
Cara is welcoming, calm, has a good sense of humor, and really knows her stuff. I found Cara and the Simply Music program she uses for teaching piano quite by accident and I’m so glad I did.
#Composers of medieval period free#
“What a joy! I have a very stressful job with little free time and was looking for something fun and relaxing to add to my life. Here are a couple of examples of instrumental music from the Medieval Period.Īs is common with music from this time, the composers’ names are unknown. Leonin wrote the original version, with Perotin editing and adding new ideas afterward. The music was compiled as a book called the “Magnus Liber Organi” (Great Book of Organum). In fact, Leonin and Perotin were so good at writing organum that they wrote the first complete annual cycle of chants for the mass in two parts. Perotin also used these techniques, but went a step further and composed for three and sometimes four vocal parts. This new type of multi-part chant was called organum. Leonin used these techniques to write music with two vocal parts. Other times, the original chant was sung at an extremely slow pace, while a new, faster melody was added at a higher pitch.

Often, the added part was sung at the same rhythm as the original chant, creating a parallel harmony. In order to achieve new music while adhering to the rules, both composers added vocal parts to chants.

This meant that any new compositions had to be based on a preexisting composition, such as church chants. This is significant because it hadn’t been done in church music before, and in medieval thought, anything new had to be founded on something old. Leonin and his student, Perotin, are generally credited with composing the first significant polyphonic, or multi-part, church music. In the 1200s, French composers Leonin and Perotin of the Notre Dame cathedral drastically changed music. Perotin – Organum quadruplum, “Sederunt principes” Leonin – Organum Duplum from Christmas Day, “Viderunt Omnes” This sacred musical drama is a morality play with allegorical and human characters, including the happy, unhappy, and repentant souls, prophets, virtues, and even the devil, though he was only allowed to have a spoken part. Written in 1151, “Ordo Virtutum” is her most extended musical work. Hildegard’s standout work is a musical play called “Ordo virtutum” (The Virtues). At a time when the church had very strict rules about music, she was able to creatively integrate and extend musical techniques to compose music that was intriguing, yet still fit the church’s guidelines. She is known for writing songs that were uncharacteristically melodic for this time period. First written as poems, Hildegard later set her visions and prophecies to music. She was a German nun who was known for her visions and prophecies. Hildegard is the earliest composer that we know by name.
#Composers of medieval period movie#
Several film/TV composers have also adapted the theme (including Miklos Rozsa in “Young Bess” and “El Cid”, Ennio Morricone in “The Mission”, Basil Poledouris in “Conan the Barbarian” and Bernard Herrmann in “The Jar”, an episode of “The Alfred Hitchcock Hour”), but most notably Wendy Carlos for the opening of the movie “The Shining.” Hector Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique, Franz Liszt’s Totentanz (Dance of the Dead) or Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Isle of the Dead and other works. The melody has been frequently used by other composers in their own compositions especially when their music has a macabre theme, e.g.

This piece is often associated with death and was formerly included as part of the Requiem Mass. Dies Irae translates as “Day of Wrath” but is sometimes more loosely translated as the “Wrath of God.” The Latin verses describe the Day of Judgement. This melody is an old one dating from at least the 13th Century as a plainchant. We begin with the most famous of all Gregorian Chants.
