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Updated: May 5, 2025
When he returned to Arnstadt, the spirit of Buxtehude was upon him. Henceforth the quiet people of Arnstadt knew no rest. Variations, subtle, beautiful, a refined and fuller contrapuntal treatment, mingled with the chorale. The conservatism of Arnstadt received a severe shock a dreadful experience, doubtless, to the quiet German town.
From the first he used counterpoint, canon, imitation, and all the devices of the contrapuntal style. But the difference between his newer style and that of Wagenseil and the rest is that he neither uses counterpoint of any sort nor chord figures to make up the true substance of the music, but merely as devices to help him in maintaining a continuous flow of melody.
The second subject, introduced by the word "repent" descending through the interval of a diminished seventh and contrasted with the florid counterpoint of the phrase, "and believe the glad tidings of God," is a masterpiece of contrapuntal writing, and, if performed by a choir of three or four hundred voices, would produce an overpowering effect.
In these responsoria he always sang along with his sons, and in cantu figurali he sang the alto." The alto which Luther sang must not be confounded with the alto part of to-day. Here it means the cantus firmus, the melody around which the old composers wove their contrapuntal ornamentation. Luther was the creator of German congregational singing.
Not that the words should have predominance over the music, or even coequal sway with it, but that they should serve to give direction to the succession of feelings expressed by the music. "Lift up your heads" and "Hallelujah" do not owe their glory to the text, but to that tremendous energy of rhythmic and contrapuntal progression which the text serves to concentrate and justify.
He says that in these compositions he tried continually to give the meaning of the words and so to touch responsive chords of feeling. He endeavored to compose in a pleasing style by hiding all contrapuntal effects as much as possible. He set long syllables to consonances and let passing notes go with short syllables.
Besides, Bach set comic dialogue to music exactly as he set the recitatives of the Passion, there being for him, apparently, only one recitative possible, and that the musically best. He reserved the expression of his merry mood for the regular set numbers in which he could make one of his wonderful contrapuntal traceries of pure ornament with the requisite gaiety of line and movement.
Muzio Clementi, the Earliest Virtuoso, strictly speaking, as a Pianist. Born in Rome in 1752. Scion of an Artistic Family. First Musical Training. Rapid Development of his Talents. Composes Contrapuntal Works at the Age of Fourteen. Early Studies of the Organ and Harpsichord. Goes to England to complete his Studies. Creates an Unequaled Furore in London. John Christian Bach's Opinion of Clementi.
The character of this taste encouraged the development of the musical apparatus of the lyric drama toward opulent complexity, and the medium for this was found in the rapidly growing madrigal, which soon ruled the realm of secular music. In it the frottola, raised to an art form and equipped with the wealth of contrapuntal device, passed almost insensibly into a new life.
This gives greater interest and makes each voice stand forth independently. At first contrapuntal music may not seem interesting to us. If that is so, it is because we are not in the least degree conscious of the wonderful interest which has been put into every part.
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