Baroque Era

Before we can even begin to speak on a powerful figure of the Baroque period, such as Arcangelo Corelli, we must first get an understanding of what the Baroque period even is. The word Baroque is derived from the ancient Portuguese word borroco, which stands for “The Misshapen Pearl”. Now to compare such vibrant and spectacular music such as Pachelbel’s Canon and Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons to a misshapen pearl sounds ludicrous but bear with me. You will understand before I finish explaining. It got its terminology from the nineteenth century critics who view people such as Bach and Handel’s music as being overly ornamented and exaggerated. Though a very crude way of viewing such exquisite music it has long since shed its derogatory connotations, “baroque” is now simply a convenient catch-all for one of the richest and most diverse periods in music history. Now …show more content…
Contrast became a massive factor in music or this time to truly make it stick out from the crowd as something new and exciting. The differences between loud and soft, solo and ensemble (as in the concerto), different instruments and timbres all play an important role in many baroque compositions. Then we have monody and the advent of the basso continuo. In previous musical eras, a piece of music tended to consist of a single melody, perhaps with an improvised accompaniment, or several melodies played simultaneously. Basso Continuo was a method of musical notation in which the melody and bass line are written out and the harmonic filler indicated in a type of shorthand. Monody was a style of accompanied solo song consisting of a vocal line, which is frequently embellished, and simple, often expressive, harmonies. Now that we have gone through some of the major components of the Baroque period we can truly get going with our main topic, Arcangelo Corelli, also known as the “Father of the Concerto