A NEW DISCANT STYLE
Giovanni de Cascia’s madrigal Appress’ un fiume (“Hard by a stream”) shows every distinctive feature of the budding trecento style (Ex. 10-1). The opening stanzas (tercets) enumerate a veritable shopping list of the ingredients that went into defining the bucolic scene—the “pleasant place” (in Latin, locus amoenus) inherited from the classical authors of’ “idylls” and “eclogues” like Virgil and Theocritus—within which all pastoral lyrics were set: a stream, a shade tree, flowers in bloom. It is the setting familiar from paintings and tapestries of noble outings, the same noble villas and their grounds where these agreeable songs were generally performed. The human ingredients are likewise idyllic: a beautiful lady, her graceful dance, her sweet song. In the ritornello the lady—Anna, of course—is secretly named within the word “fall in love” (an[n]amorar).
- Citation (MLA):
- Richard Taruskin. "Chapter 10 “A Pleasant Place”: Music of the Trecento." The Oxford History of Western Music. Oxford University Press. New York, USA. n.d. Web. 12 Oct. 2024. <https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume1/actrade-9780195384819-div1-010003.xml>.
- Citation (APA):
- Taruskin, R. (n.d.). Chapter 10 “A Pleasant Place”: Music of the Trecento. In Oxford University Press, Music from the Earliest Notations to the Sixteenth Century. New York, USA. Retrieved 12 Oct. 2024, from https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume1/actrade-9780195384819-div1-010003.xml
- Citation (Chicago):
- Richard Taruskin. "Chapter 10 “A Pleasant Place”: Music of the Trecento." In Music from the Earliest Notations to the Sixteenth Century, Oxford University Press. (New York, USA, n.d.). Retrieved 12 Oct. 2024, from https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume1/actrade-9780195384819-div1-010003.xml
