Colossal Baroque
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The Colossal Baroque style is a name which has been coined to describe a number of composition from the 17th and 18th centuries composed in an opulent, magificent and large scaled style. Such works frequently make use of polychoral techniques and often feature larger than average instrumental forces (for Baroque compositions). At first Colossal Baroque was an Italian style evolved to represent the successes of the counter reformation. Pieces were typically in 12 or more parts but there is evidence that the polychoral aspects did not always involve wide spacing. (In Ugolini's Exultate Omnes for instance there are trio passages for all the sopranos, tenors and altos from each choir together. This would have sounded absurd in wide spacing.) However some pieces were very likely to have been performed with singers and players distributed both up and down in Salzburg Cathedral.
Another colossal baroque composer, Orazio Benevoli became confused with Heinrich Biber, and Stefano Bernadi in the celebrated mixup over the authorship of the Missa Salisburgensis.
Colossal Baroque music was a philosophical part of the counter reformation and spread over the Brenner to the Austrian Empire, where multi part pieces were written for special occaisons but usually not published and there is a long list of missing and incomplete works by Valentini, (some in 17 choirs), Priuli, Bernadi, (the mass for consecration of Salzburg Cathedral was in 16 choirs), and others. Some of Valentini's trumpet parts survive and they do not have many changes of note in them and lots of rests. The brass must have made dovetailed mass volume answering phrases in a multichoir texture somewhat like Giovanni Gabrieli.
Brass parts on only one note are probably where Heinrich Biber got his ideas for the one note tunes in the Table Sonatas published a generation later.
Perhaps the roots of the Colossal Baroque style can be found in the Florentine Intermedii of the 16th century? La Pellegrina, performed for the wedding of Ferdinand de' Medici to the French princess, Christine of Lorraine, in 1589, featured music for up to seven choirs, by Cristofano Malvezzi in Intermedio VI.
Works we may consider to be examples of the Colossal Baroque style were frequently ceremonial works, composed for special occasions (coronations, weddings, religious festivals, municiple functions, victory celebrations, et cetera). These works were frequently performed with unusually large musical forces. From time to time the scores of such works may have been presented to the aristocrat hosting or the subject of the event. As a result, many scores of large scale 16th and 17th century works have been lost or mislaid. Heinrich Schütz composed a musical setting of Psalm 136 »Danket dem Herren, denn er ist freundlich« which included three vocal choirs, 12 cornetti and 18 trumpets! Alas, the score is now lost.
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[edit] Some composers
Composers of the 17th century who composed works in the colossal style include:
- Orazio Benevoli (1605-1672).
- Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber (1644-1704).
- Dietrich Buxtehude
- Marc-Antoine Charpentier
- Giovanni Gabrieli
- Stefano Landi
- Heinrich Schütz
- Jan Křtitel Tolar
- Johann Joseph Fux
- Andreas Hofer
- Jean-Baptiste Lully
- Vincenzo Ugolini (ca.1580-1638).
[edit] Works which may be considered to be in the "Colossal Baroque" style
- Giovanni Gabrieli: Sonata XX à 22
- Giovanni Gabrieli: Magnificat à 33 voci
- Michael Praetorius: In Dulci Jubilo à 12, 16, & 20 cum Tubis
- Stefano Landi: Missa à 12 chori' (music lost)
- Heinrich Schütz: Domini est terra SWV 476 (this work features two vocal choirs, 2 cornettini, 5 dulcians, 2 violins, 4 trombones)
- Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber: Missa Salisburgensis à 53 voci
- Jean-Baptiste Lully: Te Deum (Lully conducted a performance with a choir of 300 singers and an orchestra of a similar size)
- Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Messe à quatre chœurs
- Dieterich Buxtehude: Benedicam Dominum in omni tempore à 24 (this motet features six "choirs" of voices and instruments)
- Johann Joseph Fux: Costanza e Fortezza (the score for this opera features 8 trumpets, 2 timpanists and two complete orchestras)
[edit] Music Editions
- Orazio Benevoli Opera Omnia, ed.
L. Feininger, Monumenta liturgiae Polychoralis Sanctae Ecclesiae Romane, (Rome,1966-).
- Orazio Benevoli, Christe, a 12 in 3 choirs, ed.
Marcel Couraud (Paris, Editions Salabert,1973)
- Vincenzo Ugolini, Exultate omnes, Beata es Virgo Maria
and Quae est ista, three motets in 12 part triple choirs. Transcribed and edited by Graham Dixon, (Mapa Mundi,1982).
[edit] Books with Music
- Steven Saunders, CROSS, SWORD AND LYRE, Sacred Music at the Imperial Court of Ferdinand II of Habsburg (1619-1637),(Clarendon,1995).
