Music in the Collective Experience in Sixteenth-Century Milan

Practices of Renaissance musical performance depended enormously on the many variables of local environments. Italian cities shared many types of venues and musical organizations, and individual musicians and composers might move from one city to another, so they had a number of features in common. But all manner of specifics, from the size and technical competencies of the choirs, to the strength of the music publishing industry, to the roles of courts and civic institutions, varied so considerably that modern efforts to understand urban musical experience require local study. Thus the past two decades have seen the production of a substantial scholarly literature on the musical culture of particular Renaissance cities, especially those of Italy. Christine Getz contributes to this important and growing body of knowledge with her study of Milan.

A number of features made Milan and its musical culture both significant and unique. It enjoyed its own liturgical rite, the Ambrosian. It was in many ways a meeting point between Mediterranean and Northern European cultural trends and features. Long run by a series of signori, Milan was not only one of the great cities of Italy, but was at the heart of the Italian Wars of the early sixteenth century. It began the era with Sforza dukes, ended with Spanish Hapsburg governors, and suffered several other changes in between. Under its Archbishop Charles Borromeo, Milan was also a center of Catholic reform.

Getz surveys several principal types of performance settings. Two combine civic and ecclesiastical functions: the ducal chapel and the cathedral. The changes wrought by Borromeo's implementation of the Council of Trent included organizing the discussion of other ecclesiastical institutions, including confraternities and schools of Christian doctrine. Two chapters focus on instrumental music and secular song, mainly at court and as seen in some significant publishing ventures.

The strength of the study is descriptive rather than analytic. Getz moves chronologically through each topic, pausing to discuss some significant features of a number of exemplary compositions relevant to the theme. Charts help to organize some of the information, for example the names and salaries of court trumpeters, or cleffing and finals for some significant publications, such as Hermann Matthias Werrecore's 1555 motet collection. Werrecore, chapel master at the cathedral during the second quarter of the century, appears at several points in the study. His work commemorating the Battle of Bicocca (1522) and recast to memorialize the Battle of Pavia three years later, leads off the discussion of the uses of music in maintaining a civic identity amid the battles and disruptions of the first half of the century. Vincenzo Ruffo, who served at midcentury, also receives attention. Getz endeavors to associate a number of printed music collections with particular institutions or events. She notes a number of urban associations but focuses particularly on the Church of the Madonna dei Miracoli and the Society of the Ave Maria. She also discusses the laude that were a central feature of instruction at the schools of Christian doctrine.

Borromeo's implementation of reforms was famous both for his own aggressive style and for the resistance it engendered. Nonetheless, by the time of his death the Church had become a noted center of the city's musical life. The cathedral, the city's many churches, and the confraternities and schools that captured so much lay devotional energy provided a range of musical experience.

Getz has presented an abundance of information on musical life in Milan; her work should serve as a helpful aid to further research. The production and appearance of a book are the responsibility of the publisher and not the author: here, Ashgate has room for improvement. The failure to wrap text consistently around the charts and musical examples has left so many large white spaces on so many pages as to give an initial impression that text is missing. More attention is called for here.