Page 80 - ESSENTIAL LISTENING TO MUSIC

FiguRE 4.11
Michelangelo’s enduring statue of David (1501–1504) is an iconic symbol of man’s greatness.
Even today pilgrim-tourists line up to venerate this monument to humankind in near-perfect form. Like Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo made a careful study of human anatomy.
Attending the rebirth of the arts and letters of classical antiquity was a renewed interest in humankind itself. We have come to call this enthusiastic self-interest humanism. Simply said, humanism is the belief that people are something more than mere puppets dangling from divine strings, that they themselves have the capacity to shape their own world and place therein things both good and beautiful. The culture of the Middle Ages, as we have seen, was fostered by the Church, which emphasized a collective submission to the al- mighty, hiding the individual human form beneath layers of clothing. The culture of the Renaissance, by contrast, rejoiced in the human form in all its fullness, expressed in works such as Michelangelo’s David (Figure 4.11). This
culture looked outward and indulged a passion for invention and discovery. Today, when college students take courses in the “humanities,” they study the arts, letters, ideas, and institutions that have enriched—and marked
the best of—the human experience over the centuries.
With pride the artist of the Renaissance asserted a personal identity
and a name, such as “Leonardo,” “Michelangelo,” or “Josquin”—this in contrast to the faceless, usually anonymous master of the Middle Ages. If inspiration still came from God, it could be shaped in personal ways by an innovative creator. Renaissance artists demanded independence, recognition, and something more: money. Now a gifted artist might vie for the highest-paying commission, just as a sought-after composer might play one patron off against another for the highest salary. Money, it appeared, might prime the pump of creativity and lead to greater productivity. The prolific Michelangelo left an es-
tate worth some $10 million in terms of today’s money.
If artists were paid more in the Renaissance, it was because art was now
thought to be more valuable. For the first time in the Christian West, there emerged the concept of a “work of art”: the belief that an object might not only serve as a religious symbol but also be a creation of purely aesthetic value and enjoyment. Music in the Renaissance was composed by proud artists who aimed to give pleasure. Their music conversed, not with eternity, but with the listener. It was judged good or bad only to the degree that it pleased fellow human beings. Music and the other arts could now be freely evaluated, and composers and painters could be ranked according to their greatness. Artistic judgment, appreciation, and criticism entered Western thought for the first time in the human-
istic Renaissance.
Josquin Desprez (c. 1455–1521) and the Renaissance Motet
Josquin Desprez (pronounced “josh-CAN day-PRAY”) was one of the greatest composers of the Renaissance, the Mozart or Beethoven of his day. Josquin was born somewhere near the present border between France and Belgium about 1455, and died in the same region in 1521. Yet, like so many musicians of north- ern France, Josquin was drawn to Italy to pursue fame and fortune. Between 1484 and 1504, he worked for various dukes in Milan and Ferrara, and in Rome in the Sistine Chapel, the pope’s private chapel in the Vatican (Figure 4.12). Evidence
58 chapter four music in the middle ages and renaissance
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