Urgently request a brief introduction to west-music~Thanks!

History of Western Music

1. 1000 to 1450 - The Middle Ages

Music began to play a role in Christian churches at an early age. Church music embraced the influences of the Greeks, Hebrews and Syrians. The evolving chants were brought together in time into organized liturgies. At the end of the sixth century, Pope Gregory I (590 to 604) reformed Christian music. Gregorian chant (also called a cappella unison music) came from Greek and Hebrew music, which had only a single melodic line. There is no harmony or counterpoint. Its free-flowing vocal melody exquisitely matches the iambic pentameter of the Latin lyrics. The melody of Gregorian chant has no regular accents, and it exhibits what might be called a prose rhythm in music, or a free-form rhythm, which is different from the kind of rhytmic poetic rhythms we encounter in music with regularly occurring accents in duple or triple meter. During the Romanesque period (c. 850-1150), an extremely important development occurred in the history of Western music: polyphony emerged as the most important musical style. This development occurred at about the same time as the development of the science of perspective in painting, so that hearing and seeing with depth entered European culture together, which inevitably produced some very significant works. This development took shape during the Gothic era (c. 1150-1450). During this period, secular music flourished through the art of feudal court musicians and troubadours. More importantly, cathedrals with choirs and organs were built during this period. The progress of architecture, which made possible the construction of magnificent edifices, produced its counterpart in music. The new science of counterpoint reached the height of its skill. The artists who became proficient in music were for the most part monks and clergymen, who mastered the art of composing large musical works by means of different counterpoints. At this time, their main interest was in the structural combination of musical elements, which explains the derivation of the word "composer" from the Latin componere (to put together), and the creative musicians of the late Gothic period considered themselves first and foremost architects.

2: 1450 to 1600 - The Renaissance

From the end of the eleventh century to the end of the thirteenth century, the events of the Crusades took place in Europe. In music, a large number of troubadours, troubadours and lyric singers appeared. They used small harp-like accordions or instruments within the ancient violin family, and their singing involved love songs, narrative-poetical stories, hymns to nature, and religious and moral aspects. From the mid-to-late thirteenth to the fourteenth centuries, the Gothic style of art quietly emerged in northern Europe and was evident in architecture. In music, the Gothic style, although it did not develop a form representative of an age, is quite clearly characterized in the polyphonic forms that began in Oganum. In the scriptural songs of the thirteenth century, in addition to the fixed melodies of solemn Gregorian chant, there are forms which employ the melodies of dance and love songs with different lyrics and metre **** sung together. In the second half of the fourteenth century, Europe's social ideology began to undergo profound changes. Some advanced, new ideas with driving significance were conceived and gradually spread. One of the most representative is the idea of humanism. Humanism advocated that human beings should be the center of society and that human beings should be the masters of society rather than gods. It celebrated man's love of life and human wisdom, and believed that human power could overcome everything. It advocated humanity and opposed the asceticism of the Middle Ages. Under the influence and impetus of humanist thinking, a profound change took place in Europe involving politics, culture and other aspects - the "Renaissance" movement. After literature, art and other forms of literature and art, music also entered the "renaissance" period. In this period, secular music became more and more important. The depiction of the inner world of man and the beauty of nature became very prominent, resulting in a whole new style of music and numerous instrumental and operatic genres. Some individual composers such as Palestrina, Russo, Landino, Dufay and Monteverdi carried out outstanding musical activities. Their compositions were full of new musical tendencies and were of important pioneering significance. In this period, the art of music was in full development, and polyphonic music had developed into a golden age in the sixteenth century. Music theory also tended to mature during this period: the tonal system of major and minor keys had been basically established; the functional system of harmony was also in the process of germination and development; the notation method had been transformed from alphabetic and symbolic method to two-line notation, four-line notation and up to five-line notation; and the application of the counterpoint method had been enriched to a very high degree. During this period, the independence of instrumental music became stronger and stronger; the development of musical instruments also gradually accelerated. At that time, the ancient violin, cornet, trumpet, trombone, organ and lute and other instruments have been active in the music stage, and the emergence of the late Renaissance violin and ancient pianos, more so that the art of music has added a dazzling luster.

3:1600 to 1750 - the Baroque era

The Baroque period of Baroque style music is usually considered to be roughly from 1600 to 1750, that is, from the beginning of Monteverdi to Bach and Handel.1750, the death of the master of counterpoint, Johann Sebastian Bach, marked the pinnacle of Baroque counterpoint music. end, and also marked the end of the Baroque era. The reason why we call this period Baroque is that the techniques and methods of musical expression of the period basically have its certain degree of ****similarity, so there is no special significance in using this term to mark it. The word baroque comes from the French language, tracing its origin to the Portuguese word barroco, meaning the form of the pearl is not round. Is the end of the baroque critics in the comment on the music of this period when first used, and generally contains a derogatory meaning, refers to crude song, strange, exaggerated music. The musicians of the Classical period after the Baroque tended to simplify and standardize the language of music, which in their opinion was too ornamental and not standardized enough. The term baroque was therefore used by critics to refer to the art and music of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.

Now, with the passage of time, we can look at the music of this period with a deeper and more detailed historical perspective. Baroque no longer has the connotations of crudity and crudity, but compared to the music before and after the Baroque, it is true that it has the characteristics of exaggeration and somewhat less regularization. Renaissance art was characterized by clarity, unity and harmony. By the end of the sixteenth century, however, the emotional element in art was increasing, and the clarity and perfection of form were overwhelmed by the need to express emotion. In the fine arts this can be seen in the intensely colored, dramatic paintings of Caravaggio (1573-1610). In music too we have long seen it in the pastoral songs of Marenzio and Jesuardo, and in the ancient songs of Daulund, while their next generation went still further. A new style of music had to be developed to produce these intense effects. Generally speaking, the smooth polyphony of the Renaissance was no longer suitable for the characteristics needed for the new period. The most important creation of the Baroque period was the concept of "contrast". In the Renaissance, the music flowed smoothly, with the voices (usually four to five) intertwined and synchronized, but after 1600 this kind of weaving became less common, and was only found in church music, which was the most conservative because it was bound by traditions and a fixed liturgical form. Contrasts" can be expressed in various ways: high and low tones; fast and slow speeds (contrasts between fast and slow passages or between fast and slow voices); strong and weak strengths; different timbres; soloists (singers) and whole players (choristers), etc. All of these were used in Baroque music, but they were not used in Baroque music. All of these were present in the musical structure of the Baroque period, and each had its place. Many Baroque musicians used the concerto or complex concerto form (the word itself implies an obvious element of contrast), which is basically characterized by shifts in the weave, sometimes with a single voice (solo) or several voices, and sometimes with larger group ensembles. The most obvious and strong contrast was the emergence at the time of a new genre called ?quot;monody' (monody), a solo song, roughly speaking, with a smooth vocal part over the top, accompanied by a lute or a harpsichord, which proceeds more slowly, a genre represented (and to some extent arguably created) by the composer and singer Caccini ( Caccini (c. 1545-1618), in his epochal work Nuovo musico, the vocal melodies follow the meaning of the lyrics, varying greatly in rhythm and weave from the austere to the very decorative, and contrasting with the accompaniment, which has an almost fixed pattern of sound. Caccini belonged to the "Carmelata Society" in Florence (a group of musicians, poets, and aristocrats), and in the 1770s and 1880s he was exposed to the concept of reinventing the idea of expressing feelings in ancient Greek music, which the group followed by adopting the form of the "monophonic song". The term "accompaniment", as mentioned above, is hardly considered in Renaissance music, but belongs to the Baroque period as an idea that implies a different status between the instrumental parts. In fact, the most important characteristic of Baroque music is its accompaniment, the basso continuo. The basso profundo player plays the bass part on the lute or organ (or on the plucked string instrument, the lute or guitar), with numbers indicating the fill chords he should play. Passing basses are often played by two players, one of whom plays the bass part on a cello (or vihar or tuba), an instrument that extends the sound, while the other plays the fill chords. This use of the bass through the weave is: the top of a vocal or instrumental melodic voice, the bottom is a bass instrument, filled with harmonies in the center, which is typical of the Baroque music style. The upper part of the voice is also often used two, sometimes written for two singers, sometimes two violins (at this time that is called trio sonata), this structure is also very typical of Baroque music, especially the bass can not be missing through the bass, indicating that the concept of the bass to produce harmony for the Baroque music is how important it is the center of the concept. The emergence of this concept was not sudden; there was already in the mid-sixteenth century a distinction of the bass voice from the several other voice lines above it in polyphonic music, but it was only in the Baroque period that this style became clearly established. Along with, and related to, the changes described above was the abandonment of polyphony (more precisely, polyphony became an old-fashioned method used almost exclusively in a certain type of church music). The emphasis on harmony inevitably led to the emergence of a number of terminations of harmonic progressions in a piece of music; these terminations, called terminations or wind-ups, were formed as a result of a series of harmonic progressions of a certain standard. Related to this is the rhythmic progression; in vocal music, the melody must follow (or even exaggerate) the natural rhythm of the language in order to express the emotion of the lyrics; in instrumental music (including some vocal music, especially chorales) dance rhythms are used. The use of dance music rhythmic patterns for the bass accelerated the development of tonal feeling and the tendency to proceed toward a particular tone. At the same time, this process was accelerated by the appearance of new types of instruments, the most important of which were of the violin family. At that time, the violin's articulation was suited to the clarity of polyphonic music but lacked rhythmic dynamics, whereas the violin's clean, clear bowing and its ability to play brilliantly virtuosic music were suited to music with dance rhythms, which were more virtuosic than monophonic songs. The alternation of vocal and instrumental styles is a typical Baroque technique, and the alternation of two different styles in Baroque music was for novelty and effect. Important early Baroque musical forms were the monophonic song (as opposed to the polyphonic music of the previous period) and the associated body-loaded operas and oratorios, which emphasized the close integration of voice and music, and, in the case of operas, the effect of scenery. Counterpoint was not used in mono-melodic music, and its forms developed from the combination of melody and bass, such as sectional song forms, iambic pentameter structures, and variations on recurring bass voices. There was also a corresponding development in instrumentation, such as instruments suitable for playing through the bass combination, as well as replacing the violin in the Violin family line, which was more flexible and capable of playing a higher vocal-like range. Music in Europe during the Baroque periodThe Baroque period saw an unprecedented growth in the art of music. And contributed to the rise of Rococo art. This period of music to Germany, Italy, France and other countries most representative.

1. German music in the Baroque era German music in the Baroque era, represented by Schütz, Bach and Handel. If the polyphonic music since the Middle Ages is compared to a pyramid, their music is like the top of the tower, because they not only absorbed the new music of Italy since the Renaissance, but also opened up a completely new path. Heinrich Schutz (1585-1672) went to Italy at the age of twenty-four to study under Giovanni Gabrieli (1557-1612), a great master of the Venetian school. Upon his return, he published his first opera in German, Dafne, and later composed numerous Passions. Schütz was exactly one hundred years removed from Bach and Handel, and his style was an important influence on the compositions of these two masters of Baroque music. The musical works of Handel and Bach, whether in the traditional music of the collection, or in following the new trend of thinking, are radiating in the history of music. Handel Nao patella Fan hacking fork ò decadent malefactor reeling cover Zheng pay a visit to the sodium swollen patella points fortunate port star caustic industry Na Zhonggui Wu anxious to build a uniform royal sheath security ship an exhausted? ; Bach's music, on the other hand, contains strong instrumental elements in the vocal works, which laid a solid foundation for the dawn of the classical era.

2. Baroque era of Italian music opera this great art form, was born in the "cradle of music" - the ancient civilization of Italy. In Florence at that time, there were many great artists and a group of aristocrats who were very interested in ancient Greek art. These aristocrats were determined to give new life to Greek drama, so they began to compose music for ancient Greek stories, and the chorus put on costumes and sang the whole story, which was the prototype of opera. As it developed, the roles in the stories were each performed by singers; between choral programs, male and female singers sang separate solos. When the words of the characters were soft, the lines were treated as half-sung, half-said, and the singing, much like a hymn, was called declamatory; while strong feelings were expressed by true melodies, called arias. And later on, arias were used exclusively to show off the beautiful tones of the singers. At that time, whether an opera was performed in Italy, England or Germany, its arias were always sung in Italian, while the declamatory parts were sung in the national language. Also comparable to early opera in Italian baroque music were the strings, which dominated the ancient overtures and concertos of opera at that time.

Italy in this period abounded with violinists such as Giuseppe Torelli (1650-1708), Arcagello Corelli (1653-1713), T. Antonio Vitali (1665-1735), Vivaldi (Antonio Vivaldi (1675-1743), Giuseppe Tartini (1692-1770), and others, all of whom preceded Bach. These musicians were not only all famous violinists, but all composers of violin music. In the northern Italian Alpine region of Cremona (Cremona) people, violin makers can be said to be endless, such as Amati, Guarneri and Stradivari, etc., their elaborate violin, is still active on the stage, showing endless artistic charm.

The overture of an opera must be divided into three parts: a fast beginning, a slow middle section, and a fast ending, a form that later became the basic form of the concerto and symphony. Violin, viola, cello, double bass and other string instruments are still indispensable instruments in the orchestra, but also extremely important chamber music and solo instruments. It can be seen that the Italian music of the Baroque era had an extremely far-reaching influence. The French music of the Baroque era was extremely popular in Paris at that time in the residences of the princes and nobles, where the opera and the ancient piano music were very popular. The French opera of this period grew independently from the tradition of Italian opera, and was close to the form of dance theater.

In the Baroque era, France's most representative opera composer is Lully (Jean BaptisteLully, 1632-1687), his creation of the opera is simple and clear, melodious, but also has a strong dance; its content is spicy, humorous, into the wood. Alongside the operas was the prevalence of ancient piano music. The ancient piano was often accompanied by decorations representing Baroque culture, and it was the predecessor of the modern piano, along with the harpsichord. The masters of the old piano were Francois Couperin (1668-1733) and J.P. Jean Philippe Rameau (1683-1764), who composed a number of suites for the old piano, many of which are still popular today. The Introduction to Harmony (by Rameau), published in 1722, is the earliest theoretical work on harmony in the history of music.