Kyronne Amiel Peneyra

Jeric Juan
Diego Barzil
 During the baroque period, the orchestra evolved into a performing group based
on instruments of the violin family.
 The modern standards, the baroque orchestra was small, consisting of from ten to
thirty or forty players.
 Its instrumental makeup was flexible and could vary from piece to piece.
 At its nucleus were the basso continuo (harpsicord plus cello, double bass, or
bassoon) and upper strings (1st and 2nd violins and violas).
 Use of woodwind, brass, and percussion instruments was variable.
 To the strings and continuo could be added recorders, flutes, oboes, trumpets,
horns, trombones, or timpani.
 One piece might use only a single flute, while another would call for two oboes,
there trumpets, and timpani.
 Trumpets and timpani joined the orchestra mainly when the music was festive.
 The flexibility contrasts with the standardized orchestra of later periods, consisting
of four sections: string, woodwind, brass, and percussion.
 The baroque trumpet (like the early French horn) had no valves but was given
rapid, complex melodic line to play in a high register.
 Bach, Handel, Vivaldi, and other chose their orchestra instruments with care and
obtained beautiful effects from specific tone color.
 They loved to experiment with different combinations of instruments.
 However, in the baroque period tone color was distinctly subordinate to other
musical elements melody, rhythm, and harmony.
 Composers frequently rearranged their own or other composer’s works for
different instruments.
 Often, one instrument was treated like another.
 An oboe would play the same melody as the violins, or the flute and trumpet would
imitate each other for extend sections of a piece.
Unity and Mood
 A baroque piece usually expresses one basic mood: what begins joyfully will
remain joyful throughout.
 Emotional states like joy, grief, and agitation were represented at the time, these
moods were called affections.
 The prime exception to this baroque principle of unity of mood occurs in vocal
music. Striking changes of emotion in a text may inspire corresponding changes in
the music.
 But even in such cases, one mood is maintained at some length before it yields to
another.
Rhythm
 Unity of mood in baroque music is conveyed, first of all, by continuity of rhythm.
 Rhythmic patterns heard at the beginning of a piece are repeated throughout it.
 This rhythmic continuity provides a compelling drive and energy--- the forward
motion is rarely interrupted.
 The beat, for example, is emphasized far more in baroque music the in most
Renaisance music.
Melody
 Baroque melody also creates a feeling of continuity.
 An opening melody will be heard again and again in the course of a Baroque piece.
 And even when a melody is presented in varied form, its character tends to remain
constant.
 There is a continuous expanding, unfolding, and unwinding of melody.
 This sense of directed motion is frequently the result of a melodic sequence, that is,
successive repetition of a musical idea at higher or lower pitches.
 Many Baroque melodies sound elaborate and ornamental, and they are not easy to sing
or remember.
 A Baroque melody gives an impression of dynamic expansion rather than of balance or
symmetry.
Dynamics
 Paralleling continuity of rhythm and melody in Baroque music is continuity of
dynamic: the level of volume tends to stay constant for a stretch of time.
 When the dynamics do shift, the shift is sudden, like physically stepping from one
level to another.
 This alternation between load and soft is called terraced dynamics.
 Gradual changes through crescendo and decrescendo are not prominent features
of baroque music.
Texture
 Baroque music is predominantly polyphonic in texture: two or more melodic lines
compete for the listener’s attention.
 Usually, the soprano and bass lines are the most important.
 Imitation between the various lines, or “voices,” of the texture is very common.
 A melodic idea head in one voice is likely to make an appearance in the other
voices as well.
 However, not all late baroque music was polyphonic.
 A piece might shift in texture, specially in vocal music, where changes of mood in
the words demand musical contrast.
 Claudio Monteverdi  Domenico Scarlatti
 Heinrich Schutz  Jean-Philippe Rameau
 Jean-Baptiste Lully  Gregorio Allegri
 Arcangelo Corelli  Alessandro Scarlatti
 Henry Purcell  Giovanni Battista Pergolesi
 Antonio Vivaldi  Giuseppe Tartini
 Dietrich Buxtehude  Johann Hasse
 Johann Sebastian Bach  Francois Couperin
 George Frideric Handel  Georg Philipp Telemann
 Nationality: German
 Born: Nuremberg, 1653
 Died: Nuremberg, 1706
 Specialist Genre: Organ music.
 Major Works: Canon and Gigue in D major;
six suites for two violins;
organ chorales.
 Johann Pachelbel, an important predecessor of Johann Sebastian Bach, is
remembered today chiefly for a single composition, known as “Pachelbel’s Canon”
(of which many versions now exist including rock). But in his day he was much
admired fir his contribution to German Protestant church music, particularly for
organ.
 He was born in Nuremberg, he Began his career as organist at St Stephen’s
Cathedral in Vienna.
 In 1667 he became organist at Bach’s birthplace, the Thuringian town of Eisenach,
but a year later he moved a few miles east to Erfurt, where for the next 12 years he
was organist at the Predigerkirche.
 There he came into contact with members of Bach family (he was godfather to one
of J.S Bach’s sisters, and thought his elder brother Johann Christoph, who in turn
taught Johann Sebastian)
 Pachelbel became godfather to Johann Ambrosius' daughter, Johanna Juditha,
taught Johann Christof Bach (1671–1721), Johann Sebastian's eldest brother, and
lived in Johann Christian Bach's (1640–1682) house.
 While at Erfurt, Pachelbel married, only to lose his wife and their baby son two
years later in a plague epidemic.
 He remarried in 1684, and raised a family of seven children. He then spend two
years as court organist at Stuttgart, and three as town organist at Gotha, before
finally moving back to his own birthplace as organist of St Sebald’s Church.
 The organ chorales composed by Pachelbel – Complex polyphonic pieces based
on Protestant hymn tunes – had enormous influence on those of Bach
 He was also a master of various other keyboard genre of the time, including
toccatas, ricercari, fantasias, chaconnes and variations – his Hexachordum Apollinis
(1699) is a group of six arias with variations for organ or harpsichord, each in one
of five keys making up a perfect fifth.
 Pachelbel also wrote six suites for two violins and keyboard, the masterly and justly
famous Canon (a set of 28 canonic variations originally scored for three violins and
bass), motets, sacred concertos and 11 fine settings of the Magnificat for chorus
and instruments, intended for Vesper services in Nuremberg.
 Contributions to the development of the Chorale Prelude and fugue have earned
him a place among the most important composers of the middle Baroque era.
 On 29 June 1669 he became a student at the University of Altdorf, where he was
also appointed organist of St. Lorenz church the same year.
 Financial difficulties forced Pachelbel to leave the university after less than a year.
In order to complete his studies he became a scholarship student, in 1670
 Also Known as Pachelbel’s Canon
 a piece of chamber music scored for three violins and Basso Continuo
 suggested that the piece may have been composed for Johann Christoph Bach’s
wedding, on 23 October 1694, which Pachelbel attended
 experienced a tremendous surge in popularity during the 1970s
 This is due to a recording by Jean-François Paillard in 1968
 it has in recent years become extremely popular for use in weddings,
rivalling Wagner's Bridal Chorus
 the Canon's chord progression has been used widely in pop music in the 20th and
21st centuries and is called “Almost the godfather of Pop Music”