Josquin des Prez has been compared to Beethoven as the greatest composer of his generation and beyond. The parallels between these two legendary figures extend from their musical influence to the contemporary shifting paradigms of music dissemination. Musical literacy in Josquin’s time had recently received a boost through the advent of printing (Petrucci, 1501), and now musical enthusiasts were able to study not only manuscripts (hand copied) but also printed scores or parts. In Beethoven’s time, musical literacy grew through public concerts and mass produced scores. These two developments contribute in part to the reputations afforded to the composers.
Before Petrucci, music was available to connoisseurs through manuscripts, usually copied by monks. Manuscripts of this type would be “distributed” to very few patrons. As printing of books was just starting in the late 15th century, some liturgical music was printed, but this seems to have also been very rare. Familiarity with contemporary music at this time came more from performance than from score study. Petrucci and his successors provided a viable method by which music could be copied and disseminated, though this was by no means “mass media.” Music printing as an industry began to take off, alongside the book industry, and people throughout Europe could now own and perform works by composers like Josquin. Scores thus distributed were more than likely to be chamber music, for amateurs to perform from and enjoy, and perhaps study. At this time, larger works, such as requiem s and masses were being written and were well known (as composers began to be identified with their work) but “mass producing” their scores was not done, as the audience for these works would be less broad (and commercially viable) as for small scale works. Church patrons were a different market, which may have continued to utilize manuscripts (especially where the work had been written by a local composer for a specific church), as well as still having access to scribes and funding for scores. Widespread dissemination of printed works meant a larger audience for Josquin and his contemporaries, and a legacy by which they could be memorialized in future generations.
By the 19th century, music printing was as widespread as private and public performance. As noted in class, the first published scores of Haydn’s symphonies became available in the 1780s, and for the first time, not only chamber music but large scale orchestral works – too large to be performed in the home – were available to consumers. This represents, to me, two trends in music history: the popularity of these larger works to a mass audience, and the advent of greater literacy in music. If you were to buy a score of a Haydn symphony, this would likely not be the only printed book or even book of music on your shelf; you likely could read the notation and study the score’s finer points of harmony, melody and orchestration, and may have already become familiar with the piece through attending a concert performance or reading through a four-hands piano arrangement. In the time of Beethoven, the association between composer and works had grown even tighter, as scores were published and given an opus number (roughly) in order of composition. Haydn’s works were left, as with Bach, to be catalogued as part of his legacy; Beethoven had some control in his interactions with publishers over which pieces would form an opus and what, if any, extra information (title, etc) would be included. Beethoven’s music was marketed to an audience who participated in contemporary music through listening to performances, collecting printed scores, performing the music themselves (in arrangements or as written) and perhaps studying them. Musical amateurs were both an intellectual and commercial audience, and composers and publishers worked to gain their business.
Discussions of musical literacy in our day often touch on the issues involved in “cultural literacy:” how to market awareness of classical and classic pieces to an audience more familiar with the Top Ten. At the same time, our contemporary composers can seem difficult to approach, especially through printed scores. Musical literacy today must keep up with complicated notational techniques and non-tonal approaches to harmony or counterpoint, as well as literacy in the “common practice” style. It is interesting to contemplate what kind of paradigm-shift could take place today to equal that of the eras of Josquin and Beethoven: what innovation in music dissemination has the ability to increase the audience of amateurs? The innovations that brought scores by Josquin and Beethoven into more people’s hands helped in some small way to make the reputations of these composers last far beyond their lifetimes, and the changing times of these composers may also contribute to the legends that have grown up around their reputations. Perhaps in the future digital technology may be seen as the next parallel to music printing and the careers of our most legendary musical figures.
The growth of music technology and musical literacy is a subject I know far too little about, and not the easiest subject to trace in one source. Some of the sources I found helpful include:
, et al. "Printing and publishing of music." In Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/40101 (accessed April 7, 2011).
Eisenstein, Elizabeth L. “The Advent of Printing and the Problem of the Renaissance.”
Past & Present, No. 45 (Nov., 1969), pp. 19-89
Taruskin, Richard. "Chapter 13 Middle and Low." In Music from the Earliest Notations to the Sixteenth Century, Oxford University Press. (New York, USA, n.d.). Retrieved 7 Apr. 2011, from http://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume1/actrade-9780195384819-div1-013008.xml
Weber, William. “Mass Culture and the Reshaping of European Musical Taste, 1770-1870.” Croatian Musicological Society: Vol. 8, No. 1 (Jun., 1977), pp. 5-22 http://www.jstor.org/stable/836535
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