• Note-taking Guide for Notion

History

• middle ages - approx. 1000 years (476 CE to 1450 or so)
  • the beginning of renaissance
    • renaissance → rebirth
  • Fall of Western Roman Empire to the Beginning of Renaissance
    • last couple hundred years
      • was split unto two administrative region
      • the City of Rome was the business capital
      • Constantine (emperor) decided to move the capital to a newly-built city → Istanbul (now)
      • it was difficult to communicate
• called the Dark Ages
  • technological and scientific progress was slow
  • much knowledge preserved and advanced in the Islamic world
    • astronomy (Miza, Alcor, Altair)
    • mathematics (algebra)
• Roman Empire was Christian at the end
  • By 476 CE, the official state religion of the Roman Empire was Christianity
    • Rome is also the centre of power
  • Only one Christian church - church of Rome
  • Christianity continued as the dominant religion
  • feudal society (feudalism)
    • pyrimidal hierarchy (God → King)

<aside> ❓ Why is this important for music?

• Church was everywhere!
  • bureaucracy was strictly imposed
    • liturgy, etc. were codified
    • language was Latin
    • church also supplied the people in the government
    • church was an important institution
  • system for music composition
    • there was no notation or at least a proper musical notation system
    • Pope Gregory
      • was not a musician, but a bureaucrat
    • early prominent music was church music </aside>

Monasteries

• dominant centres of learning although there wasn’t much new learning going on in the European world - plenty in the Islamic world
• preserved the learning of the ancient world
  • Greek and Roman
  • music → derives from the Muses
    • 9 daughters of Zeus who inspired the various arts (Calliope-epic poetry, Euterpe-lyric poetry and what we would call music)

Sacred and Secular

• two broadest functional categories for music are “sacred/liturgical” and “secular”

• there was sacred music before the Middle Ages, and there was all kinds of secular music going on in the Middle Ages

  • work songs
  • singing in taverns
  • love songs
  • nursery songs and lullabies

  → we have little idea what these were or sounded like

• liturgical/sacred music

  • designed for use in the church
  • also ceremonial music of semireligious character
  • vocal music
  • melodies are very smooth and flowing

• secular music

  • folk songs, work songs, dances, and instrumental pieces
  • non-religious

• development of notation

  • sophisticated system for writing music down began to be developed in the church in the early Middle ages

  <aside> ❓ Why write it down?

  • Need to standardize the liturgy or order and structure of the service
  • Usually attributed to Pope Gregory I (590-604) </aside>

Music of the Middle Ages

Liturgical: Plainchant

• Gregorian chant (plainsong, plainchant)
• Earliest chants were tranmitted orally

<aside> <img src="/icons/list_lightgray.svg" alt="/icons/list_lightgray.svg" width="40px" /> PLAY: Kyrie

• mass in Latin, lyrics in Greek

PLAY: Kyrie (Plainchant)

</aside>