Madrigal

MADRIGAL. - From "matricale," with reference both to language and to maternal song; or from "mandriale," a shepherd's song. In its most common form from the 14th to the 16th century, the madrigal consists of two tercets of hendecasyllables variously rhymed, followed by a pair of hendecasyllables rhymed with each other (schemes: aab aab cc; abb acc dd, or others). From the 14th century onward the addition of a seven-syllable line to the tercets was not excluded; but the 7-syllable line was more often mixed in during the 16th century and after, when the original idyllic inspiration of the madrigal changed into literary refinement, and in place of its former freshness a gallant content was preferred, and even the pungent wit of the epigram. Musically (since the madrigal is in its essence poetry sung or to be sung) its tercets have melody and rhythm different from those of the final pair of lines (which form the refrain). It is characteristic of the madrigal not to be based on pre-existing themes: that is, to be, so to speak, of free invention.

In an initial period, that is in the 14th century, with Giacomo da Bologna, Gherardello, Giovanni da Cascia, Landino, the madrigal presents itself as one of the genuine forms of the stupendous flowering of Italian music known as Ars nova (v.). The music, which strives to follow the text not only in accentuation but often also in imagery, is written for 2 or 3 voices. The prevalence of homophony (that is, of the vertical concordance of the voices) lasted until the development of the madrigal through the work of the 16th-century composers and especially of those Franco-Flemish musicians who, having lived in Italy, owed much to Italy: such as Verdelot and Arcadelt. But from the middle of the 16th century to its decline, the best polyphonists, both in Venice and in Rome, from Willaert to O. Lasso, from A. Gabrieli to Pierluigi da Palestrina, brought the madrigal to a much more complex technique, writing for 4, 5 or 6 voices in a style that reflects the contemporary perfection of the motet and that benefits from the expressive intensity proper to these authors. Their tendency could not fail to flow into a more solemn conception of the madrigal: thus the spiritual madrigal arose (also as a reaction to the licentious subjects popularized by madrigalian music). There were also "corone" or series of madrigals forming more or less organic overall unities of varying extent and duration, such as A. Banchieri's Festino or Jannequin's Le caquet des femmes; in these a nimble and unrestrained descriptive vein asserts itself and onomatopoeias of animals abound, with imitative cries and sounds. Madrigals were also performed, or expressly composed, as intermezzi in theatrical productions, toward the end of the 16th century in Italy (reaching the so-called madrigal opera). In the forms of the polyphonic madrigal L. Marenzio and Gesualdo prince of Venosa carried out singular harmonic innovations, oriented toward chromaticism and the search for color. In its final phase the madrigal assimilated what was the great novelty, the new word of music: the recitative melopoeia created by the Florentines. Thus Caccini in the Nuove musiche has madrigals for a single voice; and C. Monteverdi will employ the "agitated" style for his warlike and amorous madrigals, with instrumental accompaniments and with the use of that pyrrhic rhythm from which his genius drew the idea of measured tremolo. From Italy the vogue of the madrigal spread, besides to other countries, to England, where both the collections of translated Italian madrigals and those of English authors, such as Bird, Morley, Gibbons, enjoyed wide favor. A Madrigal Society was founded there in 1741.

Edgardo Carducci Agostini