67 Baroque Music Facts: You Should Read About This Classical Trivia!

Baroque music is an era or form of Western classical music that evolved in Western Europe between 1600 and 1750.

The Galant style, which began after the Renaissance music era and was succeeded by the Classical era, signified the shift between the Baroque and Classical eras. The term 'baroque' has been derived from the Portuguese word 'barroco,' which means 'misshapen pearl.'

Early, middle, and late are the three primary stages of the Baroque period. They're dated back around 1580 and 1650, 1630-1700, and 1680-1750, with certain overlap.

Baroque music is today frequently studied, played, and listened to and makes up a large part of the 'classical music' tradition. Monteverdi, Corelli, and Vivaldi are just a few of the well-known figures from the early Baroque period who came from Italy.

(By the mid-18th century, we've narrowed our concentration to German composers Bach and Handel.) While some countries may appear to have a larger share of our current understanding of Baroque music, every country played a part.

The new customs they discovered created subtle influences on musicians and composers as they traveled throughout Europe and listened to each other's music. Read along to find out about late baroque music theory, baroque music opera composer, and more about the baroque style art form.

Initial Baroque Music Era

The Florentine Camerata was an early Renaissance Florence meeting of humanists, composers, writers, and intellectuals who encountered under Count Giovanni de' Bardi's patronage to study and steer trends in the arts, especially music and drama. They founded their musical goals on a notion of Classical (particularly ancient Greek) musical theatre that prized oration and discourse.

As a result, instead of studying archaic Greek musical forms like monody, which comprised of a single vocalist supported by a kithara, they derided their successors' use of polyphonic and orchestral. Early realizations of these principles, like Jacopo Peri's Dafne and L'Euridice, signaled the beginning of opera, which acted as a catalyst for the development of the Baroque period.

The growing prominence of harmony as the linear basis of polyphony is reflected in the increased use of written basses in music theory. Harmony is created by counterpoint, and figure bassline is indeed a graphic representation of the harmonies commonly utilized in a live concert.

Composers began to think about harmonic progressions, and the tritone, which was considered an unreliable frequency at the time, was used to produce dissonance.

Certain Renaissance composers, especially Carlo Gesualdo, were invested in harmony; nonetheless, the move from the Renaissance to the Baroque era is marked with the use of harmonies focused on tonality rather than a modality.

One of the major ideas behind tonality was that specific chord patterns, instead of sounds, could generate a sort of closure at the completion of a piece.

Claudio Monteverdi helped to complete the shift from Renaissance to Baroque music by introducing these new elements of composition. He created two distinct forms of composition: Polyphony in the Renaissance as well as the new Baroque basso continuo style.

Idiomatic musical patterns got increasingly popular.

In particular, in their lute journals of 1611 and 1614, Robert Ballard and Ennemond Gaultier established the style luthé—the infrequent splitting up of chord changes, as opposed to the frequent patterning of damaged chord progressions a constant texture in French music, and it has been known as style brisé since the early twentieth century.

Early baroque monody was a classical style of solo singing, typically a poem.

There were lyric theatre, baroque counterpoint, music manuscripts, and musical offerings. Music historians organized public music along with melodic voice, solo cello at first and third beats, and much more music performed for the musical drama during music history.

Midway Baroque Music Era

The construction of the centralized court is among the financial and political elements of what has been commonly referred to as the Era of Absolutism, which was personified by Louis. He established a palace style and cultivated a judicial process of manners and arts that became standards for European countries.

The creation of the vocal styles of the cantata, oratorio, and opera in the 1630s signifies the beginning of Italy's intermediate Baroque era, as well as a new idea of chord progressions that lifted music's status to that of words, which had previously been considered as superior.

The florid coloratura monody of the early Baroque gave rise to a leaner, more polished harmonic approach.

This harmonic modification also resulted in a new formal mechanism for recitative and aria differentiation. The most renowned creators of this type were always the Romans Luigi Rossi and Giacomo Carissimi, who primarily created sonatas and choral music, respectively, as well as the Venetian Francesco Cavalli, who primarily composed operas.

Arcangelo Corelli was known for his contributions to purely instrumental music, particularly for his promotion and development of the concerto grosso, as well as his work on either side of musical technique—as a musician who structured violin practice and teaching.

While Lully was imprisoned at court, Corelli was among the first musicians to release his piece publicly and perform it across Europe.

In comparison to such musicians, Dieterich Buxtehude was a church musician who worked at Lübeck's Marienkirche as a pianist and Werkmeister.

As Werkmeister, he worked as the church's secretary, treasurer, and business manager, while as organist, he performed for all of the church's primary services, additional violinists, or singers who also were paid by the church were utilized on occasion.

Developed Baroque Music Era

The Renaissance polyphony style has created the basis for the study of composition thanks to Johann Fux's efforts.

Handel was a tireless worker who frequently recycled his own material and borrowed it from others. He was also recognized for rewriting compositions for available singers and musicians, such as the famous Messiah, which appeared in 1742.

Some of today's most well-known composers are reworking Baroque instruments and even techniques to create 21st-century sounds that appeal to a wider and younger audience than most modern compositions, and the Bay Area is at the forefront of change.

Mason Bates' Auditorium, which blended a modern orchestra with processed recordings of a baroque ensemble, with the electronic element composed of fresh neo-Baroque music recorded on period instruments, was debuted by the San Francisco Symphony in 2016. It took time and effort to develop specific tones that made them sound afraid and defenseless.

With the exception of the instrumental sonorities, the majority of this new music sounds like it was composed in the twenty-first century. However, part of it reflects rising interest in incorporating Baroque music's actual elements and styles — counterpoint, improvisation, and so on — into modern works.

Popular Baroque musical forms include the prelude and fugue. The lively French dance, Spanish dance, sacred German music, and Renaissance-style lively baroque dance take inspiration from this European art form. Other than the music baroque and the baroque dances, which is a very popular dance form, Baroque art also consists of Baroque painting.

Cultural Impact

Composers and artists employed increasingly intricate musical ornamentation changed musical notation and developed new instrumental playing techniques during this time period. Opera, cantata, oratorio, concerto, and sonata were musical genres as a result of Baroque music, which enlarged the size, range, and complexity of the instrumental performance.

Emphasis on dynamics: The harpsichord was superseded as the dominant keyboard instrument during the Baroque era by the pianoforte. The pianoforte used felted hammers to strike the strings, whereas the harpsichord plucked them. As a result, the pianoforte could play softly as well as loudly, allowing for new dynamic possibilities.

Embrace of instrumental music: Prior to the Baroque era, a lot of music was performed in liturgical contexts but was mostly vocal music. While chorales, cantatas, and operas continued to be popular among Baroque composers, instrumental music got popular.

Ornamentation: Baroque music, like Baroque architecture and sculpture, is incredibly charming. Trills, acciaccaturas, appoggiaturas, mordents, and turns were frequently used to enhance even the simplest tunes.

Key composers of the Baroque era include Antonio Vivaldi, George Frideric Handel, Domenico Scarlatti, Alessandro Scarlatti, Johann Sebastian Bach, Jan Pieterszoon, Dieterich Buxtehude, Marc-Antoine Charpentier and others.

Musical instruments utilized in Baroque music had been used earlier, and some are still in use today, although without the assistance of technology. The effort to perform music in a historically informed manner, attempting to imitate the sound of the period, resulted in the usage of historic period instruments as well as instrument recreation.

Harpsichord

Johann Sebastian Bach, one of the best composers of the Baroque era, produced a number of works for the Harpsichord that are remarkable for their intricate, intertwining lines. It has a piano-like appearance but a distinct, twangy tone that is one of the iconic sounds of the Baroque era. This is due to a trigger mechanism plucking the strings.

Pianoforte:

Around the beginning of the eighteenth century, Italian piano maker Bartolomeo Cristofori invented the Pianoforte, an early version of the classical piano. Due to the lack of control over the dynamics that the other keyboard instruments might provide, Cristofori attempted to invent it.

Baroque violin:

A Baroque violin is one that has been set up in the style of the Baroque era of music. Original instruments that have survived unchanged since the Baroque period, as well as later instruments that have been modified to fit the baroque arrangement and modern copies, are all included in this category.

Baroque guitar:

The Guitar had five strings in the Baroque period but was still identical to a modern acoustic guitar. It replaced the renaissance lute, which was extremely popular among home musicians. Many scholars believe the guitar was used in combination with a basso continuo instrument to play the bass line.

Trumpet:

The trumpet is the Baroque's royal instrument, embodying both secular and divine majesty. Three trumpets represent the Trinity in Bach's BWV 172 aria, which addresses the "Heiligste Dreifaltigkeit" (Most-holy Trinity), with only three trumpets and timpani accompanying the bass voice.

Baroque Flute:

The Baroque Flute, sometimes known as a Transverse Flute (indicating sideways-blown), is intimately associated with the modern flute. The materials utilized in their construction are the fundamental difference between the two. Flutes are usually constructed of metal nowadays, however, they were made of wood during the Baroque era.