This presentation contains information about The Reformation and the music it produced.

1. Culture and Music:
The Renaissance
and The Reformation

2. Background:
Nearly 500 years ago,
during the Renaissance period in Europe,
one of the most important cultural
developments that took place
was a religious protest movement known as
The Protestant Reformation
(or more commonly, just “The Reformation”).
This movement began in what is now Germany
and spread throughout most of Europe.

3. The Reformation affected
many aspects of life and culture
in Europe, including
the development of
certain new styles of music.

4. The Reformation began in 1517,
when a German Catholic monk
named Martin Luther wrote
a series of 95 complaints criticizing
the teachings and doctrines of the
Catholic Church and nailed them to the
door of the Castle Church in the small
town of Wittenberg, Germany.

5. Similar protests by religious groups
followed in France, Switzerland,
England and Scotland.
The development of the printing and the
printing press in Europe
in the mid-1400s was
very influential in the spread of
The Reformation.

6. Instead of “reforming” the Catholic
Church as Martin Luther had intended,
these protests led to a series of divisions
within the Church that resulted
in the formation of
new religious denominations
that broke away from
the Catholic Church.

7. These new religious denominations,
such as the Lutherans in Germany,
the Huguenots in France
and the Anglicans (Church of England)
each developed their own
new styles of music that were written to be
sung in their church services.
Important composers associated with this
these new styles of music included English
composer Thomas Tallis (1505–1585).

8. Musical Examples
Giovanni Palestrina (1525-1594): “Sicut Cervus”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yd5EE0hAB8
The example above demonstrates the fully-polyphonic style
of scared choral music of the Roman Catholic Church
in the Late Renaissance.
Thomas Tallis (1505–1585): “If Ye Love Me”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqt005j1dB0
The example above demonstrates the partly-homophonic
and partly-polyphonic style of scared choral music of the
Anglican (English Protestant) Church in the Late Renaissance.

9. Most important among the new musical
styles inspired by the Reformation
was a German style of hymn singing
called the Chorale.
The Chorale style typically features
a four-part homophonic vocal texture
consisting of soprano, alto, tenor and bass
voice-parts, with a melody
in the highest part (soprano).
The other parts share the same basic
rhythm as the melody and provide a
harmonic accompaniment to the melody.

10. While this type of music did exist before
the development of the German chorale
style, it was because of the new style of
hymn singing in German Protestant
churches that the Chorale Style became
an important musical phenomenon
during the Renaissance.

11. German Chorale-Style: Example 1
Melody, in the Soprano (highest) Part

12. German Chorale-Style: Example 2
2-part Chorale harmonization
Soprano & Bass

13. German Chorale-Style: Example 3
3-part Chorale harmonization
(Soprano, Alto, Bass)

14. German Chorale-Style: Example 4
4-part Chorale harmonization
(Soprano, Alto, Tenor Bass)

15. Examples of German Choral-Style Harmonization
Simple Version:
Complex Version:

16. The German Chorale style of music was
also used for other kinds of music
besides Protestant hymns.
One notable example is
a famous German part-song called
“Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen”
(“Innsbruck, I must leave you”)
by the German Renaissance composer
Heinrich Isaac (1450–1517).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rI712ZGflAQ

17. Over the next 350 years,
the melody of this part-song
was adapted by other composers including
Johann Sebastian Bach and
Johannes Brahms in several very notable
works for chorus and for organ, including
the famous Bach Chorale,
“O Welt, ich muss dich lassen.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zPiwHBGnh4 (voices)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eze8K_-g5M (trombones)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbKF1Zl3QWQ (marimba)

18. Even more importantly, though, the
development of the German Chorale style
is important because there is
a direct line of influence in musical history
from the original development of the
German Chorale Style (beginning with
hymns composed by Martin Luther himself)
through to the Chorales composed by
Johann Sebastian Bach and included
in his 200+ Cantatas, 150 years later.

19. Bach’s harmonizations of these Chorales
has had a profound impact on the
development of harmony throughout
all subsequent musical history.
More than fifty years after Bach’s death,
Beethoven called Bach
“Der Urvater des Harmonie”
(“the original father of harmony”).

20. The reason why the development of the
German Choral Style, culminating with the
Chorales of Bach, is so important is that it
can be shown that a very significant
number of classical composers who lived
after Bach learned advanced harmony by
playing and studying Bach’s Chorales.
This is true up until the current day,
because music students in most college
and university music schools
are required to sing, play and/or analyze
the Bach Chorales.

21. After Bach’s time, in the Classical Period,
and especially later, in the Romantic period,
composers incorporated the
German Chorale Style into their music as
a basic musical texture –
a sort of “musical cornerstone.”
While music in the Classical Period
became more predominantly
homophonic in texture, many composers
still occasionally employed counterpoint
in some of their more complex works.

22. The influence of the German Chorale Style
can be traced in the 19th century to the
musical and stylistic development of
traditional Christmas Carols, as
demonstrated clearly by the example below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Drb4zqh-YF0

23. The influence of the German Chorale
Style can also be traced to the
20th and 21st centuries, in which 4-part
homophonic texture can be seen as
the predominant musical texture
of most forms of contemporary
Popular Music, Jazz,
Rock and Roll and Rock,
among many other musical genres.

24. The influence of the German Chorale
Style can also be traced to the
20th and 21st centuries, in which 4-part
homophonic texture can be seen as
the predominant musical texture
of most forms of contemporary
Popular Music, Jazz,
Rock and Roll and Rock,
among many other musical genres.