in style in the years 1600-1650, the principle change was one of form: this precipitated by the ideas of Monteverdi and the Florentine Camerata et al. that reserected ancient ideals and lay the common foundation for the seconda prattica and stile rappresentativo. Their practical activities grew naturally out, as has been shown above, of earlier practice. There cannot, from that point of view, therefore, been said to have been a "revolution".

The seconda prattica and stile rappresentativo themselves did not provide a framework for music later on in the Baroque, but were the ultimate extension and expression of a earlier "pre-revolutionary" paradigm.

Finally, the model of evolution and revolution itself should perhaps ultimately be eschewed in favour of recognising how "the basic conceptions of composition, of harmony and melody, of expressiveness, all of which arose with Monteverdi, transcended the ephemeral nature of style" (Schrade, 1951, p 11), and that Monteverdi's seconda prattica and stile rappresentativo were the first embodiments of, as far as musical expression is concerned, underlying principles that held true for Bach, Beethoven and Brahms. The stile rappresentativo, the second practice, and most of the rest of Western music from then on thus grew out of the same underlying crucial concept - expression in music.

Artusi, Giovanni Maria: L'Artusi, overo, Delle imperfettioni della moderna music (Venice, 1600) in Strunk, O: Source Readings in Music History, The Baroque Era; Norton, 1995

Carter, Tim: Music in Late Renaissance & Early Baroque Italy; London: B.T. Batsford Ltd, 1992

Fabbri, P: Monteverdi; Cambridge: CUP (trans.), 1994

Leopold, Silke: Monteverdi, Music in Transition; Oxford: Clarendon Press Oxford (OUP), 1991 (Trans. Anne Smith)

Monteverdi, Claudio: Foreword by Giulio Cesare Monteverdi to Scherzi Musicali; Venice, 1607, in Strunk, O: Source Readings in Music History, The Baroque Era (p 45); Norton, 1995

Monteverdi, Claudio: Foreword to Madrigali guerrieri ed amorosi; Venice, 1638.

Pickett, Philip: "L'Armonia Sonoria" in "Monteverdi- L'Orfeo" CD recording with the New London Consort; released by L'Oiseau Lyre, 1993

Schrade, Leo: Monteverdi, Creator of Modern Music; New York, W.W. Norton & Co., 1972 re-iusse.

Tomlinson, Gary: Monteverdi and the End of the Renaissance; Oxford: Clarendon Press Oxford (OUP), 1987.