Essay On Instrumental Concerto

Both sonata and vocal forms influenced the development of concerto form as instrumental music practices and writing evolved from the middle to late Baroque (ca. 1680– 1730). This paper will examine the development of the instrumental concerto during the Baroque, focusing on analysis of the works and contributions to the form by Arcangelo Corelli (1653–1713) and Antonio Vivaldi (1678–1741). Representing a span of one generation in time, and working in different musical centers within Italy, Corelli and Vivaldi each made major contributions to the development of the Baroque concerto grosso and solo concerto forms, helping establish instrumental music as an independent entity from vocal music, and moving orchestra music practices toward what would evolve into the Classical era concerto and symphony later in the 18th century. Their respective scoring, texture, number and form of movements (e.g., ritornello, fugue, or dance-based), and use of affect (tempo and feel) will each be evaluated using Corelli’s “Christmas Night” concerto and Vivaldi’s “Winter” from “The Four Seasons” as primary examples. How the composition of established Roman and Venetian large-scale musical ensembles affected the scoring for the respective composers’ concertos will also be examined. …show more content…
More published collections of trio sonatas followed in 1685, 1689, and 1694, and his opus five of twelve sonatas for solo violin and accompaniment was published in 1700. All these publications constituted carefully prepared and edited versions of works covering the course of his career. The late seventeenth century was a pivotal period in the development of instrumental music, as the concept of the orchestra was beginning to take definite shape, and instrumental writing was becoming more independent from vocal music. There was not, as yet, a definite concept of large-scale orchestra scoring as differentiated from chamber