MUS-319 Exam 2
Comprehensive List of Vocabulary, Terms, and People
Terms & Concepts
Anglican Church: The official Church of England created by King Henry VIII after separating from the Catholic Church in 1534.
Anthem: A sacred polyphonic choral setting in English used in the Anglican liturgy, analogous to the Latin motet.
Calvinism: A Protestant movement led by Jean Calvin emphasizing strict liturgical simplicity, congregational singing of unembellished metrical psalms, and the rejection of elaborate polyphony in church.
Cantus Firmus: A pre-existing melody (drawn from plainchant or secular song) placed in the tenor as the structural foundation for a polyphonic composition.
Concerto delle Donne: A famous ensemble of professional female court singers in late-16th-century Ferrara known for their high virtuosity and expressive solo/ensemble singing.
Consort: An instrumental ensemble of the 16th and 17th centuries. A whole consort uses instruments from the same family (e.g., all viols); a mixed/broken consort combines instruments from different families.
Contenance Angloise: The "English guise/manner"—a 15th-century term describing the distinctive English sound imported to continental Europe, characterized by full sonorities, sweet harmonies, and pervasive 3rds and 6ths.
Council of Trent (1545–1563): An ecumenical council of the Catholic Church convened as part of the Counter-Reformation; it sought to reform church music by banning secular cantus firmi, demanding clear text intelligibility, and restricting overly complex polyphony.
Counter-Reformation: The Catholic Church’s internal reform movement in response to the Protestant Reformation, aiming to restore spiritual devotion, liturgical purity, and musical clarity.
Court Chapel: A mobile or permanent institution of professional musicians (singers, instrumentalists, and composers) employed by a monarch, prince, or noble court (e.g., the Duchy of Burgundy).
Deudsche Messe: Martin Luther’s German Mass (1526), designed for smaller or vernacular churches, replacing traditional Latin Mass chants with German hymns and chorales.
Duchy of Burgundy: A wealthy 15th-century political territory (spanning eastern France and the Low Countries) whose court was a primary center for early Renaissance polyphony under composers like Du Fay and Binchois.
Faburden / Fauxbourdon:
Faburden (English): Improvised 3-voice polyphony where a chant in the middle voice is doubled a 4th above and a 3rd below.
Fauxbourdon (Continental): Composition technique where the chant is placed in the top voice (cantus) with a bottom voice moving mostly in 6ths/octaves, and an unwritten middle voice improvised a 4th below the top voice.
Formes Fixes: Standardized French poetic and musical structures dominant in the 14th and 15th centuries: Rondeau (), Ballade (), and Virelai ().
Frottola: A light, strophic, 4-part Italian secular song of the late 15th and early 16th centuries, featuring top-voice melody and homophonic chordal rhythm.
Harmonice Musices Odhecaton A (1501): The first book of polyphonic music printed from movable type, published in Venice by Ottaviano Petrucci.
Humanism: A Renaissance intellectual movement focused on classical antiquity, human potential, rhetoric, individual expression, and a closer relationship between music and text.
Intabulation: An arrangement of a vocal work (chanson, motet, madrigal) re-notated into tablature for solo lutenist, keyboardist, or vihuelist.
Intermedio: A dramatic, musical, and visual spectacle performed between the acts of a spoken play at Renaissance court weddings and celebrations.
L'homme armé: A popular 15th-century French secular song whose tune was used as a cantus firmus for dozens of Renaissance Mass settings.
Lutheranism: The Protestant movement founded by Martin Luther, promoting congregational singing in the vernacular (German) through strophic chorales.
Madrigalism: Word-painting techniques in 16th-century madrigals where musical figures visually or audibly mimic specific textual words (e.g., rapid ascending notes for "climbing", pauses for "death").
Mensuration Canon: A canon in which two or more voices sing the same musical line simultaneously at different speeds or metric proportions (e.g., Ockeghem's Missa prolationum).
Missa Prolationum: A landmark Mass setting by Johannes Ockeghem constructed entirely using mensuration canons across all four voice parts.
Motto Mass: A cyclic Mass setting where every movement begins with the exact same melodic motive or head-motive (head-motive Mass).
Musica Reservata: A late-16th-century term describing emotionally intense, chromatic, highly expressive music composed for select, connoisseur audiences.
Musica Transalpina (1588): A collection of Italian madrigals translated into English, published in London by Nicholas Yonge, which ignited the English Madrigal boom.
Musique Mesurée: A late-16th-century French style of quantitative vocal composition pioneered by Jean-Antoine de Baïf and Claude Le Jeune, matching long and short text syllables to exact long and short note durations.
Oriana: The poetic name representing Queen Elizabeth I in Thomas Morley’s famous madrigal anthology The Triumphes of Oriana (1601).
Palestrina Style: The late-16th-century polyphonic style developed by Palestrina, characterized by smooth, stepwise melodic contours, controlled dissonance preparation and resolution, clear text declamation, and triadic harmony.
Point of Imitation: A structural passage in polyphonic music where a single musical theme/phrase is introduced successively across all voice parts.
Psalter: A printed book containing metrical translations of the Psalms set to simple, strophic melodies for congregational worship.
Reformation: The 16th-century religious movement that split Western Christianity into Protestantism and Catholicism, profoundly altering church music styles and liturgies across Europe.
Renaissance: The cultural and historical era (c. 1400–1600) marked by a "rebirth" of classical antiquity, humanist philosophy, expanded polyphonic techniques, and international musical styles.
Tablature: A system of notation for plucked or keyboard instruments (lute, vihuela, organ) that uses numbers, letters, or visual diagrams on lines to show finger placement rather than abstract pitch names.
Important People
Pierre Attaingnant (c. 1494–1552): Major French music publisher active in Paris who revolutionized music publishing by popularizing the single-impression printing method. This technique combined staff lines and notes into a single piece of movable type, making printed sheet music far cheaper and more widely accessible to the middle class than Petrucci’s triple-impression system. He issued hundreds of anthologies of light Parisian chansons by Sermisy and Janequin.
Gilles Binchois (c. 1400–1460): Central Franco-Flemish composer of the early Renaissance who served for decades in the court chapel of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy. Renowned as a master of the 15th-century Burgundian chanson, he wrote elegant 3-voice settings in the formes fixes (especially the Rondeau De plus en plus) marked by sweet, arching treble melodies and gentle syncopation.
William Byrd (c. 1540–1623): Preeminent English composer of the Elizabethan era who remained a staunch Roman Catholic while serving as a Gentleman of the Royal Chapel. He composed masterworks for both the Anglican Church (Sing Joyfully) and underground Catholic services, as well as virtuosic keyboard variations (John come kiss me now). Along with Tallis, he held Queen Elizabeth I’s exclusive royal patent for music printing.
Jean Calvin (1509–1564): French theologian and Protestant reformer who established a strict teocratic government in Geneva, Switzerland. Rejecting complex Latin polyphony, elaborate instruments, and non-scriptural texts as idolatrous distractions, he mandated that church music consist solely of monophonic, congregational singing of vernacular Biblical Psalms set in strict meters (Metrical Psalms).
Guillaume Du Fay (c. 1397–1474): Outstanding Franco-Flemish composer of the early-to-mid 15th century who worked across northern France, Italy, and the Papal Chapel. He synthesized international styles—combining French rhythmic complexity (Resvellies vous), Italian smooth melody, and English triadic harmony (Contenance Angloise). He was a pioneer of the 4-voice secular Cantus-Firmus Mass (Missa Se la face ay pale) and sacred fauxbourdon hymn settings (Christe, redemptor omnium).
John Dowland (1563–1626): Leading English composer and virtuoso lutenist who served as court lutenist to Christian IV of Denmark before securing a position at the English court. Famous across Europe for his melancholy aesthetic, he perfected the English lute song (air), an intimate genre for solo voice accompanied by lute and optional bass viol (Flow, my tears, adapted from his famous Lachrimae pavane).
John Dunstable (c. 1390–1453): Preeminent English mathematician, astronomer, and composer who spent key years in France serving John, Duke of Bedford (Regent of France). He is historically credited with importing the sweet Contenance Angloise to continental Europe, heavily influencing Du Fay and Binchois through his full sonorities, non-functional triadic harmonies, and declamatory motets (Quam pulchra es).
Giovanni Gabrieli (c. 1555–1612): Leading Italian composer and principal organist at St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice during the late Renaissance. Taking advantage of the church’s multi-balconied architecture, he perfected polychoral composition (cori spezzati) and was one of the first composers to specify exact dynamics and instrumental scoring in published scores (Canzon septime toni a 8).
Carlo Gesualdo (1566–1613): Italian nobleman, Prince of Venosa, and composer infamous both for murdering his unfaithful wife and for his extreme, highly eccentric late Renaissance madrigals. Working outside commercial print pressures, his late works ("Io Parto" e non più dissi) feature shocking, chromatic harmonic progressions, abrupt rhythmic shifts, and intense word-painting to depict pain and death.
Henry Tudor / Henry VIII (1491–1547): King of England whose political and marital break with Rome led to the Act of Supremacy (1534) and the founding of the Anglican Church. His dissolution of Catholic monasteries and demand for English-language services forced a radical transformation in English church music, replacing Latin polyphonic Masses with English services and anthems.
Josquin Des Prez (c. 1450–1521): Preeminent Franco-Flemish composer of the High Renaissance who worked in prominent Italian courts (Milan, Rome, Ferrara) and for the French royal chapel. Praised by Martin Luther as "master of the notes," he perfected continuous points of imitation, paired voice textures, and humanistic text-expression across sacred motets (Ave Maria...virgo serena), Paraphrase Masses (Missa Pange lingua), and polyphonic chansons (Faulte d'argent).
Clément Janequin (c. 1485–1558): Major French composer active in Bordeaux and Paris who was the undisputed master of the programmatically descriptive Parisian chanson. He gained immense popularity across Europe for his vivid, lighthearted secular pieces that incorporated vocal sound-effects imitating battles, birdsong, street cries, and rural chatter (Martin menoit son pourceau).
Claude Le Jeune (1528–1600): Leading French Protestant composer affiliated with the poet Jean-Antoine de Baïf’s Académie de Poésie et de Musique. He was the primary practitioner of musique mesurée, an experimental compositional style that sought to revive ancient Greek poetic meters by assigning strict long and short note durations to long and short text syllables (Revecy venir du printans).
Orlando di Lasso (1532–1594): One of the most prolific and internationally famous Franco-Flemish composers of the late Renaissance who served for decades as maestro di cappella to the Duke of Bavaria in Munich. A master of all European vernacular genres, he published over 2,000 works spanning Latin motets, Italian madrigals, French chansons, and German Lieder, renowned for his dramatic text depiction.
Martin Luther (1483–1546): German monk, theologian, and composer who initiated the Protestant Reformation in 1517 by posting his Ninety-Five Theses. An avid lover of music, he placed congregational singing at the heart of the Lutheran liturgy, writing and adapting simple strophic German hymns (Chorales, such as Ein feste Burg) so that entire congregations could participate in worship.
Luca Marenzio (1553–1599): Outstanding Italian madrigalist active in Rome and Florence who brought the late Renaissance madrigal to its peak of stylistic refinement. Renowned for his exquisite textual sensitivity and virtuosic word-painting, he used advanced chromaticism and bold melodic figures to illustrate poetic mood (Solo e pensoso, where the top voice sings a slow chromatic scale to depict walking alone).
Thomas Morley (1557–1602): English composer, theorist, music printer, and student of William Byrd who popularized Italian secular styles in England. He authored the famous treatise A Plaine and Easie Introduction to Practicall Musicke (1597), published light, homophonic balletts with "fa-la-la" refrains (Sing we and chant it), and edited the madrigal collection The Triumphes of Oriana honoring Elizabeth I.
Johannes Ockeghem (c. 1410–1497): Master Franco-Flemish composer of the mid-to-late 15th century who served three consecutive French kings over four decades. Famous for his deep bass register sonorities, long non-imitative melodic lines, and astonishing contrapuntal complexity, his masterwork Missa prolationum is constructed entirely of simultaneous mensuration canons across all four voices.
Ottaviano Petrucci (1466–1539): Venetian printer who produced the very first book of polyphonic music printed from movable type, Harmonice Musices Odhecaton A (1501). He held an exclusive 20-year patent from the Venetian Signory for his triple-impression process (printing staff lines first, text second, and music notes third), which set unprecedented standards for visual elegance.
Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525–1594): Italian composer who spent his entire career in Rome serving major basilicas (including St. Peter's). Revered as the definitive master of Catholic Counter-Reformation sacred polyphony, his refined, balanced style (Palestrina Style) featured smooth stepwise melodies, strict dissonance control, and transparent text declamation, famously exemplified in his Pope Marcellus Mass.
Claudin de Sermisy (c. 1490–1562): French composer and singer who served in the French Royal Chapel under King Francis I. Along with Janequin, he was the primary composer of the 16th-century Parisian chanson, producing light, syllabic, homophonic 4-voice settings focused on speech rhythms, clear form, and optimistic love poetry (Tant que vivray).
Thomas Tallis (c. 1505–1585): Foremost English composer who successfully navigated the dangerous religious shifts of the Tudor era, serving the Royal Chapel under four monarchs (Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I, Elizabeth I). He composed Latin polyphony for Catholic rites as well as simple, clear syllabic English anthems for the Anglican Church (If ye love me).
Thomas Weelkes (c. 1576–1623): Prominent English madrigalist and organist at Chichester Cathedral known for his imaginative, highly descriptive word-painting. His 6-voice madrigal As Vesta was (contributed to Morley's The Triumphes of Oriana) features extreme pictorial devices, such as voices ascending for "first came down" or falling for "running down a hill".
Adrian Willaert (c. 1490–1562): Influential Franco-Flemish composer who was appointed maestro di cappella at St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice in 1527. He pioneered Venetian polychoral techniques (cori spezzati), emphasized strict matching of musical meter to Latin speech accents, and trained an entire generation of major composers and theorists, including Gioseffo Zarlino.