This is a passage from giovanni boccaccio (131375), an outstanding Italian humanist writer and one of the pioneers of the Renaissance, in the last story on the first day of decameron. Amelia is singing a ballad. Decameron is set in 1348 during the Black Death in Florence. Ten upper-class young men and women took refuge in a villa outside the city. In order to kill time, everyone tells a story every day, and the last person sings as the end of the day. "decameron" contains 1 1 complete lyrics of balata, which affirms the popularity of performing balata in the high society of Florence. Unfortunately, there is no music left in the book. At the same time, in the mural "The Influence of Good Government" in Siena City Hall, A. Lorenzetti also depicts nine dancers dancing around a tambourine singer.
This kind of balata is a popular secular genre of Italian songs in the14th century. It and the other two genres, Pastoral and Cachia, belong to the elite art of Italian music in the "Ars Nova" period. They are only popular in a few areas, mainly in Verona and Sculley in Padua and the Visconti Palace in Milan. Between 1335 and 1420, the so-called "Trecento", there are more than 600 existing tracks in these three schools.
Italy's "Art Nouveau Movement" is rooted in the oak song of troubadour, a southern French singer. /kloc-In the early 4th century, Dante heard Trobado's songs at Scala Court in Verona, expressing his reverence for oak poems. Petrarch also mentioned the name 15 Trobados in his Triumph Cup. /kloc-in the third century, Italian poets imitated oak poems and wrote local poems, but the purpose was not for music. This separation between poetry and music was not broken until a century later. Canzone is an advanced poetic style, which shows its musicality by adding harmony, rhythm and syllables to the formal segmented structure, while music is more suitable for balata, pastoral and hunting songs with mediocre styles. Almost all early pastoral songs and all hunting songs were written for music. In fact, these lower poetic styles are despised by literary theorists.
Among these schools, balata is the most popular. Early balata, such as those in "decameron", was monophonic, but it was not a written record of "Art Nouveau" tracks. Undoubtedly, the few single-voice balata recorded in written form are more complicated than daily performances and are not suitable for dancing. Together with some existing early pastoral songs, they appeared in the first large-scale Italian secular song collection "Rossi Codex" introduced in this paper.
The code is now divided into two parts. The main part includes 7 pieces of two-page parchment, including 29 Italian secular works of14th century, which are now in the Vatican Library (No.Rossi 2 15). Smaller works, including two double-page parchments and eight works, are now at Pia Music Opera House in ostia near mantua. "G.Greggiati"), numbered mu. rari B 35。 They all belong to one copy, including at least 16 Shuang Ye parchment. The size of the manuscript is 230× 168 mm, and each page has eight lines of Italian six-line notation, which belongs to14th century Italian quantitative notation.
Rossi 2 15 is an Italian collector Chovan Francisco de rossi (Giovan? Francesco de Rossi) collection, hence the name. 1857, his widow gave the manuscript to the Jesuit library in Linz, which later moved to Vienna. 1922, the Jesuits handed over the collection to the Vatican. These two fragments were discovered by Oscar Miceti in 1963. Judging from folding and defacing, they may be used as the cover of other manuscripts. The situation of the manuscripts before Rosie's collection is not clear. Pirlotta thinks Rossi was bought in Padua Verona. Although the exact history of the transcript is unknown, some details can be established. They are the works of a group of singers and composers gathered by Alberto de la Scala in Padua and Verona from 1330 to 1345. Alberto is the eldest son of the Grand Duke of Verona and the famous protector of Dante, Can Grande della Scala. He himself is also a famous art protector. Alberto lived in Padua and was controlled by his family. The dialect of Padua appeared in the manuscript, when Marchetto, a musician in Padua, wrote in his book "Bo Miri, Malaysia Weng in Art? According to the characteristics of notation described in Musical Measurement, the manuscript may have originated in Padua-Verona region in the middle of14th century. Like most music manuscripts of the14th century, the transcripts are traceable, that is, the tracks are likely to be written between 1325 and 1355, and copied after 1350, while the widely accepted date now is around 1370 according to Pirrotta.
The 37 works of Codex include 30 pastoral songs (one of which is the pastoral song of Snow Girl), 5 balata dances, a hunting song and a Landrau dance, some of which are incomplete. All balata is an early form of single sound. All the works are unsigned, but compared with other music transcripts later, four belong to the masters of Kaya, Piero and Giovanni da Cascia.
Codex is the earliest extant collection of Italian secular songs in14th century, in which balata, pastoral songs and hunting songs also belong to the early forms of their respective genres, which is of great significance to the study of their origin and development.
The five balata songs in the transcript are all monosyllabic, and this genre probably originated from a dance music "Canzona". In Italian, ballare means dancing. However, the genre recorded in this way is no longer an ordinary dance music. After polishing and refining by court musicians, it soon became a complex and exquisite pastime loved by aristocratic circles. The frame structure of narrative poetry is similar to that of Italian religious music school Lauda, Spanish Cantiga and French Ville. bba？ A structure in which A begins with a refrain, followed by two verses with the same music (piedi)b, followed by Volta) A. The same music is used as the refrain, but the lyrics are different. Theoretically, the refrain should be repeated after each stanza, but it may be omitted during the performance, so that the balata structure in multi-stanzas will be changed from ababa ababa to ababa ababa.
Balata, a monosyllabic part of Codex, has smooth and long lines and exquisite melody outline, which can clearly express the lyrics. The first and penultimate syllables of each line are coloratura (one syllable corresponds to multiple sounds), and other syllables are composed in syllabic style (one syllable corresponds to one sound). "Excessive trust will put people in danger" (Per tropo fede talor se perigola) is a typical example. This balata clearly expresses the lyrics in a fluent style, and painfully condemns love. There are overlapping sentences between its three stanzas, and its performance may be like Boccaccio's description, in which a soloist sings stanzas and a group of people sing overlapping sentences. Three of the five balata poems in the manuscript have only one verse, which can be sung and danced. Amor mi fa cantar a la Francescha is also a French singing method, and this balata is probably the type that can sing and dance well in decameron. The other two medium-sized balata belong to many knots and can only be used for singing. Lucinte Stella may be the work of Giovanni of Florence composer Cahia, with sweet melody and skillful technique. Balata later developed into a multi-voice form, which was favored by Italians and occupied a dominant position in quantity.
There are many controversies about the origin of pastoral. One is from matricale, which means local poetry, and the other is from mandria, "shepherd" or "sheepfold". 14th century pastoral has nothing to do with the genre of the same name in16th century, although many of them are pastoral themes. The pastoral songs in the manuscript are all two parts, showing its original form. Generally speaking, the poetic form of pastoral poetry is terzetti plus one or two lines of ritornello. The musical form of pastoral can be expressed by aab or aaab, but it also has many changeable structures.
Quando i oselli canta embodies all the above formal features. Like most14th century rural areas and balata, this rural area has two parts. The upper voice is gorgeous and slightly ostentatious, and the lower voice moves with longer notes, using deliberate simple rhythm and preferring progressive movement. Sometimes the contrast between the two sounds is very sharp. The first and penultimate syllables of each line are sung by fast flowers, and the other syllables are made of syllable lyrics. The word "La pasturele" in the first three verses of this pastoral reflects the "rural part" that Padua theorist Antonio da Tempo thinks is the characteristic of pastoral with bagpipe-like sound extension effect. It is quite possible that the two-part style of14th century began with improvisation, and parallel fifth and eighth harmonic intervals are common. The Luo Nai part of Lido is a series of parallel fifth degrees with some scattered transitional sounds, and occasionally parallel octaves are added to key structural points in music. This two-part form, which is very common in Italian music in the14th century, is often described as the second half accompanied by the first half, but in fact, the relationship between the ministries is more complicated. When birds sing, the lower part has the melody of Aba (not counting Li Du Luo Nai), while the upper part does not have this melody, but it is a melody decoration for the lower part.
Let's talk about Italian hunting songs. Italian hunting songs are not directly related to French hunting songs (chace). It only has two upper parts in the form of a cannon, the lower part is an instrumental accompaniment part with a long note duration, and the French hunting song is a three-part cannon. Hunting songs usually consist of an adult gun section and a Liduneiro section. The number of this genre is much less than that of balata and Pastoral. There is only one song in the transcript, but it is very lively and charming, which is very popular with the court audience. One of their main pastimes is hunting. In addition to hunting, the lyrics of hunting songs also involve fishing, bonfires or street scenes in the market. The same thing is that there is an outdoor atmosphere. The lyrics have the dramatic effect of realistic shouting, and the lines are free in form and different in length.
The only hunting song "Orkua" (Componi) in the manuscript is the work of Anonymous, and some people think it is the work of Piero. This hunting song describes the hunting scene, using many of the same questions and answers and dialogues, and presenting it in the form of cannon. The lyrics are full of shouts, "Here we go! Here! " "Grab it, grab it!" There is also a call for the name of the hound, "white hair, sit here!" " It makes people feel like they are in a hunting ground.
Ongni dilecto e ongni bel piacciere, belonging to Piero, is a cannon-like pastoral. The difference between this mixed form of pastoral and hunting songs is that its lyrics are in the form of pastoral, not the free form of hunting songs, and it does not have the realistic cry in hunting songs. The difference between it and ordinary pastoral is that it uses a large number of artillery forms.
Few recorded albums are completely copied tracks, and the best one is the Song of Love by Micrologus Orchestra (D'Amor cantando, Opus1130-141,/kloc-0. This album featured 25 balata and pastoral songs by Codex, and there were many ways to choose and use vocals and instruments. The works identified as dance music are accompanied by tambourines depicted in Lorenzetti murals, and bagpipes are used in the pastoral style. In balata, the troupe used many impromptu decorative sounds and stress to emphasize the dance beat. This version of the interpretation style is very secular, the voice is full of wildness, and it doesn't look like aristocratic singing.
Esther Lamandir is a famous female musician in the Middle Ages. Her album "decameron" (astréE 7706, 1986) attempts to reproduce the performance of Boccaccio's representative work, Basalata. Lamandir used a lot of decorative improvisation techniques, which was unique. This album records all five songs of balata in the manuscript, which is worth collecting and listening to.
The album "Lantini and Italian Ars Nova" (OPUS11160-9206, 1992) recorded by Ala Piero Della Francesca Orchestra, although the title is related to the master musician Lantini, is also selected from several songs in the transcript. This version of Bridget Lesne's singing has the temperament of Italian medieval aristocrats, elegant and smooth.
Rossi Manuscript is the earliest extant Italian "Art Nouveau" music manuscript, which provides valuable information for early balata, pastoral and hunting songs. These leisurely, lively and exquisite secular songs seem to make people swim in the medieval world of Boccaccio's decameron.
(Originally published in Sanlian Philharmonic Magazine,No. 1, 202 1)