Talk:Renaissance music

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Q&A

Any opinions on listing composers both on the Baroque page and the Renaissance page? Some composers who worked around 1600 straddled the boundary, and wrote music which clearly fits into each category (for example Monteverdi: the first several books of madrigals are obviously Renaissance, while books six to nine are clearly Baroque; Sweelinck, almost all of his vocal music is Renaissance while his organ music is Baroque, directly influencing Bach; numerous other examples). I put Sweelinck on both lists. Antandrus 23:54, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I think it's fine to list some composers on both. It's a bit artificial to make clean divisions, as you suggest (the same goes for Baroque/Classical and so on). --Camembert

Marcus2, you have removed this line, or equivalent, twice: "While 1600 is a convenient and easily-remembered year to use as an end-date for the era, it should be noted that music with essentially Renaissance characteristics continued to be composed, especially in England, and some degree in Spain, for the first several decades of the 17th century (see English Madrigal School)." I need to make the point that musical, artistic or cultural eras don't start and stop at nice round-numbered years and times, like prime-time TV shows. There is a lot of gray area, a lot of simultaneous practice of different styles, and in the case of the end of the Renaissance a very clear set of examples of Renaissance-style movements in different parts of Europe outside of the Italy-France-Germany region which most definitely lasted into the first couple decades of the seventeenth century. The advent of monody in Italy around 1600 has come to be recognized as the "conventional" boundary for the end of the Renaissance but the reality is a whole lot more complicated and I would like the article to express that. Please discuss deletions on the talk page. If you have some compelling reason for insisting that the "Renaissance" ends right at 1600, everywhere at once, I would love to see it. Thanks!  :-) Antandrus 01:50, 2 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I'm thinking of breaking up this long list of composers into smaller lists by country (Franco-Netherlanders; Spanish; Italian; German; English, etc). Another way, probably not as good, would be to subdivide them by stylistic school (Burgundian School; Roman School; Venetian School; English Madrigal School, etc.) The second way is fuzzier and leaves a lot of people out; besides a lot of composers wrote in more than one style. As I write up more of the individual national styles and more of the schools, the list of composers is only going to grow--and the same thing will probably happen to Baroque music. Comments anyone? I'm leaning towards method #1. Or I could leave it as it is, with a really long list. (They'd remain listed by birthdate within each list.) Antandrus 14:06, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I think there is a general confusion between the terms "form" and "genre." Most of the terms listed under "forms" are not forms at all, but genres. DrG 2005 May 2

You are correct: genre is the more precise term. Antandrus 01:36, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

I have a question about what should be its own page. How do you know when to make an idea a separate page, or whether to include it in a larger topic containing that idea? I am running into this problem a lot, and find it very frustrating. When dealing with large topics, like "renaissance music" or "medieval music", it seems like all that they contain are pointers to other articles. The big articles then lack any kind of flow or feeling of history, and the smaller ones lack proper context. What do you think about putting the text to the small articles (the stylic schools, the "ars nova", etc) into the large article, and then pointing the stubs for the small articles at the proper section in the large article? Is this possible? Is it desireable? Is it proper wiki thinking? Please help me! DrG 2005 May 3

You're combining a couple of different ideas here. Many of the music history articles don't flow well, and that's because they need someone with time and knowledge to improve them. If you can do that, go ahead. Generally long articles get divided into sections using headers. Once the entire page gets too long, it can be broken into separate articles. But usually the topic gets deveoped in a single article first. In this article List of Renaissance composers has already been broken out. But this article is too many lists and not nearly enough textual information. Those other lists might be on the chopping block once there's enough textual information. Please be my guest and wade right in and make it better. —Wahoofive (talk) 06:15, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

Date changes

Through my knowledge of the history of music, 1400 seems to be the correct starting date for the Renaissance. John Dunstable was a Medieval/Renaissance transition composer. I can show you sources if you'd like. Marcus2 22:02, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

This is an area of substantial disagreement both among Wikipedia editors and music historians. —Wahoofive (talk) 00:19, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

A finely laconic way to put it, and quite accurate. I have a lot of books on this era, and I don't think any two of them agree on where the date goes. Some even think the Burgundian school composers were still medieval; some think the composers of the Italian trecento were Renaissance, since their painter colleagues are defined that way (and have musicologists and art historians ever gotten together to sort that one out? I wish--) Antandrus (talk) 00:25, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

GA Re-Review and In-line citations

Members of the Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles are in the process of doing a re-review of current Good Article listings to ensure compliance with the standards of the Good Article Criteria. (Discussion of the changes and re-review can be found here). A significant change to the GA criteria is the mandatory use of some sort of in-line citation (In accordance to WP:CITE) to be used in order for an article to pass the verification and reference criteria. Currently this article does not include in-line citations. It is recommended that the article's editors take a look at the inclusion of in-line citations as well as how the article stacks up against the rest of the Good Article criteria. GA reviewers will give you at least a week's time from the date of this notice to work on the in-line citations before doing a full re-review and deciding if the article still merits being considered a Good Article or would need to be de-listed. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact us on the Good Article project talk page or you may contact me personally. On behalf of the Good Articles Project, I want to thank you for all the time and effort that you have put into working on this article and improving the overall quality of the Wikipedia project. Agne 03:14, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Reasons for GA Delisting

This article's GA status has been revoked because it fails criterion 2. b. of 'What is a Good Article?', which states;

(b) the citation of its sources using inline citations is required (this criterion is disputed by editors on Physics and Mathematics pages who have proposed a subject-specific guideline on citation, as well as some other editors — see talk page).

LuciferMorgan 18:17, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

---

The Musical Instruments section if very weak, limited, and full of suppositions and half-truths. It could be a lot better. For example: Krummhorns (Crumhorns) aren't mentioned, but panpipes are? There are too many things wrong with that section to criticise here. It should be entirely rewritten by some instrumentalists. I was an amateur Rennaisance wind player 30 years ago, but I am not prepared to take on the task. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.71.8.71 (talk) 21:48, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Recent addition

"Recent contributions to musicological research however suggest that the concept should be avoided once and for all, or at least used with utmost care, due to the extreme difficulties in defining the meaning and periodization of the term. It is safe to state that the Italian humanist movement, uncovering and proliferating the aesthetics of antique Roman and Greek art, contributed to an accelerated revalidation of music on a conceptual level, but its direct influence on music theory, composition and performance remain suggestive."

What does this mean? Other than that the Italian humanist movement was influential in music as well as the other arts, but its exact degree and type of influence remains somewhat controversial? Antandrus (talk) 01:30, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Haha! "...it's direct influence on music theory, composition and performance remain suggestive." What a malapropism. I'd like to see a suggestive passage of Italian humanist writing.Tdimhcs (talk) 01:50, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

many instruments originated from the time of renaissance . —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.1.106.172 (talk) 15:00, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Madrigal Sub-section?

I notice that there is a complete article on madrigals. Brief mention is made here of English and a little futher on Italian madrigals. I have added an internal link to this section, but should there be a madrigal sub-section summarising the Madrigal article, with a link to main article, as is the Wikipedia style? Because of the structure used here I cannot quite see where it would go at the moment and I am reluctant to stuff it in under mannerism. Perhaps someone else can see where it would go.--Sabrebd (talk) 09:48, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with you; it needs such a subsection. For what it's worth, I'm the one who wrote the madrigal (music) article. Frankly I've been avoiding editing this article; it's kind of a mess, full of inaccuracies (extreme chromaticism in Marenzio?) and will require some effort to bring it up to our quality standards. Is anyone else watching this page? It's a big project, and a worthy one. Antandrus (talk) 01:29, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

This article a mess

I can't believe the Renaissance Music article itself, not, say, the article on Renaissance lute technique, is such a disgrace. I'll do what I can, but lil' help here?Tdimhcs (talk) 01:46, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

A top-to-bottom rewrite of this article has been on my to-do list for maybe seven years. Every time I look at it though I feel like I'm downwind of the Augean Stables. It's quite a big job, really. We could propose an outline, and anyone watching the page could pitch in if they have time. Antandrus (talk) 02:08, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Upgrade

I've started the job. It's remarkably difficult to write four general paragraphs about a topic you know well! (the lede). Let me know if I left anything obvious out (e.g. I could mention Josquin with the unified Franco-Flemish style). Everything is very general and easily citable, but in accordance with MOS I think the specific facts should go in the article body with cites there. I think the main article should have chronological sections, as it currently does, perhaps each split into sacred, secular, with perhaps a section for other developments affecting music (such as the birth of the printing press, the Reformation, the Counter-Reformation). A lot of stuff can stay (such as the parts on instruments). Antandrus (talk) 00:43, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Splendid. Do go ahead. Xxanthippe (talk) 04:01, 9 January 2012 (UTC).

We now have an editor placing a "lead too long" tag on it. What shall we do -- trim my summary of the period? Which parts of the history are unimportant?

How does this tag help a reader? An honest question. It seems utterly pointless. Shouldn't this kind of meta-commentary go on a talk page? Antandrus (talk) 17:19, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Reading through -- IMO the problem isn't the lead, it's that we never wrote the rest of the article. @Xxanthippe:, what do you think? Antandrus (talk) 17:39, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

The lede is rather long but OK with me. I suggest have another look when the article is finished. Xxanthippe (talk) 22:31, 23 July 2020 (UTC).

Organization of periods

Looking at the article history reveals this mess was less incoherent a decade ago. I'm not sure whether User:Marcus2 was being entirely serious a decade ago in defining the "Middle renaissance" from 1467-1534: Timeline of musical events doesn't list 1467 in music, and it's not obvious why 1534 in music was a crucial turning point. I've half a mind to roll things back to 2005. Sparafucil (talk) 07:57, 8 October 2015 (UTC)

WP:Semi protection

Vandalism by IPs continues. There is a case for indefinite WP:Semi protection. Xxanthippe (talk) 21:32, 17 December 2015 (UTC).

Audio examples

We have a number of audio files of renaissance period classical music. Perhaps someone with more experience in the subject matter could identify a few to sprinkle throughout the article and provide representative accompaniment to the interested readers of this article. -- ke4roh (talk) 17:47, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Folk music

Folk music like Greensleeves isn't mentioned in this article. Should it be? Pdxuser (talk) 12:14, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Indeed there is no discussion at all of popular/folk music as a separate category. I am thinking more of Italy than of England in this regard, but the point is well-taken. However, mentioning one isolated example is not the way to go about it, in my opinion. "Greensleeves" might be mentioned, en passant, along with a few other examples ("Robin is to the greenwood gone", "Watkin's Ale", "Green garters", etc.) in a general discussion of such music, but context is important. The same would be true for continental examples, such as the genres of Carnival and street songs from Italy, the various sorts of both secular and pious popular songs quoted in masses, motets, and German Tenorlieder of the sixteenth century, and so on. There must be sources out there that would help provide a framework for such a discussion.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:54, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

Music

What are the characteristics of renaissance music 120.28.228.119 (talk) 12:02, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

I'd recommend reading the article, myself. Ravenswing 12:35, 23 September 2022 (UTC)