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The Style of Palestrina and the Dissonance (Dover Books on Music)

The Style of Palestrina and the Dissonance (Dover Books on Music)
By Knud Jeppesen

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Product Description

This classic study remains one of the foremost works on the music of the 16th-century composer known as Palestrina. A rigorous and valuable analysis of the composer's handling of rhythm, line, and harmony, it explores his treatment of dissonance as well as the evolving concept and treatment of dissonance by his predecessors.

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #235067 in Books
  • Published on: 2005-03-24
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 320 pages

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes
Text: English, Danish (translation)

Customer Reviews

An AHA! moment in Music history4
This was Jeppesen's doctoral dissertation, I believe, and explores a very narrow area as might be expected. You really have to be into music theory in a serious way to want to read it at all. After deciphering the detailed arguments, I realized that Jeppesen had a genuinely fresh insight to offer: that the late 16th century, as reflected in the Palestrina style represents a watershed in the psychological / stylistic attitude toward dissonance, separating all of medieval music from all modern music (post-1600).
For me, this is a great AHA! But as I say, you have to be REALLY into music theory to get it. As with Jeppesen's "Counterpoint", you must read multiple C-clefs in score, or be willing to transcribe the examples into modern clefs if that's what you can read, so it's not a casual read. I give it 5 stars for the AHA! but dock it one star for inaccessibility.

The English translation preserves intact many of the convoluted clauses of the Danish. Footnotes are confidently presented in original languages: German, Danish, Italian, Spanish, Catalan, and Medieval Latin, with the apparent expectation of linguistically sophisticated readers. lol... wish I could rise to the occasion.