rustic songs, Canzoni Villanesche, or Villanelle, or Villotte, which peasants and soldiers sang as drinking-songs. In form the Villanelle adhered to the contrapuntal style, though in spirit they were essentially popular. More refined and yet more trifling were the Villotte alla Napoletana,[1] gallant addresses from singing-masters to their feminine pupils. The so-called Fa-la-la was a composition of somewhat later date, and more merit. Those which Gastoldi wrote (about 1591) were good; so too were his Balletti. Gradually the term Frottola disappeared; the more serious Frottole passed into the Madrigali, while the gayer and merrier type was merged in the Villanella. A Frottola, printed in Junta's Roman collection of 1526, evidently became ere long a Villanella, for it is still sung in Venice with the same words and melody, 'Le son tre fanticelli, tutti tre da maridar.' Originally it was a part-song, with the melody in the tenor. The Villanelle were, as a rule, strophical—the same melody repeated in each stanza—but the Frottole had different music for each verse.
The vocal music, to which our attention has thus far been directed, consisted either of partsongs or unisonous chorus, with little or no accompaniment. Sometimes the principal or upper voice had a sort of cantilene, but solo-singing was still unknown. The first instance of it is supposed to have occurred in 1539, in an Intermezzo, in which Sileno sings the upper part of a madrigal by Corteccio, accompanying himself on the violone, while the lower parts, which represented the Satyrs, are taken by wind instruments. But the piece itself shows that it was far from being a song for one voice with accompaniment. It will be noticed that the under parts are as much independent voices as the upper one.
Fragment of a Madrigal.
Sonato da Sileno con violone, sonando tutte le parti,
e cantando il Soprano.
According to the historian Doni, Galilei was the first composer who wrote actual melodies for one voice. Doni further tells us that Galilei set to music the passage of the 'Inferno' which narrates the tragic fate of Count Ugolino, and that he performed it himself 'very pleasingly' with viola accompaniment. But be that as it may, an epoch in musical history was undoubtedly marked by Giulio Caccini, when he published, in 1601, under the title of 'Le Nuove Musiche,' a collection of Madrigali, Canzoni, and Arie for one voice. These compositions have a figured bass, and some are embellished with fioriture. Caccini was promptly followed in the path which he had opened by numerous imitators, and thus the monodic system was virtually established. Indeed he may be regarded as the inventor of the 'expressive monodia,' for he was the first to attempt to render certain thoughts and feelings in music, and to adapt music to the meaning of words. Caccini is said to have sung his own pieces, accompanying himself on the theorbo; and in the preface to his collection he gives minute directions as to the proper mode of singing them. The airs are well supplied with marks of expression, as the following example from his 'Nuove Musiche' will show:—
- ↑ For examples by Cambio (1547) and Donati (about the same date), see Kiesewetter's 'Schicksale und Beschaffenheit des weltlichen Gesanges,' Appendices Nos. xxii. and xxlii. Several collections of Villanelle still exist, and amongst others an important one in Naples.
- ↑ 'Without keeping to the time, as if speaking in accordance with, the already expressed disdain.'
