Studies in Music, Words, and Imagery in Early Modern Europe

Characterized by an interdisciplinary approach, these essays highlight the relationship between music and poetry in Italian secular works of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, examine the role of images in shedding light on the cultural context in which these and other works came into being (music iconography), and explore the binaries and similarities of the arts in this period. Insights about early opera are complemented by discussions of accompanied solo song, or monody, both genres new to Italian music at the turn of the seventeenth century.

Many chapters focus on specific images, ranging from the figure of Apollo and his significance as the earliest operatic protagonist, to an early eighteenth-century representation of a salon concert and its “ensemblisation” of events that likely occurred serially. Others include discussions and analyses of musical poetics, from Tasso’s influence on the Italian madrigal to Rinuccini’s authorship of the earliest opera libretti. Another focuses on history while narrating the circumstances under which opera came into being in late Renaissance Florence.

Addressed in large measure to teachers and students, Studies in Music, Words, and Imagery in Early Modern Europe presents a range of subjects that broaden our perspective on the era. Certain essays take a specifically pedagogical approach, while others are more apt to interest music historians or those familiar with Italian versification. All are presented with a view toward making more accessible essays that do not fit neatly into one subject area but cross boundary lines between music, words, and images.

Barbara Russano Hanning is Professor Emeritus of Music at The City College of New York (CCNY) and the City University Graduate Center (CUNY) and has also taught in the DMA program of The Juilliard School. She wrote a book on the beginnings of opera and articles on sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Italian secular music, music iconography, and eighteenth-century French subjects. She also authored a college textbook, Concise History of Western Music, currently in its fifth edition (2019). A past president of the Society for Seventeenth-Century Music, she currently serves on the Board of the NY-based early music ensemble ARTEK.