0.5 Chapter 4: european art music: middle ages to romantic  (Page 6/12)

Baroque: ca. 1600-1750

Many of the historic events in Europe during the 17th and early 18th centuries are extensions of forces that shaped and defined the Renaissance. The explorations of the 16th century were followed by the establishment of more and more colonies in the New World. In the sphere of intellectual activity, the scientific methodologies and discoveries of Copernicus and Galileo laid the foundations for the work of Kepler and Newton, and the philosophers Descartes, Spinoza, and Locke embraced the Renaissance pursuit of truth through reason. Religious conflicts engendered by the Reformation continued to erupt throughout the 17th century. In the area that is now Germany, tensions between Protestants and Catholics following the Reformation ignited a catastrophic Thirty Years War, during the course of which half the population died. The history of England is also a violent one, with such bloody deeds as the beheading of Mary Queen of Scots and Charles I, both Catholics, and the posthumous hanging and dismemberment of Oliver Cromwell, a commoner and Puritan who became England’s Lord Protector during the Commonwealth period. The powers of the absolute monarch reached new heights in France, whose citizens were heavily taxed to support Louis XIV and the 20,000 courtiers who lived at the extravagant palace he had built for himself at Versailles.

These were some of the contexts in which artists worked during the approximately 150-year period of the Baroque. As in the Renaissance, popes, cardinals, monarchs, and members of the aristocracy continued to use art as a symbol of power and wealth. But artists and musicians also created works for a wider public. The art, architecture, and music they created exhibit features that are characteristic of romantic expression—intense emotion, flamboyance, and dynamic movement. For subjects, painters and sculptors were drawn to dramatic moments from mythology, ancient history, and the Bible, which they depicted with elaborate decoration, vivid color, and bold use of light and shadow. They also portrayed scenes from everyday life that were displayed in the homes of the rising middle class. Architecture, often grandiose in scale, employed sweeping lines, high domes, columns, and statues, all overlaid with ornamental detail. The taste for dramatic expression in conjunction with the opening of public concert halls created a supportive climate for the emergence of opera and oratorio and of new instrumental genres independent of vocal music such as the sonata, concerto, and suite. In their pursuit of dramatic intensity, composers introduced strongly contrasting effects—between loud and soft, between soloist and large group, between voices and instruments—and developed a vocabulary of devices that associated particular keys, meters, rhythmic figures, and instruments with specific emotional states, such as anger, love, joy, and grief.

Historic context

• Founding of Dutch East India Company, 1602.
• Founding of Sante Fe, New Mexico, 1605.
• Founding of Jamestown, Virginia, 1607.
• Dutch East India Company ships tea from China shipped to Europe, 1609.
• Discovery of Hudson Bay by Henry Hudson, 1610.
• King James Bible published, 1611; first authorized version of the Bible in English.
• Tobacco planted in Virginia, 1612.
• Thirty Years War in Germany, 1618-1648; almost half the population dies due to war, famine, and plague.
• Discovery of circulation of the blood by William Harvey, 1619.
• First African slaves in North America arrive in Virginia, 1619.
• Pilgrims arrive in Massachusetts, 1620.
• Dutch West Indies Company purchases Manhattan Island from native Indians; colony of New Amsterdam founded, 1626.
• Founding of colony of Massachusetts, 1629.
• Founding of Harvard College, 1636.
• Bay Psalm Book, oldest surviving printed book in America, 1640.
• English Commonwealth, 1649-1660, under leadership of Oliver Cromwell.
• Restoration of English monarchy, 1660.
• Founding of Academic Royale de Danse by Louis XIV, 1661.
• Louis XIV begins building of Versailles, 1662.
• Plague in London kills 68,000, 1665.
• Great Fire of London, 1666.
• Founding of the College of William and Mary, Virginia, 1692.
• Inoculation against small pox introduced in England, 1717.
• Frederick the Great introduces freedom of the press and freedom of worship in Prussia, 1740.