1. History of Opera
Seconda Pratica, Aria, Arioso, and Recitative, L’incoronazione di Poppea

2. KEY TERMs Prima Pratica Seconda Pratica Text Painting Dissonance(s)
Aria
Arioso
Recitative (Recit)
Blank Verse

3. Breaking the Rules of Harmony
Dissonance: a combination of two or more tones that, when played together, produce an unpleasant sound
The distance between two tones is called an interval
Opposite of dissonance is consonance
Renaissance  Baroque: strict rules concerning dissonances/what was allowed
Some examples

4. Why Use Dissonance?
Monteverdi is using musical elements to portray the text
This is called text painting
Technique developed in madrigals
Monteverdi wrote many madrigals
Used to stress/show importance of the most meaningful words of the libretto
Libretto: poetic text set to music in an opera

5. Text Painting in L’Orfeo
Messenger scene (from last week)
Begins on pg. 60

6. Dissonance in L’Orfeo Orfeo’s Lament: Tu se morta
Immediately follows the messenger scene
Orfeo is singing about Euridice’s death by snakebite
VERY sad
VERY emotinal
Listen

7. Scandal!
Monteverdi used these dissonances in his operas and his madrigals
Not everyone was happy about this
Remember, change is slow…
1600 Artusi (theorist) publishes a pamphlet: “On the Imperfections of Modern Music”
Cites specific examples from Monteverdi’s music
This upsets Monteverdi and his brother, Giulio Caesare Monteverdi

8. “I got your back, Bro.”
Giulio Caesare Monteverdi responds to Artusi’s pamphlet in Monteverdi’s next book of madrigals
Prima Pratica: (First Practice) sixteenth-century style of polyphony. Music is more important than the text and must follow its own set of rules (This is what Artusi preferred)
Seconda Pratica: (Second Practice) music serves to heighten the effect and rhetorical power of the words, and therefore can break traditional rules. Dissonances can be used to convey the meaning of the text.

9. “Thanks, Man.”
Monteverdi’s philosophy: the music and the text are equal partners, and when the correct balance was achieved between the two, musical drama can be created.
Text drives music, which drives drama
Evident in his operatic works

10. Moving Forward… Concepts from last time:
Aria
Recitative
As opera develops throughout the century, these types of music continue to develop
By the 1620s, there are 3 distinct styles: Aria, Arioso, and Recitative
Composers blend these styles within operatic scenes to form one cohesive unit

11. Recitative
Uses blank-verse poetry: seven to eleven syllable lines, has no rhyme scheme
Through-composed
“Dialogue” of the opera
Speech-like rhythms
Little accompaniment beneath vocalist
Lots of repeated notes, but no repeated text
Most important and most emotional style
In duple meter

12. Aria Emerges as its own distinct form in the 1620s
Not the same thing as Caccini’s arias from earlier
Lyrical lines—not speech-like rhythms
Usually set to seven or eight syllable lines of poetry (clear rhyme scheme)
Repeated text
Strophic
Repeated notes
Used for happy moments
Triple meter

13. Arioso Hybrid of aria and recitative: Recitativo in bastardio
Speech-like + Fast harmonic OR Lyrical + slow harmonic
Repeated text or no repeated text—it varies
Through composed
Repeated notes
Toughest to spot, since it has traits of both aria and recit
Arias and ariosos were both VERY short

14. L’Incoronazione di Poppea
Last opera Monteverdi wrote
1647
Act I, scene ii
Blend of recitative, arioso, and aria
Signor, deh non partire
Begins on pg. 18
Listen

15. Next week First public opera house Monteverdi’s death
Changes made in the generation of composers after Monteverdi
Development of the aria