Les Presses Du College Musical La Basse Continue En Italie Au Xviie Siecle Vol.1

Summary of This Book

Dedicated to basso continuo in Italy, this volume explores the very beginnings of a technique that profoundly transformed the writing and performance of Baroque music. Focused on the first half of the 17th century, it compiles essential treatises and texts authored by Cavalieri, Viadana, Agazzari, Bianciardi, Banchieri, and Sabbatini, offering a coherent overview of ideas, recommendations, and practices related to figured bass accompaniment.

During this period, the rise of basso continuo led to an abundant production of texts: realization advice, indications of figured bass notation, stylistic remarks, and practical principles often appear in warnings or prefaces to collections of pieces, notably motets. The book highlights this concrete dimension, close to the sources, to better understand how musicians approached accompaniment, voice balance, and harmonic progression in the early decades of the century.

The development of basso continuo is also placed within its aesthetic context: the invention of the recitative and the accompanied monody in Florence, followed by the rapid diffusion of this practice throughout Europe. Beyond a mere accompaniment technique, basso continuo gradually became a composition method destined to leave a lasting mark on the entire tonal period. Complementing the original texts and their annotated bilingual Italian-French translation, the work finally offers a selection of motets by the main authors: a genuine application material to work on realization, refine stylistic references, and enrich an informed interpretation of early 17th-century repertoire.

Technical specifications

Genre	Treatises and writings on basso continuo	Pages	160
Language	Bilingual Italian-French