There appear to have been three classes of secular composition, for which madrigal became the general term—viz., madrigals for one voice, with accompaniment; madrigals for several voices, in parts and unaccompanied; and, lastly, madrigals accompanied by many instruments, and sometimes described as “apt for viols and voices.” The English writers preferred the second class, and excelled in it.
In the fifteenth century the madrigal was well known in the Low Countries, being at that time invariably constructed according to the ancient ecclesiastical modes, and sometimes containing great features of elaboration. I complained, when speaking of the history of the mass, that musical subjects originally associated with profane words were introduced as canti fermi, but we find in the case of the madrigal that the reverse happened, and that passages of plain chant were used in connection with some light secular counter-subject.
Petrucci, before mentioned as the inventor of movable music types, was the first to publish these works, composed by such representatives of the early Flemish madrigal school as Okenheim, Tinctor, Josquin des Prés, Agricola, and several others. I should like once again to quote that learned writer on music, Mr. Rockstro, who considers this first period “no less interesting than instructive to the critical student, for it is here that we first find science and popular melody working together for a common end.”
From 1530 to the end of the sixteenth century a great advance was taking place in art generally. Appropriate treatment of words, and, if it were necessary, simplicity itself, restrained that desire to show contrapuntal complexity and other conceits at the selfish expense of truth and honesty.
This advance in the right direction was supported by the last composers of the old Flemish school, Archadelt, De Wert, Waelrant, and that great writer Orlando di Lasso, at whose death the madrigal school of the Netherlands ended; but not so the madrigal itself, which long ere this had been transplanted into other countries, and had commenced to grow most healthily in Italy. In fact, Archadelt’s first collection of madrigals was published in Venice in 1538, and was speedily followed by five other sets, in some of which we find specimens by the first really good Italian madrigal writer, Costanzo Festa. In his work, and until Palestrina, vestiges remain of the Flemish style; but gradually the Roman or Italian element destroyed all foreign character and influence, and alone remained.
Palestrina wrote madrigals with equal facility and merit in all styles; he named two of his volumes “Madrigali Spirituali,” sacred music, but intended rather for the chamber than the church, for which latter the motetts were written. He varies every passage according to the sentiment of the words, and above all his contrapuntal learning, places his noble sincerity and purity of style and expression. Would that our modern work possessed such simple nobility!
Succeeding him, Felice Anerio produced, and in 1585 published, three volumes of Madrigali spirituali, and, soon after the year 1600, two volumes of secular madrigals; there were besides fine madrigals by Giovanelli Nanini, Francesco Anerio, and last but not least, Luca Marenzio. These and others formed the great Roman school, but there existed a school in Venice also, founded by Willaert the Netherlander, from which sprang the works of the two Gabrielis, Leo Hasler, Gastoldi and Croce. In Florence also madrigals were very popular for a short time, until the craving of the Florentines for instrumental accompaniment destroyed their early affection for purely vocal music.
In Naples a lighter form (villanella) existed, but in France and Germany it found no home, where the chanson and volkslied held their respective sway.
In England a national school was formed which took firm root, and developed into fully as healthy a tree as any of the rival foreign growths. First of all Italian madrigals were introduced and printed in England, but by the end of the sixteenth century Byrd and Morley had published original specimens, and the madrigal was fast becoming an English institution, supported by such excellent composers as Weelkes, Edwardes, Kirby, Dowland, Wilbye, Ford, Benet, Michael Este, and others. We may call special attention to Morley’s collection in honour of the virgin Queen Elizabeth, named the “Triumphes of Oriana,” including madrigals by many of the above-named writers. It was published in 1601. Only a few years later Orlando Gibbons brought out a volume of “Madrigals and Motets,” and just a hundred years after the earliest publication in England of such works, appeared a book of madrigals collected by Martin Pierson. Madrigals they undoubtedly were, though he called them “mottects.” Ambros, in his “Geschichte der Musik,” speaks in the highest praise of our great madrigal school, and names it “one of the most pleasing flowers of that Elizabethan soil,” a soil teeming with great scholars, poets, and dramatists.
To conclude, the madrigal is generally interpreted by many voices to each part, and as a rule is the more effective in proportion to the number of singers employed. Whereas the glee, into which the madrigal gradually changed, and of which we are about to speak, is intended to be sung by a single representative of each part. Other differences, more important than this, we shall have occasion to note later on.