How Music Developed

of Popu

s "Tannh?user" and "Die Meistersinger" as historical pictures-Th

know who were the secular musicians of the time, and we know that they were nearer the fundamental principles of modern music than the churchmen were. The enormous mass of ecclesiastical music produced in the middle ages was fit only for the worship of cathedrals. It could never have been made to utter the notes of human passion, and until some other style was found, the modern symphony, song, and opera must have remained impossi

s on the face of Europe. They were the troubadours, j

rankish chiefs, now their lords and masters. In the earliest days they were simple vagabonds, whom the law did not allow redress for bodily injury wantonly inflicted. In the latter half of the twelfth and the early part of the thirteenth centuries these strolling musician

n from the folk songs, but their own songs were distinguished by refinement and improved melody. These knightly singers existed simultaneously with the jongleurs, who sang and played for money. The most celebrated troubadours were King

recorded that in that year Louis XV. made Jean Pierre Guignon "le Roy des Violons." The songs of the troubadours and wandering minstrels were the popular songs of the day of Columbu

that the troubadours received new ideas in regard to melody from the East; as they found among the Arabs not only a different system of tones, but many fanciful vocal ornaments then unknown in Europe, and which they introduced in their own songs on their return from the Crusades. But as harmony was in that day yet undeveloped, the flowing vine of melody received little support from it, and therefore often appears weak. Th

the twelfth century and the first half of the thirteenth. It was the golden age of the minnesong, the age of Wagner's "Tannh?user" and the great S?ngerkrieg at the Wartburg Castle, the age of the Landgrave Hermann, Wolfram von Eschenbach, and Walther von der Vogelweide. This time has been made alive for us by the genius of Wagner, whose contest in "Tannh?user" int

by Wagner as the theme of his march goes to show. Perhaps no better description of a meistersong could b

rsinger-cr

measuremen

regulati

ver vi

a section i

self-same m

veral lines

e with a rhy

e to the "A

be also som

its espec

e other diff'

d sections o

g may have

new song

ur syllable

rain doth

ain the ma

ocheimer Liederbuch" is a collection dated 1452. H. de Zeelandia, in his "Lehrcompendium," gives many in vogue in the first half of the fifteenth century. The essential features of the volkslieder are clearness an

n by Dr. Hesse as "O Welt, ich muss dich lassen," was but the continuation of the practice of Heinrich von Laufenberg, who in the fifteenth century set sacred words to secular tunes continually. This brief review of the state of music

ge of some noble, who selected from the guild a "piper king." It was his business to see that "no player, whether he be piper, drummer, fiddler, trumpeter, or performer on any instrument, be allowed to accept engagements of any kind, whether in towns, villages, or hamlets, unless he had previously enrolled himself a member of the guild." At irregular intervals a court was assembled, consisting of a mayor, four masters, twelve ordinary members, and a beadle, whose business it was to mete out punishment to guild offenders. These guilds were simply the musical protec

der the protection of some prince or noble. For instance, the children of the chapel ate in the chapel hall with the yeomen of the vestry and were well cared for. They were the young students

7; to the collegiate churches of Southwell, in Nottinghamshire; to Beverley, in Yorkshire, and Westminster. At Oxford, New College had an endowment for sixteen choristers, and Magdalen, All Souls', and St. John's had similar funds. Nearer to Okeghem's day the famous Dick Whitting

first a song by King Thibaut of Navarre, and the second the first

t Meist

hibaut of

r per la

bos et un

to-re ai

pour son e

it un so

ent-li ma

cel-le

oi de f

s sans d

, die

bon

Die Meis

eister

e-si

d zwan-

cht wie J

n bru-d

-wi

n F major and while its rhythm is not clearly indicated, it is plainly not a polyphonic composition. The directness of this kind of music and its suitability to the expression of simple feelings were bound to make