Germany Music Part 5
At this time it happened to German musicians that they had to suffer the consequences of the foreign supremacy that had already existed for centuries: around 1550-90 it was Flemish supremacy, then up to 1620 of the English and finally of the Italian. The example, in preferring the Flemish chapel masters, was given by the Emperor of Germany Charles V himself, who led with him in all his residences, even temporary, his chapel in Brussels, directed by Th. Crecquillon, from C. Canis and N. Gombert.
In Dresden he was called M. Le Maistre, from Bergamo A. Scandello. Monaco became from 1556 onwards one of the major musical centers of the time due to the presence of the brilliant Orlando di Lasso, who, then came from Flanders, had already made himself famous with a collection of motets and madrigals. The influence exerted by Orlando on the various European schools and therefore also on the German one was very great; in Germany his best pupils were I. de Vento, J. Eccard, L. Lechner. Eccard, who had come to Berlin after Augsburg and Königsberg, became one of the most important masters of the so-called Currende – Motette Protestant (these motets were intended to confer solemnity to processions, processions, etc., and were sung on the way, generally by school children; Eccard’s motets were published under the name of Preussische Festlieder by the pupil J. Stobaeus). Lechner, who came from Val d’Adige to Stuttgart, could be called (for his Passion according to St. John, his Motets on the Song of Songs, the sayings on life and death) a faithful to the a cappella style. In the time of Lasso, another famous Flemish composer was working in Augusta: J. de Kerle; in Graz, Annibale Padovano and Johannes de Cleve; in Heidelberg C. Hollander; in Ansbach and Königsberg T. Riccio da Brescia, in Prague the inexhaustible madrigalist Ph. de Monte and that Jakob Regnart who, with the introduction of light Neapolitan villanelles, put into disuse the elaborate style (on still song) they had illustrated the Senfl, K. Othmayr, Germany Forster, Jobst von Brant. These villanelle are happy and short triplets, which ironically accentuate their rustic character with series of parallel fifths; quick southern forms that opened the way to Germany for the so-called Falala o fa – la (see fa -la), songs and ballets by GG Gastoldi and L. Marenzio. In Vienna he met Jacob Vaet, successor of the famous Arnold von Brück, and the organist J. Buus, a pupil of A. Willaert; in Innsbruck the Belgian A. Utendal.
Close to many foreigners, many Germans are now beginning to assert themselves and historically place themselves as masters of the late Renaissance. The Lutheran tradition of J. Walter, by a group of Thuringian musicians, J. von Burgk, L. Schröter, Gallus Dressler, to which are added the East German B. Gesius, J. Stobaeus and Germany Lange, is conducted (through the various motet currents of Clemens non papa and Orlando di Lasso) up to the threshold of the early Baroque. Under the Italian (Venetian) influence, J. Gallus (died 1591) and HL Hassler (died 1612) nevertheless succeeded in founding musical buildings which were very significant for the development of national art. Especially HL Hassler, a pupil of A. Gabrieli, managed to give a clearly German tone to his music, even though it was built in the Italian style. Neue deutsche Gesänge (1596) and its Lustgarten (1601); and famous melodies of the German musical heritage date back to him, such as Fr. ex. Mein Gemüt ist mir verwirret and O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden, the latter of which occupies such an important place in the Passion according to St. Matthew by Bach. In his versions of evangelical songs, two stylistic versions are distinguished: one is very simple, in a homophone style; the other more complex, in an imitated style. Moreover, the coexistence of different stylistics was not limited to the work of Hassler: while the masters of Augusta: C. Gumpelzheimer, B. Klingenstein, C. Erbach practiced the fugitive style of a Venetian nature, in the work of Germany Aichinger (died in 1628) the influence of the Roman style of Palestrina was felt. In Hamburg H. Praetorius is influenced by the Gabrieli, while in Stettin F. Dulichius continues the style of Lasso, but bringing the number of voices from five to seven.
More or less common in all these musicians, however, is a tendency to move away from the beauty of the contrapuntal lines to reach that resulting from the great sounds of compact groups of voices: a sign of the spiritual change that the Baroque brought.
According to diseaseslearning.com, the restlessness and dynamism, the search for the powerful and dramatic effect, typical of the early Baroque, take the place of the tight Gothic construction and the learned in depth contemplative work of the early Renaissance; so that the year 1618 which marks the beginning of the Thirty Years War can also be considered a decisive year for the evolution of German musical art. Exponent of this transition period is M. Praetorius of Wolfenbüttel (died 1621). This representative of the tradition of J. Walter di Torgau ended up becoming a passionate apostle of the Italian concertante style. In his theoretical work (Syntagma musicum, 3 vols., 1614-18) he teaches a very baroque composition technique, based on the juxtaposition of various and variously important vocal and instrumental masses.
