A Complete History of Music / for Schools, Clubs, and Private Reading

by W. J. Baltzell

What kind of emotion is present in the polyphonic style of music?

What composers were prominent outside of Italy?

Name the prominent composers of the Italian school.

Sum up the Polyphonic Era.

Consult a history of art and give an account of the great painters, sculptors, architects and their greatest works during the century preceding the development of the Italian school.

LESSON XIV.
Palestrina and His Influence on the Music
of the Italian School. The Madrigal.

Palestrina.

A Church Composer.—But one master of the Italian Polyphonic schools is worthy of lengthy notice, more because of his influence on the music of the Church than his contribution to the new instrumental school then only in its infancy. Palestrina, while acquainted with Galilei, the reformer of Opera, and Neri, the originator of Oratorio, and with many of the men identified with the new style of vocal and instrumental music, gave his entire life to the composing of Church music, though in his poverty-stricken condition musical work under wealthy patronage must have often appealed to him. At any rate, the farthest he ever strayed from the Church was in the composing of many madrigals, in which he excelled; it is almost certain that in these he unintentionally influenced the development of instrumental music. For the present, however, a consideration of his life and influence on Church music is more important. But for him, Church music would have lacked for at least a century that simple and individual note so often struck by himself and Bach. Palestrina, by the enormous number of his masses and by the fertility of his invention, placed the music of the Latin Church on so high a plane that no composers, at least until the time of Bach, even approached him, much less equalled him.

Giovanni Pierluigi Sante, known as Palestrina, after his birthplace, was born in 1514 at Palestrina, a small town southeast of Rome. His parents were peasants and the boy received but the ordinary education of his class. While very young he seems to have become a choir-boy at Rome, though it is recorded that his voice was anything but pleasing. Upon this supposition rests the statement that he was, for a short time, a pupil of Arkadelt; this is unimportant because eventually (1540) he became a pupil of Goudimel, whose influence far overshadowed that of any former teacher. In 1548 he married and four sons were the result of the union, three, however, dying at an early age and the fourth proving, in after-life, a worthless fellow. In 1551 he succeeded Arkadelt as choir-master of St. Peter’s; later the dedication of three masses to Pope Julian III won him a position as singer in the Papal Choir. Owing to the jealousy of the other singers he finally lost his position, but received an appointment at the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore where he stayed for ten years. Naumann says that in 1565 he received the appointment of master of the Sistine Chapel, but never occupied the position because of the opposition among the choir. Grove, however, says that in 1565 he was made composer to the Pontifical Choir and did not become master until 1585, holding the position from that time on. In 1571 he was again connected with St. Peter’s; this also marks his acquaintance with Neri, for whom he wrote some music, and the founding of a music school, though it cannot have amounted to much since most authorities give no particulars in regard to it. Indeed, it is certain that he cannot have had much influence in that line, for his pupils, outside of his own family, did not amount to more than a scant half-dozen. In 1576 he was given the task of revising the Gradual and Antiphonary of the Latin Church but, with the assistance of a pupil, finished only a little more than one-half of the work. He died in 1594 and was buried in the Vatican. His life is marked by the usual jealousies and quarrels of musicians, though Palestrina himself seems to have been nobleminded and more than reasonably free from all such faults. He was in poor circumstances during his life, and his only living son was a bitter disappointment. Altogether, as we examine his life we are impressed by many things; first, his apparent failure from a worldly point of view; secondly, the enormous amount of composing which he did; and, finally, his devotion to the Church and her music, and because of it, his glorious success as a musician, and his undying fame.