0:00:02 > 0:00:04In the early 21st century, we take it for granted that the vast
0:00:04 > 0:00:07and diverse world of music that's all around us can be
0:00:07 > 0:00:09summoned at the flick of a switch.
0:00:09 > 0:00:12But not that long ago, music was a rare
0:00:12 > 0:00:16and feeble whisper in a wilderness of silence.
0:00:16 > 0:00:18How on earth did that miracle happen?
0:00:18 > 0:00:22MUSIC: Instrumental version of "Poker Face" by Lady Gaga
0:00:22 > 0:00:25Music, one of the dazzling fruits of human civilisation,
0:00:25 > 0:00:29has become a massive global phenomenon.
0:00:29 > 0:00:32And so it's hard for us to imagine a time when, in centuries
0:00:32 > 0:00:36gone by, people could go weeks without hearing any music at all.
0:00:36 > 0:00:39Even in the 19th century, you might hear your favourite symphony
0:00:39 > 0:00:42four or five times in your whole lifetime,
0:00:42 > 0:00:45in the days before music could be recorded.
0:00:49 > 0:00:53The story of music, successive waves of discoveries, breakthroughs
0:00:53 > 0:00:56and inventions is an ongoing process.
0:00:57 > 0:01:01The next great leap forward may take place in a backstreet
0:01:01 > 0:01:04of Beijing or upstairs in a pub in South Shields.
0:01:14 > 0:01:20# Can't read my, can't read my No, he can't read my poker face
0:01:20 > 0:01:22# She's got me like nobody... #
0:01:22 > 0:01:24Whatever music you're into,
0:01:24 > 0:01:30Monteverdi or Mantovani, Mozart or Motown, Machaut or mashup,
0:01:30 > 0:01:33the techniques it relies on didn't happen by accident.
0:01:33 > 0:01:36Someone, somewhere thought of them first.
0:01:44 > 0:01:47Music can make us weep or make us dance.
0:01:47 > 0:01:51It's reflected the times in which it was written. It has delighted,
0:01:51 > 0:01:53challenged, comforted and excited us.
0:01:55 > 0:01:58In this series, I'm going to trace music's extraordinary
0:01:58 > 0:02:00journey from scratch.
0:02:00 > 0:02:03They'll be no fancy jargon nor misleading labels.
0:02:03 > 0:02:07Terms like baroque, impressionism or nationalism
0:02:07 > 0:02:09are best put to one side.
0:02:09 > 0:02:12Instead, try to imagine how revolutionary
0:02:12 > 0:02:15and how exhilarating many of the innovations
0:02:15 > 0:02:19we take for granted today were to people at the time.
0:02:19 > 0:02:22There are a million ways of telling the story of music.
0:02:22 > 0:02:23This is mine.
0:02:40 > 0:02:42You may think that music is a luxury,
0:02:42 > 0:02:45a plug-in to make human life more enjoyable.
0:02:45 > 0:02:47It's fine if you think that,
0:02:47 > 0:02:50but our hunter-gatherer ancestors wouldn't agree with you.
0:02:50 > 0:02:53To them, music was much more than mere ear candy.
0:02:53 > 0:02:57ANIMALS ROAR
0:02:58 > 0:03:00It was a matter of life and death.
0:03:03 > 0:03:08You don't believe me? Let me take you back to 32,000 BC,
0:03:08 > 0:03:12to the Stone Age cave paintings in Chauvet, France.
0:03:14 > 0:03:17The people who painted them may have used singing as a life-saving
0:03:17 > 0:03:22form of sat nav, a bat-like type of sonar to help you find where
0:03:22 > 0:03:25you were in the labyrinth of caves.
0:03:31 > 0:03:34In 2008, acoustic scientists made the extraordinary
0:03:34 > 0:03:37discovery that the Chauvet paintings,
0:03:37 > 0:03:41which lie within huge, inaccessible, pitch-black networks of tunnels,
0:03:41 > 0:03:45are located at the points of greatest resonance in the networks,
0:03:45 > 0:03:48so that singing would carry throughout the whole subterranean
0:03:48 > 0:03:53system from these special points, echoing and ricocheting.
0:03:53 > 0:03:58HORN ECHOES
0:04:00 > 0:04:03We also now know that music played an important part
0:04:03 > 0:04:06in Palaeolithic rituals, since whistles
0:04:06 > 0:04:10and flutes made out of bones have been found in many of these caves.
0:04:11 > 0:04:15From these dusty artefacts would one day grow Duke Ellington's
0:04:15 > 0:04:19horn section and the massed ranks of the Dagenham Girl Pipers.
0:04:24 > 0:04:28HORN BLARES
0:04:39 > 0:04:43By the time that tribal communities began settling in one place
0:04:43 > 0:04:47and farming, between 9000 and 7000 BC,
0:04:47 > 0:04:50we know that music had become an essential activity.
0:04:50 > 0:04:53As well as helping along the rhythm of work,
0:04:53 > 0:04:56music was seen as something potent, magical,
0:04:56 > 0:04:58and, if the mood required, seductive.
0:05:02 > 0:05:06And yet, we've absolutely no idea what the music of these
0:05:06 > 0:05:09ancient societies actually sounded like.
0:05:09 > 0:05:11Because they couldn't write their music down,
0:05:11 > 0:05:14it has disappeared completely.
0:05:14 > 0:05:18There's no surviving video, no sheet music, no Pythagorean MP3,
0:05:18 > 0:05:20not a note of it.
0:05:20 > 0:05:24A few ancient instruments have been dug up, mind.
0:05:24 > 0:05:27HORNS RESONATE
0:05:31 > 0:05:33These ones are called lurs.
0:05:36 > 0:05:41A set of six lurs were excavated in a field in Denmark in 1797,
0:05:41 > 0:05:46now known as the Brudevaelte Lurs. They were perfectly preserved in a
0:05:46 > 0:05:50peat bog for 2,500 years, and are still playable today.
0:05:50 > 0:05:52These two are replicas.
0:05:52 > 0:05:56Lurs are so famous in Denmark they've even had a butter
0:05:56 > 0:05:58named after them.
0:05:59 > 0:06:02These lurs may look a tad unwieldy
0:06:02 > 0:06:05but in terms of technology, they're a long way from being some
0:06:05 > 0:06:09hollowed-out piece of fruit, or a drum knocked up from a clay pot.
0:06:11 > 0:06:13What they tell us is this...
0:06:13 > 0:06:16It's a grave error to describe what musicians were up to
0:06:16 > 0:06:19in 800 BC as primitive.
0:06:19 > 0:06:22Making these elaborate brass instruments could only have
0:06:22 > 0:06:25been the handiwork of culturally sophisticated people.
0:06:25 > 0:06:29Remember, these lurs were made and played nearly a thousand years
0:06:29 > 0:06:32before the building of Hadrian's Wall.
0:06:32 > 0:06:35We don't know what the Bronze Age Scandinavians
0:06:35 > 0:06:39played on their lurs but it was probably meant to be scary.
0:06:44 > 0:06:47Around the time the Brudevaelte Lurs were intimidating
0:06:47 > 0:06:50the neighbours, much further south, in the sunshine,
0:06:50 > 0:06:54the Ancient Greeks were laying the foundations of western civilisation.
0:06:58 > 0:07:01The Greeks believed music to be both a science and an art,
0:07:01 > 0:07:03and took it extremely seriously.
0:07:03 > 0:07:07It's worth noting what their seven compulsory subjects in school were -
0:07:07 > 0:07:12grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy
0:07:12 > 0:07:13and music.
0:07:13 > 0:07:18What they loved best about music were talent contests. No, really.
0:07:21 > 0:07:24Everyone knows that the Ancient Greeks invented the Olympic Games.
0:07:24 > 0:07:28For the Greeks, though, it wasn't just nude running, wrestling
0:07:28 > 0:07:30and throwing the javelin that was important.
0:07:30 > 0:07:32They were mad about singing competitions.
0:07:32 > 0:07:36Yes, The X Factor is a 3,000-year-old format,
0:07:36 > 0:07:40the Epsilon Factor, one might say, or Sparta's Got Talent.
0:07:44 > 0:07:47Contestants would appear before a live audience and a panel of judges.
0:07:47 > 0:07:51The winners were awarded cash prizes.
0:07:51 > 0:07:53This is the beginning of music as a profession.
0:07:55 > 0:07:59The Greeks also invented European drama and the musical.
0:07:59 > 0:08:03It's thought that the comic dramas of Aristophanes, for example,
0:08:03 > 0:08:05were mostly sung.
0:08:05 > 0:08:08I wish I could sing you a number from a Greek musical drama
0:08:08 > 0:08:10at this point - Thank You For The Moussaka
0:08:10 > 0:08:13or Greece Is The Word, perhaps - but I can't.
0:08:13 > 0:08:17The tunes are all lost to us, even if we know what the words mean.
0:08:22 > 0:08:24The Greeks passed on their passion for theatre,
0:08:24 > 0:08:26poetry and music to the Romans,
0:08:26 > 0:08:31who exported it, along with their legions, all over the Mediterranean.
0:08:33 > 0:08:37But the Romans, too, never got round to writing their music down,
0:08:37 > 0:08:40and so, when Rome fell in the 5th century,
0:08:40 > 0:08:43the music of the ancient past was lost to us.
0:08:43 > 0:08:45It's as silent as the grave.
0:08:46 > 0:08:47Almost.
0:08:52 > 0:08:56MALE CHOIR SINGS
0:09:07 > 0:09:10Our one remaining link to the music of the late Roman world is
0:09:10 > 0:09:15Christian plainchant, which dates from at least the 3rd century AD.
0:09:15 > 0:09:19The singing of chant has always been central to Christian worship.
0:09:19 > 0:09:23It was a sung version of the Latin words of the Psalms
0:09:23 > 0:09:25and of the Eucharist, or Mass.
0:09:26 > 0:09:31It's, by default, often been described as Gregorian Chant, after
0:09:31 > 0:09:35Pope Gregory the Great, who was pope at the end of the 6th century.
0:09:35 > 0:09:38It's beautiful, ancient and mysterious.
0:09:38 > 0:09:42What it is not, we now know, is anything to do with Pope Gregory.
0:09:42 > 0:09:46This is one of the worst branding mistakes in cultural history.
0:09:46 > 0:09:48It would be like discovering the Wellington boot had nothing
0:09:48 > 0:09:50to do with the Duke,
0:09:50 > 0:09:53or that the Earl of Sandwich had nothing to do with a BLT.
0:09:53 > 0:09:59HE SINGS
0:09:59 > 0:10:02THEY SING IN UNISON
0:10:02 > 0:10:04In the earliest form of plainchant,
0:10:04 > 0:10:07musical monks would sing a meandering tune with no
0:10:07 > 0:10:11accompaniment, no discernible rhythm and no harmonising.
0:10:11 > 0:10:14They are singing together in unison.
0:10:44 > 0:10:47Plainchant stayed the same for centuries.
0:10:47 > 0:10:51But then, sometime before the 8th century, someone, somewhere had
0:10:51 > 0:10:54the bright idea of adding some young lads to the choir.
0:10:57 > 0:11:01HIGHER VOICES JOIN THE SINGING
0:11:07 > 0:11:10It sounds fuller and brighter with higher
0:11:10 > 0:11:12and lower voices combined, doesn't it?
0:11:17 > 0:11:20The boys sang an octave higher than the men.
0:11:20 > 0:11:24It's called an octave because in church music at the time
0:11:24 > 0:11:26there were only eight notes to choose from.
0:11:30 > 0:11:32On the white notes of a modern keyboard,
0:11:32 > 0:11:35the two lines of voices are eight notes apart.
0:11:38 > 0:11:43Having men and boys sing an octave apart prompted a further thought.
0:11:45 > 0:11:49What if we had two notes together that weren't octaves,
0:11:49 > 0:11:53but completely different notes taken from the choice of eight?
0:11:53 > 0:11:55What if they added this note, for example?
0:11:55 > 0:11:58TWO NOTES OF A FIFTH INTERVAL
0:11:58 > 0:12:02THEY SING THE INTERVAL
0:12:04 > 0:12:06Genius.
0:12:06 > 0:12:09THEY SING IN HARMONY
0:12:11 > 0:12:14They didn't go too far, mind. The new line wasn't independent
0:12:14 > 0:12:17but stayed exactly in parallel to the original.
0:12:23 > 0:12:25This parallel lines technique,
0:12:25 > 0:12:29which began in around the 9th century, was called organum,
0:12:29 > 0:12:33because, to them, it sounded like an organ, which it does.
0:12:35 > 0:12:38ORGAN PLAYS SAME MUSIC
0:12:40 > 0:12:44What we're hearing is the first experiment in what we'd call
0:12:44 > 0:12:47harmony, the simultaneous sounding of more than one note.
0:12:47 > 0:12:50THEY SING IN HARMONY
0:13:00 > 0:13:04Bland and unadventurous it may seem to us now,
0:13:04 > 0:13:08but then, in the early 100s, it was audio dynamite.
0:13:09 > 0:13:13The heady excitement of singing two notes at once had another spin off.
0:13:13 > 0:13:16This time, they went crazy.
0:13:16 > 0:13:18They stopped one of the lines moving around.
0:13:22 > 0:13:24In this form of organum,
0:13:24 > 0:13:27one singer just stays put on one note all the time.
0:13:27 > 0:13:29I say singer, but this technique is
0:13:29 > 0:13:33so boring to perform they also used to play it on instruments instead,
0:13:33 > 0:13:37an organ, perhaps, or now almost forgotten instruments
0:13:37 > 0:13:40like the psaltery, the hurdy-gurdy or the symphony.
0:13:40 > 0:13:43I'm not making this up, they really did have an instrument that played
0:13:43 > 0:13:47just one continuous note. They even had a name for the long-held note.
0:13:47 > 0:13:49It's a drone.
0:13:49 > 0:13:52INSTRUMENT DRONES
0:13:52 > 0:13:54VOICES JOIN, SINGING ONE NOTE
0:14:17 > 0:14:20This drone-plus-tune-type of plainchant is still
0:14:20 > 0:14:23remembered today on bagpipes.
0:14:23 > 0:14:26The perforated tube you play the melody on is still called
0:14:26 > 0:14:28the chanter.
0:14:28 > 0:14:30BAGPIPES MUSIC
0:14:32 > 0:14:35By the 9th century, the most adventurous musicians had
0:14:35 > 0:14:38started to mix the two available styles together.
0:14:38 > 0:14:42Parallel organum and drone organum.
0:14:42 > 0:14:46THEY SING IN HARMONY ABOVE A DRONE
0:14:52 > 0:14:56One such adventurer was Kassia of Constantinople.
0:14:56 > 0:15:00She is the first female composer whose name has come down to us.
0:15:05 > 0:15:09What makes her music intriguing is its unusual mix of simple
0:15:09 > 0:15:12but unpredictable harmonies.
0:15:40 > 0:15:43Harmony was the first giant step our medieval ancestors
0:15:43 > 0:15:46took as the year 1000 drew near.
0:15:47 > 0:15:51The other was to alter the course of music history dramatically.
0:15:51 > 0:15:54It was the invention of musical notation.
0:15:55 > 0:15:59When a monk or nun sang plainchant in the centuries
0:15:59 > 0:16:03before about 800 AD, what they had in front of them was the text,
0:16:03 > 0:16:07in Latin, of what they were singing. Just the text.
0:16:07 > 0:16:10They had to memorise the melody. All this!
0:16:11 > 0:16:14This is one of the most spectacular feats of memory in the history
0:16:14 > 0:16:18of the human race. But it's also a bit mad.
0:16:18 > 0:16:22It might take ten years of daily repetition and practice
0:16:22 > 0:16:26to memorise the entire plainsong repertoire for the church year.
0:16:26 > 0:16:30So it was deemed highly desirable to find a way of reminding
0:16:30 > 0:16:35yourself what the tunes for any bit of text might be.
0:16:37 > 0:16:42This is a 3rd-century Christian hymn written in Ancient Greek.
0:16:42 > 0:16:44Above the words, tantalisingly,
0:16:44 > 0:16:46is a fledgling attempt at writing the tune down.
0:16:48 > 0:16:49Alas, so far at least,
0:16:49 > 0:16:53no-one can agree on what exactly it's meant to sound like.
0:16:55 > 0:16:58Hundreds of years went by until squiggles came along.
0:16:58 > 0:17:01That's not their real name, which is neumes,
0:17:01 > 0:17:03but squiggles are what they are.
0:17:06 > 0:17:09This is a page from the Winchester Troper,
0:17:09 > 0:17:13the oldest surviving manuscript of organum anywhere in the world.
0:17:13 > 0:17:17It's the painstaking work of Anglo-Saxon monks.
0:17:18 > 0:17:22What it shows is the Latin text that was intended to be sung,
0:17:22 > 0:17:26with squiggles above the words and in the margin.
0:17:26 > 0:17:29The idea of the squiggles was to give some indication of
0:17:29 > 0:17:33whether the note of the melody went up or down over any given
0:17:33 > 0:17:35syllable, so they're better than nothing.
0:17:35 > 0:17:37But the squiggles had a major flaw.
0:17:37 > 0:17:40They're essentially a way of jogging your memory
0:17:40 > 0:17:41of a tune you already know.
0:17:41 > 0:17:44They're rubbish at teaching you a new tune from scratch.
0:17:46 > 0:17:50That's because they're not very good at indicating just how high
0:17:50 > 0:17:53or low successive notes are supposed to be,
0:17:53 > 0:17:56like a map without longitude or latitude.
0:17:59 > 0:18:03The breakthrough came in around 1000 in the Italian city of Arezzo,
0:18:03 > 0:18:07and it was the brainchild of a musical monk called Guido,
0:18:07 > 0:18:10known nowadays of Guido of Arezzo.
0:18:10 > 0:18:13Guido's methods were simple and clear.
0:18:13 > 0:18:16First of all, he gave these squiggles, or neumes,
0:18:16 > 0:18:19a standardised, easy-to-read form.
0:18:19 > 0:18:22So each note had its own symbol, or blob.
0:18:22 > 0:18:26He then drew four straight lines onto which the notes,
0:18:26 > 0:18:28or blobs, would be placed.
0:18:31 > 0:18:35One of the lines he made red to give you a fixed bearing
0:18:35 > 0:18:38as against all other tunes, a bit like the musical equivalent
0:18:38 > 0:18:41of the equator, or the Greenwich Meridian.
0:18:41 > 0:18:43So wherever the note, or blob, is placed,
0:18:43 > 0:18:47represents its pitch position, that is, whether it's an A, B, or C.
0:18:47 > 0:18:48# La. #
0:18:48 > 0:18:50If the note goes up, the blob goes up.
0:18:50 > 0:18:52- HIGHER:- # La. #
0:18:52 > 0:18:57And if it goes down, the blob goes down, step by step.
0:18:57 > 0:19:02# Ole, ole, ole, ole, ole, ole. #
0:19:09 > 0:19:13Before Guido, you'd think up a tune and then teach it to everyone
0:19:13 > 0:19:17you know and hope they pass it on without mucking it up.
0:19:17 > 0:19:20After Guido, music could be fixed on a page
0:19:20 > 0:19:24and could be reproduced by someone who'd never heard the tune before.
0:19:24 > 0:19:27Guido's method has been refined over the years by indicating
0:19:27 > 0:19:29the duration of notes, for example,
0:19:29 > 0:19:34but it's essentially the same system we still use to notate music today.
0:19:34 > 0:19:38# But every time she asks me Do I look OK?
0:19:38 > 0:19:41# I say
0:19:41 > 0:19:45# When I see your face
0:19:46 > 0:19:50# There's not a thing that I would change
0:19:50 > 0:19:53# Cos you're amazing
0:19:53 > 0:19:58# Just the way you are
0:19:58 > 0:20:01# And when you smile... #
0:20:01 > 0:20:05The ability to lay out multiple lines of melody on a kind of
0:20:05 > 0:20:09musical spreadsheet allowed composers to plot out
0:20:09 > 0:20:12far more complicated musical structures.
0:20:12 > 0:20:15This was to set music on a course towards greater
0:20:15 > 0:20:16and greater sophistication,
0:20:16 > 0:20:20all thanks to the bright idea of a monk from Arezzo.
0:20:21 > 0:20:23The ability to formulate musical ideas on a page
0:20:23 > 0:20:25enabled a musical approach
0:20:25 > 0:20:29that was far more ambitious than anything that had preceded it.
0:20:29 > 0:20:30A story that has to be remembered
0:20:30 > 0:20:35and spoken out loud is necessarily less complex than a novel, which
0:20:35 > 0:20:39can be written down and unfolded over a much greater length of time.
0:20:39 > 0:20:42So it was, with the invention of musical notation.
0:20:43 > 0:20:45Now you could have multiple lines of music,
0:20:45 > 0:20:50dazzling new possibilities for harmony began to suggest themselves.
0:20:50 > 0:20:53What was needed to realise this potential was for a musician
0:20:53 > 0:20:57to go a bit mad, and in his creative madness open up the harmony idea
0:20:57 > 0:20:59to a thousand new possibilities,
0:20:59 > 0:21:04which, helpfully, is what a bloke from Paris did in the 12th century.
0:21:04 > 0:21:06MALE CHORAL SINGING
0:21:10 > 0:21:12His name was Perotin,
0:21:12 > 0:21:16and he composed music for the newly-built cathedral of Notre Dame.
0:21:16 > 0:21:19What he did, was ask a seemingly simple question -
0:21:19 > 0:21:22what would happen if you had more than two voices
0:21:22 > 0:21:24singing at the same time?
0:21:26 > 0:21:28What if you had three?
0:21:28 > 0:21:30THREE VOICES SING IN HARMONY
0:21:30 > 0:21:32Or even, God forbid, four?
0:21:32 > 0:21:36FOUR VOICES SING IN HARMONY
0:21:36 > 0:21:39This might not sound momentous now, but believe me,
0:21:39 > 0:21:43it was nothing short of a revolution in music.
0:21:49 > 0:21:54Perotin strikes us even today as an irrepressibly adventurous
0:21:54 > 0:21:57creative force, a fire cracker of a composer
0:21:57 > 0:21:59who conceived and wrote down
0:21:59 > 0:22:03the most complex simultaneous note clusters ever yet heard.
0:22:03 > 0:22:06A cluster of simultaneous notes is called a chord.
0:22:09 > 0:22:12Here are some of Perotin's chords.
0:22:22 > 0:22:26Perotin also blazed the way forward in another area of music.
0:22:26 > 0:22:29He may not have been the first composer to bring rhythm
0:22:29 > 0:22:31into church music, but he's the first one to find
0:22:31 > 0:22:36a way of notating rhythm, using a system whereby shorter notes are
0:22:36 > 0:22:41bracketed together with a horizontal bar, what he called a ligature.
0:22:41 > 0:22:44He was particularly fond of one rhythmic pattern,
0:22:44 > 0:22:46a pattern that you can easily remember
0:22:46 > 0:22:49because it's the rhythm of the theme tune to the Archers.
0:22:49 > 0:22:53# Dum-de-dum de-dum-de-dum, dum-de-dum de-dum dum. #
0:22:53 > 0:22:58Perotin made that pattern his own, as you can hear in his hymn
0:22:58 > 0:23:02composed for Christmas Day 1198, Viderunt Omnes.
0:23:04 > 0:23:08MALE CHOIR SINGS RHYTHMICALLY
0:23:34 > 0:23:36In this remarkable piece of music
0:23:36 > 0:23:38you can hear not only the jaunty rhythm
0:23:38 > 0:23:42but the weirdly effective harmonies, amazingly advanced for their time.
0:23:45 > 0:23:49THEY SING DIFFERENT RHYTHMS IN HARMONY
0:24:08 > 0:24:12It's important to remember that before Perotin's time, most people
0:24:12 > 0:24:16would rarely have heard any music at all, unless they heard it in church.
0:24:16 > 0:24:20But around the 12th century, secular music began to step out
0:24:20 > 0:24:21into the limelight.
0:24:23 > 0:24:26The pathfinders were the Bob Dylans of the day,
0:24:26 > 0:24:27the trouveres or troubadours,
0:24:27 > 0:24:30travelling singer-songwriters who usually accompanied
0:24:30 > 0:24:33themselves on the early instruments available.
0:24:35 > 0:24:39At the peak of the troubadour craze, several hundred of them
0:24:39 > 0:24:41plied their trade across Europe.
0:24:41 > 0:24:43Where did this troubadour phenomenon
0:24:43 > 0:24:47with its songs of noble, elegant love originate from?
0:24:47 > 0:24:51The answer may surprise you. It came from al-Andalus, Muslim Spain.
0:24:51 > 0:24:55MALE SINGS ACCOMPANIED BY STRINGED INSTRUMENT
0:24:59 > 0:25:01In the music of the troubadours, you can still hear
0:25:01 > 0:25:04traces of the Arabic originals.
0:25:04 > 0:25:06MALE SINGS ACCOMPANIED BY STRINGED INSTRUMENT
0:25:19 > 0:25:23Muslim Spain also provided Christian Europe with more sophisticated
0:25:23 > 0:25:27musical instruments that were to become central to secular music -
0:25:27 > 0:25:30the rebab, a precursor to the violin,
0:25:30 > 0:25:34the al'Ud, which became the lute and later, the guitar,
0:25:34 > 0:25:37and the qanun, an early type of zither.
0:25:37 > 0:25:41And instruments weren't the only important thing that European
0:25:41 > 0:25:43composers inherited from the culture of Islam.
0:25:43 > 0:25:46The other was a flair for rhythm.
0:25:46 > 0:25:48STRING INSTRUMENTS PLAY RHYTHMICALLY
0:25:54 > 0:25:57The troubadour songs, like their Arabic originals,
0:25:57 > 0:26:00were shaped by the poetic metre of their lyrics,
0:26:00 > 0:26:04so most of these songs have at least a gentle, foot-tapping pulse,
0:26:04 > 0:26:07which is where Perotin got his rhythms from.
0:26:16 > 0:26:19By the end of the 14th century, nearly all music's vital
0:26:19 > 0:26:23components had been discovered - notation, both melodic and rhythmic,
0:26:23 > 0:26:25the layering of voices on top of each other,
0:26:25 > 0:26:29and a basic selection of instruments to complement the human voice.
0:26:29 > 0:26:33One final piece of the jigsaw still needed to click into position.
0:26:33 > 0:26:37In around 1400, harmony took a huge leap forward,
0:26:37 > 0:26:40a leap that was to change the way music sounded for ever.
0:26:40 > 0:26:43We still live with that change today.
0:26:43 > 0:26:46Before 1400, despite Perotin's adventurousness,
0:26:46 > 0:26:49when composers layered notes on top of each other
0:26:49 > 0:26:53they only chose a very limited menu of possible note combinations.
0:26:53 > 0:26:55There was the basic octave.
0:26:58 > 0:27:02And there were two other note combinations, both of which medieval
0:27:02 > 0:27:05musicians called perfect, because they were thought to be Godly.
0:27:05 > 0:27:08The perfect fourth.
0:27:08 > 0:27:10And the perfect fifth.
0:27:13 > 0:27:16And before 1400, that's more or less it.
0:27:19 > 0:27:23In this famous piece, for example, all the harmonies are sung
0:27:23 > 0:27:27either four or five notes apart from the basic melody line.
0:27:28 > 0:27:33# Gaudete, gaudete Christus est natus
0:27:33 > 0:27:38# Ex Maria Virgine, gaudete... #
0:27:38 > 0:27:43To our ears, accustomed to the subsequent 600 years of harmony,
0:27:43 > 0:27:46there's something missing, which makes the music sound bare
0:27:46 > 0:27:47and a little cold.
0:27:47 > 0:27:51# Tempus adest gratiae Hoc quod optabamus
0:27:51 > 0:27:55# Carmina laetitiae Devote reddamus
0:27:55 > 0:27:56DRUMS START
0:27:56 > 0:28:00# Gaudete, gaudete Christus est natus
0:28:00 > 0:28:05# Ex Maria Virgine, gaudete. #
0:28:06 > 0:28:09What's missing is a combination of notes that,
0:28:09 > 0:28:13before 1400, composers had virtually ignored.
0:28:13 > 0:28:16FEMALE CHORAL SINGING
0:28:23 > 0:28:26The man who did use this note combination set things up
0:28:26 > 0:28:29for what was to be a giant leap for harmony.
0:28:29 > 0:28:32He was an English composer called John Dunstaple.
0:28:37 > 0:28:41Dunstaple introduced the mighty but imperfect third.
0:28:43 > 0:28:46Why is the third imperfect?
0:28:46 > 0:28:50If you count just three notes up from your starting point, C,
0:28:50 > 0:28:54you arrive at E. Why isn't this third a perfect distance?
0:28:54 > 0:28:57The reason is that the third, unlike the fourth and fifth,
0:28:57 > 0:29:01has two different versions, what we'd call now a major version
0:29:01 > 0:29:04and a minor version. It is Mr Ambiguous.
0:29:04 > 0:29:08You can see just how ambiguous by counting further up the keyboard.
0:29:08 > 0:29:13If I count three notes from D for example, I come to F,
0:29:13 > 0:29:16creating a minor third, ditto E to G.
0:29:18 > 0:29:22But F to A, like C to E, is a major third.
0:29:22 > 0:29:27The fact that the third can be either major or minor,
0:29:27 > 0:29:29depending on where you start counting from,
0:29:29 > 0:29:33might sound like only a slight technical difference, but it's not.
0:29:33 > 0:29:37The pivot between the major third and the minor third is the pivot
0:29:37 > 0:29:40upon which all western music balances.
0:29:45 > 0:29:48Very broadly speaking, one is happy and one is sad,
0:29:48 > 0:29:53and harmony's using these thirds make the music richer, more subtle
0:29:53 > 0:29:54and more affecting.
0:29:54 > 0:29:58FEMALE CHORAL SINGING
0:30:10 > 0:30:14But allowing the leans-both-ways third into music
0:30:14 > 0:30:17had one other big by-product. Let's start with C again.
0:30:17 > 0:30:22We'll count up three steps and find ourselves at E, a major third.
0:30:22 > 0:30:25Then if we carry on up another three steps to G,
0:30:25 > 0:30:27we've created a minor third.
0:30:27 > 0:30:31But what happens if we play all of these three notes together?
0:30:31 > 0:30:35All these three notes played together are called a triad,
0:30:35 > 0:30:38and triads are the bread and butter of all western music.
0:30:38 > 0:30:40PIANO PLAYS
0:30:46 > 0:30:50Here's a song you may recognise which is built on triads.
0:30:50 > 0:30:54# Morning has broken
0:30:54 > 0:30:58# Like the first morning
0:30:58 > 0:31:02# Blackbird has spoken
0:31:02 > 0:31:06# Like the first bird
0:31:07 > 0:31:11# Praise for the singing
0:31:11 > 0:31:15# Praise for the morning... #
0:31:15 > 0:31:1915th-century musicians discovered that triads had an important
0:31:19 > 0:31:22effect on each other when they were mixed together.
0:31:22 > 0:31:25It's to do with the constituent notes of the chords.
0:31:27 > 0:31:32The C major triad, for example, contains two of the same notes
0:31:32 > 0:31:36as the E minor triad, and is therefore closely related to it.
0:31:36 > 0:31:40Similarly the E minor triad shares two of its notes with
0:31:40 > 0:31:43the G major triad, and they are closely related.
0:31:46 > 0:31:49Mixing together chords that are closely related to each other
0:31:49 > 0:31:52creates a mood of harmonious smoothness,
0:31:52 > 0:31:55like melding adjacent colours in the spectrum.
0:31:58 > 0:32:01Triads have another great benefit.
0:32:01 > 0:32:05They can also create the sense of home in a piece of music.
0:32:05 > 0:32:08Let me demonstrate with a famous spiritual song from a few
0:32:08 > 0:32:11hundred years later - Amazing Grace.
0:32:11 > 0:32:13In the first phrase of the song,
0:32:13 > 0:32:16we start on one chord under the words "amazing grace".
0:32:16 > 0:32:20# Amazing grace. #
0:32:20 > 0:32:23Then we shift to another one on the word "sweet".
0:32:23 > 0:32:25# How sweet. #
0:32:25 > 0:32:27Then home again to where we started.
0:32:27 > 0:32:29# The sound. #
0:32:29 > 0:32:33That safe landing back to the chord we think of as home
0:32:33 > 0:32:35is called a cadence, or ending.
0:32:35 > 0:32:39# Amazing grace
0:32:39 > 0:32:42# How sweet the sound. #
0:32:42 > 0:32:46Everything feels right about that little journey of chords.
0:32:46 > 0:32:49We felt good returning to where we started, at the end of the phrase.
0:32:49 > 0:32:53In the second phrase, we go on another short chord journey.
0:32:53 > 0:32:59# That saved a wretch like me. #
0:32:59 > 0:33:02And we have another little cadence by moving to a new chord
0:33:02 > 0:33:04on the word "me".
0:33:04 > 0:33:07Again, this journey feels logical and satisfying,
0:33:07 > 0:33:10we're being led from one place to another.
0:33:10 > 0:33:13# I once was lost
0:33:13 > 0:33:18# But now I'm found
0:33:18 > 0:33:23# Was blind but now I see. #
0:33:26 > 0:33:28You can quite clearly hear that there's nothing
0:33:28 > 0:33:32haphazard about the choice of chords under the tune, it's meant to be.
0:33:32 > 0:33:36What's at work here is a logic in the chords, they're obeying
0:33:36 > 0:33:40strict laws like the laws of gravity, or the orbit of planets,
0:33:40 > 0:33:44whereby some chords exert more power and influence than others.
0:33:48 > 0:33:50Discovering the power of triads
0:33:50 > 0:33:53was like discovering a chemical reaction.
0:33:53 > 0:33:55Composers immediately sensed that something massive
0:33:55 > 0:33:57and transformative had happened.
0:34:00 > 0:34:03From now on, the basic chord - the triad,
0:34:03 > 0:34:06one, three, five - was king.
0:34:13 > 0:34:17Just as the development of harmony up to this point had taken several
0:34:17 > 0:34:21centuries, so too, the refining of musical instruments was a slow burn.
0:34:21 > 0:34:25But by the 16th century, a new breed of instruments had been invented,
0:34:25 > 0:34:29and they were to bring in a golden age of folk or popular music.
0:34:34 > 0:34:38In Tudor England, if you went to the barbershop for a haircut,
0:34:38 > 0:34:42or some form of crude walk-in surgery, while you were waiting
0:34:42 > 0:34:47you could pull down one of these off the wall and have a sing-song.
0:34:47 > 0:34:52Yes, every self-respecting 16th-century barber had a cittern
0:34:52 > 0:34:55hanging around for the use of his customers, many of whom would
0:34:55 > 0:34:58then accompany themselves whilst singing a jolly folk song.
0:34:58 > 0:35:01# Sing no more of dumps So dull and heavy... #
0:35:01 > 0:35:03I'm not making this up.
0:35:03 > 0:35:06# Was ever so Since summer first was leavy
0:35:06 > 0:35:11# And sigh no more, but let them go And be you blithe and bonny
0:35:11 > 0:35:13# Converting all your sounds of woe
0:35:13 > 0:35:16# Into hey nonny nonny... #
0:35:16 > 0:35:19New instruments were changing the texture of music.
0:35:19 > 0:35:21Along with the cittern came the lute.
0:35:22 > 0:35:26Related to the lute was the stringed instrument known as the viol,
0:35:26 > 0:35:31and by the 1560s, the viol's young offspring, the violin,
0:35:31 > 0:35:33had been developed in Italy.
0:35:33 > 0:35:37The 16th century also saw rapid advancements in keyboard technology,
0:35:37 > 0:35:42so at home, if you had a few bob, you might have a virginal.
0:35:42 > 0:35:44But for sheer technological complexity,
0:35:44 > 0:35:47no instrument of the 16th century comes near to the organ.
0:35:47 > 0:35:50# Then sigh not so, but let them go And be you blithe and bonny
0:35:50 > 0:35:55# Converting all your sounds of woe Into hey nonny nonny
0:35:55 > 0:36:00# Then sigh no more, but let them go And be you blithe and bonny
0:36:00 > 0:36:05# Converting all your sounds of woe Into hey nonny nonny. #
0:36:05 > 0:36:09APPLAUSE
0:36:09 > 0:36:12Hand in hand with this expansion of purely instrumental music
0:36:12 > 0:36:14was a wealth of popular song.
0:36:14 > 0:36:18Often, the exact same tunes were used for both church music
0:36:18 > 0:36:21and secular music, with different words, of course.
0:36:21 > 0:36:24PIPE MUSIC
0:36:32 > 0:36:35The first religious songs to get catchy tunes were the ones
0:36:35 > 0:36:38associated with Christmas.
0:36:38 > 0:36:41Some of the early carols were derived from jaunty folk dances.
0:36:41 > 0:36:45MUSIC: Instrumental version of "Good Christian Men Rejoice"
0:36:48 > 0:36:52One reason these 500-year-old carols are still easy on the modern ear
0:36:52 > 0:36:55is because of a significant shift that was taking place
0:36:55 > 0:36:58in the musical structure at this time.
0:36:58 > 0:37:01It's to do with the positioning of the melody.
0:37:07 > 0:37:09When, in around 900 AD,
0:37:09 > 0:37:13chanting monks started to add extra voices to plainsong melodies,
0:37:13 > 0:37:16beginning the process that became polyphony,
0:37:16 > 0:37:19the layering of many voices, it was always assumed that
0:37:19 > 0:37:24the principal tune, the red bricks in our diagram, was the bottom one,
0:37:24 > 0:37:27and the added tune was on top of it.
0:37:27 > 0:37:31Gradually, as two lines became three and then four,
0:37:31 > 0:37:35this principal melody got buried inside the four voices.
0:37:35 > 0:37:39That's why the third line down in any four-part piece of choral music
0:37:39 > 0:37:42got to be known as the tenor, because this was the part
0:37:42 > 0:37:47that held the main tune, tenir being the French verb to hold.
0:37:47 > 0:37:51We take it for granted that the tune of a piece of music sits on
0:37:51 > 0:37:55top of the texture, but this wasn't the case before the 16th century.
0:37:55 > 0:37:58Gradually, in all forms of music,
0:37:58 > 0:38:00the tune worked itself up to the top.
0:38:00 > 0:38:07# In dulci jubilo Let songs and gladness flow
0:38:07 > 0:38:15# All our joy reclineth In praesepio
0:38:15 > 0:38:17# And like the sun he shineth... #
0:38:17 > 0:38:21Once the tune was sitting pretty on the top of the texture,
0:38:21 > 0:38:23you were more likely to be able to hear the words clearly.
0:38:23 > 0:38:27And the words were about to acquire a thrilling new significance.
0:38:27 > 0:38:32# Alpha es et O. #
0:38:32 > 0:38:36In 1450, in the German city of Mainz, one of the most
0:38:36 > 0:38:39important technological breakthroughs of our civilisation
0:38:39 > 0:38:44was invented - Johannes Gutenberg's movable type printing press.
0:38:44 > 0:38:48Within 50 years or so of the arrival of Guttenberg's wondrous machine,
0:38:48 > 0:38:50music was being printed.
0:38:50 > 0:38:55Now, new musical ideas could spread further and faster than ever.
0:38:55 > 0:38:58It's shown in the career of the most influential composer
0:38:58 > 0:39:01of the period, Josquin Des Prez.
0:39:01 > 0:39:05Josquin was born on what is now the Franco-Belgian border
0:39:05 > 0:39:08but by his middle age, he was in Ferrara in Italy,
0:39:08 > 0:39:13working as a resident composer for a rich and powerful duke.
0:39:13 > 0:39:17In terms of pure sound, Josquin could not be described as a radical.
0:39:17 > 0:39:21But in one key respect, Josquin made a departure from what
0:39:21 > 0:39:24went before that was to become a hallmark of the music of the age.
0:39:27 > 0:39:30Josquin is the first composer in history for whom
0:39:30 > 0:39:32the meaning of the words is paramount, and who tried to
0:39:32 > 0:39:36bring out and express that meaning in the way he set words to music.
0:39:36 > 0:39:39Small wonder that the majority of pieces he composed
0:39:39 > 0:39:44for the church were called motets, which means, literally, the words.
0:39:44 > 0:39:48One such motet is Miserere Mei, have mercy on me.
0:39:48 > 0:39:54MALE CHORAL SINGING # Miserere mei
0:39:54 > 0:40:00# Deus... #
0:40:00 > 0:40:05Miserere Mei was composed in 1503. Josquin's employer,
0:40:05 > 0:40:08the Duke of Ferrara, was a friend of the most notorious
0:40:08 > 0:40:12preacher of the age, the Dominican friar, Savonarola,
0:40:12 > 0:40:16a firebrand who constantly attacked the excesses of the Catholic Church.
0:40:16 > 0:40:18He was eventually arrested
0:40:18 > 0:40:22and in prison, he wrote a prayer asking God's forgiveness
0:40:22 > 0:40:26for falsely confessing to crimes under the agony of torture.
0:40:26 > 0:40:29The text of this prayer, essentially proclaiming his innocence,
0:40:29 > 0:40:32spread rapidly across Europe.
0:40:32 > 0:40:36So Josquin's task was to make this highly political statement
0:40:36 > 0:40:40completely clear. How he did so was new.
0:40:40 > 0:40:42Quite simply, Josquin made sure that
0:40:42 > 0:40:46the words were always clearly audible, and that was revolutionary,
0:40:46 > 0:40:48because up till then, believe it or not,
0:40:48 > 0:40:51the words in a piece of music were anything but audible.
0:40:51 > 0:40:54For centuries, song lyrics had been the poor relation.
0:40:54 > 0:40:58In folk music, audiences were as likely dancing, drinking themselves
0:40:58 > 0:41:02into oblivion, or having their hair cut as listening to the words.
0:41:02 > 0:41:05And in church, texts had been sung in Latin.
0:41:05 > 0:41:07What's more, they'd been sung in a way that made it virtually
0:41:07 > 0:41:09impossible to understand.
0:41:12 > 0:41:16This is a technique called melisma, whereby long stretches of melody
0:41:16 > 0:41:19are attached to just one syllable of text.
0:41:25 > 0:41:28The melismatic style could be musically attractive, but it
0:41:28 > 0:41:32destroyed any chance of the listener hearing what words were being sung.
0:41:32 > 0:41:35So in the first few bars of Josquin's motet,
0:41:35 > 0:41:39each voice utters the simple phrase, Miserere mei, Deus,
0:41:39 > 0:41:42"Have mercy on me, Lord," one by one.
0:41:42 > 0:41:50# Miserere mei, Deus
0:41:53 > 0:42:01# Miserere mei, Deus. #
0:42:02 > 0:42:07Josquin repeats those words, "Miserere mei, Deus,"
0:42:07 > 0:42:11throughout the piece like a mantra. He also finds ways of highlighting
0:42:11 > 0:42:13the words that were to be imitated
0:42:13 > 0:42:16by other composers time and time again.
0:42:16 > 0:42:21One, is to have the voices cascade downwards, like falling tears.
0:42:22 > 0:42:27VOICES CASCADE DOWNWARDS, OVERLAPPING EACH OTHER
0:42:47 > 0:42:49Another is to stop all activity
0:42:49 > 0:42:53and have the voices sing together identical syllables of block chords.
0:42:53 > 0:42:59THEY SING TOGETHER
0:43:36 > 0:43:41In 1517, only 17 years after Savanorola's execution,
0:43:41 > 0:43:44Martin Luther set in train the Reformation.
0:43:44 > 0:43:48Not only did religion change, religious music changed, too.
0:43:52 > 0:43:56In Lutheran churches, for the first time, the congregation played
0:43:56 > 0:43:57a major role in music,
0:43:57 > 0:44:02taking the lion's share of the singing in their own language.
0:44:02 > 0:44:05Luther, as well as being a theologian, scholar,
0:44:05 > 0:44:08writer and preacher, was a composer.
0:44:08 > 0:44:11He fervently believed music should belong to everyone,
0:44:11 > 0:44:14not just priests and trained choirs.
0:44:14 > 0:44:17He wanted the congregations in his churches to be able to
0:44:17 > 0:44:21join in hymn-singing with confidence and enthusiasm,
0:44:21 > 0:44:24and this meant having easy-to-pick-up tunes to sing.
0:44:24 > 0:44:29Luther, accordingly, collected lots of popular folk songs of the time
0:44:29 > 0:44:31and gave them holy words.
0:44:31 > 0:44:35He also caused loads of new tunes to be written for the purpose.
0:44:35 > 0:44:40This is one Luther himself wrote, Ein Feste Burg Ist Unser Gott -
0:44:40 > 0:44:43"A Mighty Fortress Is Our God."
0:44:43 > 0:44:47# Ein feste burg ist unser Gott
0:44:47 > 0:44:52# Ein gute wehr und waffen... #
0:44:53 > 0:44:58What's immediately noticeable about this chorale, or Protestant hymn,
0:44:58 > 0:44:59is that as it moves along,
0:44:59 > 0:45:02the words progress syllable by syllable,
0:45:02 > 0:45:05note by note, with a clear tune on top of the sound.
0:45:05 > 0:45:09This is what hymns were to sound like for the next 500 years.
0:45:09 > 0:45:13# Mit ernst ers jetzt meint
0:45:13 > 0:45:17# Gross macht und viel list
0:45:17 > 0:45:22# Ein grausam ruestung ist
0:45:22 > 0:45:29# Auf erd ist nicht seingleichen. #
0:45:31 > 0:45:33What followed the Reformation was more than
0:45:33 > 0:45:37100 years of religious intolerance and state-sponsored terror.
0:45:37 > 0:45:41In the midst of this blood bath, perhaps not surprisingly,
0:45:41 > 0:45:45the mood of sacred music was overwhelmingly one of penitence,
0:45:45 > 0:45:47remorse and lamentation.
0:45:47 > 0:45:50SOMBRE CHORAL SINGING
0:46:05 > 0:46:08But the dark cloud of agony and sorrow
0:46:08 > 0:46:10wasn't going to last for ever.
0:46:10 > 0:46:15UPLIFTING STRING MUSIC
0:46:16 > 0:46:20As the 16th century drew to a close, serious religious music,
0:46:20 > 0:46:23though it was still commissioned both by the Church and by rich
0:46:23 > 0:46:28patrons, was about to lose its role as the dominant form of new music.
0:46:31 > 0:46:35In the 1570s and '80s, a new wave of secular music swept up
0:46:35 > 0:46:40like a warm summer wind from Italy into the rest of Europe.
0:46:40 > 0:46:42It seemed to contain the seeds of something quite
0:46:42 > 0:46:46different from the angry certainties of the religious squabble.
0:46:46 > 0:46:49Not for the last time in musical history, art music,
0:46:49 > 0:46:51the music of posh people,
0:46:51 > 0:46:55was to be saved from itself by popular folk song traditions.
0:46:58 > 0:47:01The pioneering figure in this new wave of secular music was
0:47:01 > 0:47:05a Franco-Flemish composer called Jacques Arcadelt.
0:47:05 > 0:47:08The lute player in Caravaggio's picture here, is playing
0:47:08 > 0:47:11some of his music, he was that famous.
0:47:11 > 0:47:16Everything about his songs cocked a snook at pomposity and authority.
0:47:16 > 0:47:19His lyrics are concerned with human pleasures,
0:47:19 > 0:47:22they're full of sensuous imagery and sexual allusion.
0:47:22 > 0:47:26He worked for a while in Italy where he wrote madrigals,
0:47:26 > 0:47:30then moved to France, where he wrote their equivalent - chansons.
0:47:30 > 0:47:34Typical of these is the cheeky, syncopated tale of Margot,
0:47:34 > 0:47:36the mysterious grape picker.
0:47:36 > 0:47:40# Margot, labourez les vignes Vignes, vignes, vignolet
0:47:40 > 0:47:43# Margot labourez les vignes bientot
0:47:43 > 0:47:50- # En revenant de Lorraine et Margot - En revenant de Lorraine et Margot
0:47:50 > 0:47:52# Rencontrai trois capitaines
0:47:52 > 0:47:57# Vignes, vignes, vignolet Margot labourez les vignes bientot
0:47:57 > 0:48:01# Margot, labourez les vignes Vignes, vignes, vignolet
0:48:01 > 0:48:05# Margot, labourez Les vignes bientot. #
0:48:07 > 0:48:15WOMAN SINGS # Flow, my tears fall
0:48:15 > 0:48:18# From your springs... #
0:48:18 > 0:48:23The success of Arcadelt's songs inspired many other composers,
0:48:23 > 0:48:28one of whom was a close contemporary of Shakespeare, John Dowland,
0:48:28 > 0:48:31who, by 1600, had become the most celebrated singer-songwriter
0:48:31 > 0:48:32in Europe.
0:48:32 > 0:48:36# ..Where night's black bird
0:48:36 > 0:48:42# Her sad infamy sings
0:48:42 > 0:48:47# There let me live
0:48:47 > 0:48:54# Forlorn... #
0:48:56 > 0:48:59Dowland's songs are strikingly different in tone
0:48:59 > 0:49:02and attitude to anything that had gone before.
0:49:02 > 0:49:07He's interested in people and their emotions, not gods and demons.
0:49:07 > 0:49:11A song like Flow My Tears doesn't seem out of place amongst
0:49:11 > 0:49:13those of our own time.
0:49:13 > 0:49:18# ..Lost fortunes deplore
0:49:18 > 0:49:23# Light doth but shame
0:49:23 > 0:49:29# Disclose... #
0:49:33 > 0:49:38Music by 1600 had become a rich mix of sacred and secular,
0:49:38 > 0:49:41instrumental and vocal, but almost anything you would
0:49:41 > 0:49:44hear at that time was on a relatively small scale.
0:49:45 > 0:49:47The time was ripe for someone, somewhere,
0:49:47 > 0:49:51to start creating long, substantial forms that would last a whole
0:49:51 > 0:49:54evening and leave audiences cheering for more.
0:49:54 > 0:49:57Which is exactly what happened.
0:49:57 > 0:49:59Opera was born.
0:50:00 > 0:50:02The man of the moment, one of the ten most influential
0:50:02 > 0:50:06composers of all time, was Claudio Monteverdi.
0:50:06 > 0:50:10In his hands, opera went from zero to hero.
0:50:10 > 0:50:14DRAMATIC INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC
0:50:24 > 0:50:27In opera, music is at the service of the drama, and
0:50:27 > 0:50:31so it needs to be able to express complex, even conflicting, emotions.
0:50:31 > 0:50:34Luckily, Monteverdi had already spent years
0:50:34 > 0:50:36trying to do exactly that
0:50:36 > 0:50:39with his sophisticated passion-filled madrigals.
0:50:41 > 0:50:45To do so, he had begun to recalibrate harmony.
0:50:45 > 0:50:47Let's look at just one of his madrigals,
0:50:47 > 0:50:50which put cats among pigeons, even in his own time.
0:50:50 > 0:50:53It's from the Fifth Book Of Madrigals of 1605,
0:50:53 > 0:50:56and it's called O Mirtillo, Mirtill'Anima Mia,
0:50:56 > 0:51:00Oh, Myrtle, Myrtle, My Soul. Listen to this bit.
0:51:00 > 0:51:08# Che chiami crudelissima
0:51:08 > 0:51:11# Amarilli. #
0:51:12 > 0:51:15It's obvious Monteverdi is dipping in and out of all
0:51:15 > 0:51:18kinds of chords that don't seem comfortably related to each other.
0:51:18 > 0:51:22He wants you to feel surprised or intrigued, especially if it enhances
0:51:22 > 0:51:24the words of the poem. So on these words,
0:51:24 > 0:51:27"Che chiami crudelissima, Amarilli,"
0:51:27 > 0:51:31"The one you call cruellest, Amaryllis," he creates a series
0:51:31 > 0:51:35of deliberate clashes of chord, called a dissonance, or suspension.
0:51:35 > 0:51:38# Come sta il cor di questa... #
0:51:38 > 0:51:41Instead of sticking to chords that had close affinities with
0:51:41 > 0:51:45each other, he deliberately mixed up unrelated chords
0:51:45 > 0:51:49and exploited the strange, disorientating sounds this produced.
0:51:49 > 0:51:53VOCALS OVERLAP # Che chiami
0:51:53 > 0:52:00# Crudelissima
0:52:00 > 0:52:02# Amarilli... #
0:52:02 > 0:52:06It was music that could manipulate our emotions that Monteverdi
0:52:06 > 0:52:10brought into opera. He also introduced another ingredient,
0:52:10 > 0:52:13a dramatic aural effect that had been invented in Venice,
0:52:13 > 0:52:17then one of the world's richest and most powerful city-states.
0:52:17 > 0:52:21Its huge, cavernous basilica, St Mark's, employed some of the
0:52:21 > 0:52:26best musicians in Europe, including, for a time, Monteverdi himself.
0:52:26 > 0:52:29On top of all this, the building served as a kind of musical
0:52:29 > 0:52:31and acoustical laboratory.
0:52:32 > 0:52:36An uncle-and-nephew team called Gabrieli had developed
0:52:36 > 0:52:40a kind of precursor of surround sound at St. Mark's,
0:52:40 > 0:52:43achieved by placing groups of singers
0:52:43 > 0:52:45and instrumentalists in different parts of the building
0:52:45 > 0:52:48and having them sing or play alternately.
0:52:48 > 0:52:53The technical term for the technique is polychoral, many choirs.
0:52:53 > 0:52:57MUSIC ALTERNATES FROM LEFT TO RIGHT
0:53:07 > 0:53:10Monteverdi knew and admired this polychoral style
0:53:10 > 0:53:13and thought it would work alongside his intimate,
0:53:13 > 0:53:16emotionally-charged madrigal style when he came to writing opera.
0:53:18 > 0:53:20Monteverdi didn't invent opera,
0:53:20 > 0:53:24a Florentine composer called Peri did, in 1597.
0:53:24 > 0:53:28But Monteverdi did write the first good opera, Orfeo,
0:53:28 > 0:53:31which premiered in Mantua in 1607.
0:53:31 > 0:53:34He was aiming for maximum emotional effect,
0:53:34 > 0:53:39maximum narrative clarity, maximum impact, even shock, and wasn't
0:53:39 > 0:53:43going to obey anyone's rules about what he could or could not do.
0:53:43 > 0:53:48FEMALE OPERATIC SINGING
0:53:54 > 0:53:58What's more, Monteverdi invented a new combination of instruments
0:53:58 > 0:54:00never before gathered together.
0:54:00 > 0:54:04He borrowed old and new styles, he used choral music,
0:54:04 > 0:54:06he told the stories through characters
0:54:06 > 0:54:09directly expressing themselves to the audience.
0:54:09 > 0:54:13Almost everything about Orfeo was then a novelty.
0:54:13 > 0:54:16It was loud, it was long and it was modern.
0:54:18 > 0:54:21And let's not forget how liberating it all must have been,
0:54:21 > 0:54:24because as musical techniques had been developing,
0:54:24 > 0:54:28century by century, so too had the ability to express more complex,
0:54:28 > 0:54:32subtle and unexpected emotions along the way.
0:54:32 > 0:54:35Monteverdi was using music plus.
0:54:43 > 0:54:47Orfeo had been performed in a ducal court in front of a small,
0:54:47 > 0:54:52select audience. Monteverdi's last opera, The Coronation Of Poppaea,
0:54:52 > 0:54:56was performed in a Venetian theatre, in front of a paying public.
0:54:56 > 0:54:59It's one of the most radical dramas of all time.
0:55:00 > 0:55:03Why is Poppaea so radical?
0:55:03 > 0:55:06To put it simply, because it was about real people
0:55:06 > 0:55:08and their complicated, messy emotions.
0:55:08 > 0:55:12The Emperor Nero and his mistress Poppaea were actual historical
0:55:12 > 0:55:15figures, and Monteverdi's music acts as the soundtrack
0:55:15 > 0:55:17to their real-life passions.
0:55:17 > 0:55:20On the surface of it, Poppaea is about lust
0:55:20 > 0:55:22and ambition conquering all.
0:55:22 > 0:55:26It ends with a duet for Nero and Poppaea of unabashed eroticism,
0:55:26 > 0:55:32called Pur Ti Miro, Pur Ti Godo, "I gaze on you, I possess you."
0:55:32 > 0:55:36It appears as if Nero and Poppaea are being congratulated
0:55:36 > 0:55:38for their criminal greed.
0:55:38 > 0:55:40# Pur ti miro
0:55:40 > 0:55:41# Pur ti godo
0:55:41 > 0:55:44# Pur ti miro
0:55:44 > 0:55:46# Pur ti godo
0:55:46 > 0:55:49# Pur ti stringo
0:55:49 > 0:55:52# Pur t'annodo
0:55:52 > 0:55:55# Pur ti stringo... #
0:55:55 > 0:55:57The passion that oozes out of this duet,
0:55:57 > 0:56:01"I adore you, I embrace you, I desire you, I enchain you,"
0:56:01 > 0:56:04is so frank and sensual, it almost turns its audience -
0:56:04 > 0:56:06remember they're in the room, too -
0:56:06 > 0:56:10into voyeurs, awkwardly witnessing the private interchange of
0:56:10 > 0:56:13two weirdly uninhibited strangers.
0:56:13 > 0:56:17This was new territory indeed, the full monty.
0:56:19 > 0:56:22# O mia vita
0:56:22 > 0:56:24# O mia vita
0:56:24 > 0:56:28# O mio tesoro... #
0:56:29 > 0:56:32The most daring part of this climax is what it meant to
0:56:32 > 0:56:35Monteverdi's fellow Venetians.
0:56:35 > 0:56:38They knew what happened next in real life, that is,
0:56:38 > 0:56:40after the fall of the curtain.
0:56:40 > 0:56:45Nero killed his new Empress Poppaea and their unborn child
0:56:45 > 0:56:50and then himself, and his regime collapsed in flames.
0:56:51 > 0:56:54Monteverdi's audience would have seen the opera's ending
0:56:54 > 0:56:59for what it was - a savage attack on Venice's archrival state, Rome.
0:56:59 > 0:57:02In the light of this, the Coronation Of Poppaea can be
0:57:02 > 0:57:07seen as a scathing critique of the excesses of Roman power
0:57:07 > 0:57:10and the pressing need for humane self-restraint.
0:57:10 > 0:57:15# Piu non peno
0:57:15 > 0:57:20# Pi non moro
0:57:20 > 0:57:25- # O mia vita - O mia vita
0:57:25 > 0:57:29# O mio tesoro
0:57:29 > 0:57:37- # O mia vita - O mia vita
0:57:37 > 0:57:45# O mio tesoro... #
0:57:52 > 0:57:56Monteverdi paved the way for an explosion of musical energy.
0:57:56 > 0:58:00MUSIC: "Summer" by Vivaldi
0:58:05 > 0:58:08If innovations had come along at a snail's pace in the previous
0:58:08 > 0:58:141,000 years, the next 100 in music saw them coming thick and fast.
0:58:14 > 0:58:17In the next programme, the era of Vivaldi, Bach and Handel
0:58:17 > 0:58:20and the exhilarating sound of invention.
0:58:46 > 0:58:49Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd