Renaissance: Interdisclipinary Introduction

1. "Renaissance"

a. time frame & dates; history vs. music

• historically 1300-1585 (1600); broader; associated w/ Italy
•  musically, Italy had little influence
  

b. narrow & broad meanings:

• revival of Greek & Roman culture; antiquity
• rebirth of human spirit

c. music & antiquity (narrow)

• virtually nothing is known of actual music from antiquity
• theoretical writings extant
• general writings of music's affects; Ethos
• texts generate meter of music

d. music & rebirth (broad)

• felt they were doing something new & wonderful
• Tinctoris refers to Dunstable, among others

e. period context; continuity & transformation

• new spirit
• expansion of previous models

2. Ideas

a. secular humanism; elitists

• individualism; interdisciplinary expertise; cosmopolitan; "journeymen" (trades)

b. 1300's: forward & backward coexisted

• mysticism, scholasticism
• Franciscan Humanism: St. Francis of Assisi
• simplicity; solve problems of this life in simple parables
• return to nature, human pleasures
• natural humanism; nominalists: disagreed with scholars; were deductive, as opposed to reason
• move towards individualism

c. 1400's

• Classical humanism, models
• scientific naturalism
• prized individualism; highly rewarded

d. 1500's

• gradual decline; classical humanism "revival"
• individualism expected
• manneristic phase: academic, free; exaggerated; late Renaissance.
• Michaelangelo
• militant mysticism; reformation; fundamentalist

3. Art

• beginnings of Modern Art techniques
• free oil, free standing sculpture, perspective, realism, rich colors, textures
• subject matter conservative

4. Landmark events

• printing; music in 1500's
• world expansion
• religious upheavals

5. Literature

• purified Latin
• revival of Greek
• vernacular: Italian
  

6. Learning

• beginnings of secondary education for men, with divisions of levels