An Avant-Garde Look at Early Music:

Luigi Nono’s Thoughts on Sixteenth-Century Polyphony1

KATELIJNE SCHILTZ

Introduction

The title of this essay might sound a little surprising: what could the twentieth-
century composer Luigi Nono (1924-1991) have to say about sixteenth-century
polyphony? And, perhaps more to the point, to what extent could his
considerations offer us new insights and ideas for the study of that repertoire?
In this article, a lecture that Nono delivered in 1960 at the famous Darmstädter
Ferienkurse für Neue Musik (Darmstadt Summer Courses for New Music) will
serve as my basic source. In this lecture the composer approaches two of his
own vocal works – La terra e la compagna and Il canto sospeso – from a specific
point of view: he focuses on the way the phonetic material of the texts has a
major influence on the texture of the musical fabric.2 Nono explicitly traces the
origins of this compositional technique back to the rich oeuvre of madrigals and
motets from the Cinquecento, illustrating his theories with works by Giovanni
Gabrieli (ca. 1554/1557-1612) and Carlo Gesualdo (ca. 1561-1613). I believe
that a closer reading of Nono‘s considerations can also enrich our
understanding and analysis of this music. More precisely, I intend to show how
the polyphonic texture of many sixteenth-century pieces is closely determined
by the word-sound of the text set to music. It will also become clear that literary
and musical treatises of that time provide an essential background for the
discussion of this topic. Above all, these insights can have important
consequences for today‘s performance practice of and listening attitudes
towards early music.
To be sure, Nono is not the only twentieth-century composer who was
fascinated by the music of the past in general and Renaissance polyphony in
particular. Anton Webern (1883-1945), one of the main representatives of the
Second Viennese School, undertook a careful study of contrapuntal techniques
in the monumental Choralis Constantinus (commissioned and composed around
1508-1509) by Heinrich Isaac (ca. 1450/1455-1517), which culminated in a
modern edition of the second volume, in the series Denkmäler der Tonkunst in

1 This essay was awarded the Isabelle Cazeaux Prize of the Lyrica Society and was

read in Philadelphia on November 14, 2009, for the Society‘s annual session at the
national meeting of the American Musicological Society.
2
As far as I know, there does not yet exist a recording of Nono‘s La terra e la
compagna. However, a moving live performance of Il canto sospeso was recorded in 1992 by
the Berlin Philharmonic under Claudio Abbado for Sony Classical (SK 53 360). Both Il
canto sospeso and La terra e la compagna were published by Ars Viva Verlag.
2

Österreich (1909). Steve Reich‘s fascination with various aspects of medieval

music, especially Parisian organum, is brought to the surface in pieces such as
Proverb (1995), which he even explicitly called ―an homage to Pérotin.‖3 Olivier
Messiaen‘s interest in Claude Le Jeune‘s collection Le printemps (Paris, 1603) had
a two-fold reason. First of all, he was attracted by the homophonic text settings
that perfectly reflected the French humanist ideals of the so-called musique
mesurée à l’antique; secondly, given Messiaen‘s lifelong passion for ornithology, he
was especially charmed by the many birdsongs Le Jeune‘s Printemps contains.4
Italian avant-garde composers were also busy studying their national heritage
and integrating it in their works. Gian Francesco Malipiero‘s edition of
Monteverdi‘s complete oeuvre was not only a major step in the study of this
composer, but also left indelible traces in Malipiero‘s own output, with San
Francesco d’Assisi (1920-1921) being important evidence of this cross-
fertilization.5 It is thus clear that Luigi Nono‘s undertaking fits within a general
trend.6 However, his profound knowledge of and highly original approach to his
own compositional roots deserve closer attention, since they offer a fresh look
at the repertoire under discussion.

Luigi Nono’s exploration of the musical past

During his Darmstadt lecture (July 8, 1960) the composer presented an analysis
of Il canto sospeso (1955-1956) and La terra e la compagna (1957-1958).7 Both pieces

3 For a thorough analysis of this work, see Ronald Woodley, ―Steve Reich‘s Proverb,

Canon, and a Little Wittgenstein,‖ in Canons and Canonic Techniques, 14th-16th Centuries:
Theory, Practice, and Reception History, ed. Katelijne Schiltz and Bonnie J. Blackburn,
Analysis in Context. Leuven Studies in Musicology 1 (Leuven and Dudley, MA: Peeters,
2007), pp. 457-481.
4 See for example Isabelle His, ―La Renaissance à défaut d‘Antiquité: Olivier

Messiaen analyste du Printemps de Claude Le Jeune,‖ in “…La musique, de tous les

passetemps le plus beau.” Hommage à Jean-Michel Vaccaro, ed. François Lesure (Paris:
Klincksieck, 1998), pp. 235-249.
5 Claudio Monteverdi: Tutte le opere, ed. Gian Francesco Malipiero (Asolo, 1926-42;

repr. 1954-1968).
6 See also John C.G. Waterhouse, ―The Italian Avant-Garde and the National

Tradition,‖ in Tempo, 68 (1964), pp. 14-25.

7 Luigi Nono. Scritti e colloqui, ed. Angela Ida De Benedictis and Veniero Rizzardi, Le

Sfere. Collana di studi musicali 35 (Milan: Ricordi, 2001), vol. 1, pp. 65-83. A German
translation by the composer Helmut Lachenmann was published by Jürg Stenzl in Luigi
Nono Texte. Studien zu seiner Musik (Zürich-Freiburg im Breisgau: Atlantis Verlag, 1975),
pp. 48-60.
 KATELIJNE SCHILTZ Luigi Nono and Polyphony 3

are for soloists, choir and orchestra.8 According to Nono, one of the main
characteristics of these compositions is their innovative treatment of the
relationship between text and music. As it happens, the musical form is
intricately linked with the specific handling of the phonetic material of the
words, a process that in turn affects the semantic layer of the text. Let us take
the example of La terra e la compagna, which is based on three poems by Cesare
Pavese (1908-1950). At the beginning, Nono combines two texts simul-
taneously: ―Terra rossa terra nera‖ (About the relationship between woman and
nature), sung by sopranos, altos and basses, and ―Tu sei come una terra che
nessuno ha mai detto‖ (about the woman as beloved), sung by the tenor voices
(see Example 1).9 We can see that Nono atomizes these verses by dividing them
into separate letters and syllables, which gradually grow into words and phrases
throughout the different voices; this procedure is marked by the connecting
lines ―---‖ in the score. Paradoxically, Nono argues that through this ―apparente
frantumazione linguistica‖ (seeming pulverization of the language), the
communicative power of the text can be rediscovered.10 This effect is enhanced
by Nono‘s meticulous search for common or similar vowels and/or consonants
within and between the two texts. This intention becomes clear right at the start
(end of measure 2), where he superposes the syllables ―ros‖ and ―ra‖ (from
―rossa,‖ ―terra,‖ and ―nera‖), which all share the consonant ―r.‖ A few measures
later, similar combinations are made between the tenor‘s ―detto‖ and the bass‘s
―dove‖ (measures 8-9), two words that share no fewer than three sounds (the
vowels ―e‖ and ―o,‖ as well as the dental ―d‖).
Although many more passages could be cited, these brief examples may
suffice as illustrations. I hope it has become clear that through Nono‘s
deliberate search for common word-sounds, both textual layers of La terra e la
compagna are not only subtly related to each other, but they are also perceived by
the listener as a more or less symbiotic unity. As Nono puts it in his Darmstadt
lecture, with La terra e la compagna he has explored the ―richezza
pluridimensionale di possibilità espressivo-fonetiche‖ (multi-dimensional pro-
fusion of expressive and phonetic possibilities). In other words, the linearity of
each individual poem has been transcended via the complementary treatment of

8 On Nono‘s choral music in general, see Armando Gentilucci, ―Luigi Nonos

Chortechnik,‖ in Luigi Nono Texte. Studien zu seiner Musik, ed. Jürg Stenzl (Zürich-
Freiburg im Breisgau: Atlantis-Verlag, 1975), pp. 394-408.
9 Both poems were published in the collection Verrà la morte e avrà i tuoi occhi (Turin,

1951). ―Terra rossa terra nera‖ dates from October 27, 1945, ―Tu sei come una terra‖
from October 29, 1945.
10 ―Il trovare e ritrovare comunicativa, parole, fonemi, che nell‘apparente

‗frantumazione‘ linguistica vengono tradotti in significati musicali nella loro

ricomposizione nello spazio acustico‖ (see Luigi Nono. Scritti e colloqui, p. 437).
4

Ex. 1. Luigi Nono, La terra e la compagna, mm. 1-4. Reproduced by permission

of Ars Viva Verlag
 KATELIJNE SCHILTZ Luigi Nono and Polyphony 5

both texts.11 In Il canto sospeso too, a work that carries a penetrating social
message – its text being based on letters of condemned antifascist fighters – he
had already experimented with the subdivision of single words among the
voices. Indeed, Nono‘s intense involvement in the social issues of his time gave
rise to a style in which sound and text are inextricably linked. However,
although Nono states that this technique opens ―un mondo di nuove possibilità
di combinazione‖ (a world of new combinatorial possibilities), he is fully aware
of the fact that precursors of this phenomenon emerge in different stages of
music history.12 It is at this point that his familiarity with the musical tradition
comes to the fore.
First of all, Nono ties in with the complex repertoire of polytextual
motets from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, which brought together
two or more texts – often even in different languages (e.g. Latin and French) –
around a common theme. Because Nono considers the lack of intelligibility to
be a major deficit of these works, it soon becomes clear that his heart is not in
them.13 Immediately afterwards, however, Nono devotes special attention to the
age of polyphony and counterpoint. He is inspired by the way the composers of
this period obtained a sonic and semantic richness by activating all parameters
(melody, rhythm, imitation, etc.). Particularly instructive is the following idea:

11 Gentilucci, ―Luigi Nonos Chortechnik,‖ p. 404 compares Nono‘s ―Suche nach

neuen und unvorhergesehenen semantischen Assoziationen durch die Zergliederung

und Wiederverbindung des Textes‖ (Investigation of new and unanticipated semantic
associations through dissection and recombination of the text) with the typically
Venetian tradition of cori spezzati: ―Der Kontrast erhöht die formalen Qualitäten jedes
einzelnen der beiden ‗Chöre,‘ die sich gegenüberstehen und doch fest verbunden sind
durch eine gemeinsame poetische und technische Matrix‖ (The contrast heightens the
formal quality of each of the two choirs, which are placed opposite one another but are
also tightly bound through a shared poetic and technical matrix).
12 Nono uses the following expression: ―Questa richezza pluridimensionale di

possibilità espressivo-fonetiche nel canto, quale ci si presenta oggi, si è preannunciata

già più volte nel corso dello sviluppo storico-musicale, naturalmente sempre relativa ai
procedimenti compositivi dell‘epoca specifica‖ (This multi-dimensional richness of
expressive-phonetic possibilities in sound, as there is today, has already been proclaimed
several times during the historical development of music, of course always relative to
the specific compositional procedures of particular eras) (Scritti e colloqui, p. 68).
13 ―La loro simultaneità articolava maggiormente la composizione, sebbene con

conseguenze ‗mecchaniche‘ distruttive per l‘assenza di rapporti (testi). Un testo metteva

in discussione la comprensibilità dell‘altro‖ (Scritti e colloqui, p. 68). On this repertoire and
the question of intelligibility, see also Wolfgang Dömling, ―Simultane Mehrtextigkeit in
der Motette der Ars Antiqua. Text und Verständlichkeit,‖ in Perspektiven einer Geschichte
abendländischen Hörens, ed. Wolfgang Grazer, Schriften zur musikalischen Hermeneutik 7
(Laaber: Laaber Verlag, 1997), pp. 111-120.
6

―Through the development of polyphony and the complexity of textual

overlappings that was involved, effective possibilities arose to create links
between words or syllables in addition to their linear declamation.‖14 In other
words, the use of a polyphonic texture, based on the principal of imitation,
allowed composers to add a new dimension – both in the literal and figurative
sense of the word – to the purely horizontal dimension of the written and/or
spoken text. In Nono‘s eyes, polyphony was an ideal medium for exploring and
heightening the phonetic and semantic qualities of a text, for combining and
recombining words and sounds, thereby making full use of assonance,
alliteration, and verbal rhythm.15
In order to concretize these rather abstract ideas, Nono presents
several examples. He briefly discusses the jubilant double-choir ―Alleluja‖
conclusion of Giovanni Gabrieli‘s eight-voice motet O magnum mysterium (see
Example 2), which was published in the Concerti […] continenti musica di chiesa,
madrigali, & altro […] libro primo (Venice, 1587). As it happened, Gabrieli‘s
Christmas responsory had appeared in modern edition in 1956 (as part of the
composer‘s Opera omnia), i.e. during the completion of Il canto sospeso and only a
few years before Nono‘s Darmstadt lecture.16 What is more, as we can judge
from Nono‘s personal music collection, he even possessed an LP with a
recording of this motet by the Gregg Smith Singers.17 Nono shows how the
central message of the text is intensified by Gabrieli‘s contrapuntal treatment of
the word ―alleluja.‖ The numerous combinations of syllables that spring from
the polyphonic overlapping of the eight voices create a kind of stereo-effect,

14 ―Con la pratica della polifonia a più voci e con la complessità delle

sovrapposizioni di testi che ne derivava si produssero pure delle possibilità più efficaci
di creare, al di là del canto lineare (testo), rapporti tra parole o sillabe (musica)‖ (Scritti e
colloqui, p. 68).
15 Leonardo da Vinci also discusses the difference between poetry and music from

this point of view, the first being a linear art (―[il poeta] non ha potesta in un medesimo
tempo di dire diverse cose‖), the second having depth and volume. See Bonnie J.
Blackburn, ―Leonardo and Gaffurio on Harmony and the Pulse of Music,‖ in Essays on
Music and Culture in Honor of Herbert Kellman, ed. Barbara Haggh (Paris: Minerve, 2001),
pp. 128-149.
16 Giovanni Gabrieli: Opera omnia, ed. Denis Arnold, Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae 12

(Rome: American Institute of Musicology, 1956), vol. 1, pp. 10-17.

17 The Fondazione Archivio Luigi Nono offers information about the composer‘s

personal library (letters, manuscripts, scores, political pamphlets, etc.) and provides an
extensive bibliography and discography. See <http:www.luiginono.it/en/home>. From
this website, it appears that Nono knew Gabrieli‘s motet from the LP Music for
Antiphonal Choirs by the Gregg Smith Singers, dir. by Vittorio Negri (Verve 6151) and
produced around 1960. This recording is now available on CD as The Glory of Gabrieli.
 KATELIJNE SCHILTZ Luigi Nono and Polyphony 7

Ex. 2. Giovanni Gabrieli, O magnum mysterium, mm. 65-68

which perfectly reflects the sense of the motet‘s final exclamation.18 Gabrieli‘s
treatment of the phonetic material thus plays an active role in conveying the

18 ―Alla fine del mottetto O magnum mysterium di Giovanni Gabrieli, dalla parole

Alleluja si formano attraverso le sovrapposizioni polifoniche delle otto voci numerose

8

semantic layer of the text. Nono then focuses on the first bars of Carlo
Gesualdo‘s Il sol, qual or più splende, which was published in the composer‘s
fourth book of five-voice madrigals (Ferrara, 1596).19 In a few paragraphs, he
presents a detailed and highly original analysis of the beginning of this madrigal
(Example 3). He divides the thematic material into three cells (―Il sol,‖ ―qual or
più,‖ and ―splende‖), which each receive a distinct melodic and rhythmic
treatment. He highlights their phonetic plasticity – especially in the case of
―splende‖ (shine or radiate) – and shows how Gesualdo combined the cells
horizontally (melody), vertically (harmony) and diagonally (imitation) in every
possible way. In so doing, it becomes clear to what extent Gesualdo‘s
polyphonic texture is determined by the sounds of the individual words and
syllables, and how this procedure contributes to the aural perception of the
poetic content in a particular way (Example 3).20

combinazioni di sillabe che esaltano in senso esclamativo e in tutte le direzioni il giubilo

alleluiatico rendendo percettibile musicalmente nella ‗confusione‘ fonetica all‘interno
delle vocali della parola Alleluja, il contenuto semantico della parola originaria con
intensità accresciuta‖ (At the end of Giovanni Gabrielli‘s motet O magnum mysterium,
numerous combinations of syllables are formed from the words of the Alleluja by
means of the polyphonic superimpositions of the eight voices. These combinations
exalt the jubilation of the ―alleluia‖ emphatically and in all directions, making the
semantic content musically perceptible amidst the phonetic ―confusion‖ within the
vowels of the word ―alleluia,‖ such that the original sense of the word only grows.
Trans. Kristie Foell) (Scritti e colloqui, p. 73).
19 Nono probably consulted the modern edition Carlo Gesualdo: Sämtliche Werke, ed.

Wilhelm Weismann (Hamburg: Ugrino Verlag, 1958), vol. 4, pp. 69-74. Between 1950
and 1965 the Quintetto Vocale Italiano (directed by Angelo Ephrikian) issued
Gesualdo‘s six books of five-voice madrigals on a series of LP‘s. In 2000, the ensemble
La Venexiana made a recording of Gesualdo‘s Il sol, qual or più splende as part of the CD
Gesualdo da Venosa. Il quarto libro di madrigali, 1596 (Glossa 920907).
20 ―Queste cellule hanno caratteristiche talmente diverse che la loro sovrappos-

izione non solo non compromette l‘efficacia fonetica delle singole parole e sillabe, ma
dà invece la possibilità di creare rapporti musicalmente costruttivi tra le vocali‖ (These
cells have different characteristics so that their overlap not only does not compromise
the effectiveness of individual phonetic words and syllables, but also enables the
creation of musically constructive relations between the vowels) (see Scritti e colloqui,
p. 78).
 KATELIJNE SCHILTZ Luigi Nono and Polyphony 9

Ex. 3. Carlo Gesualdo, Il sol, qual or più splende, mm. 1-8

Origins of Luigi Nono’s thoughts in 16th-century theory and practice

In the first place, Nono‘s essay about the importance of word-sound for the
conception and construction of a polyphonic fabric offers a remarkable
testimony of how a twentieth-century composer explicitly seeks the roots of his
own practice in music from much earlier periods. But apart from that, his
approach is not merely ―an individual expression of his individual intuition‖ as a
composer. On the contrary, Nono‘s analytical strategies correspond to recent
musicological research about this period. During the past decades, it has
become increasingly clear that analyzing word-music relations in early music
should not only involve aspects such as structure, content and syntax, but can
also include a careful study of the sonic material of a text.21 Such an approach
recognizes the expressive potential of the sheer sound of poetry, and the ability
of music to enhance and project this aspect of the text.

21See especially Jonathan Marcus Miller, ―Word-Sound and Musical Texture in the
Mid-Sixteenth-Century Venetian Madrigal‖ (Ph.D. diss., University of North Carolina,
Chapel Hill, 1991) and Martha Feldman, City Culture and the Madrigal at Venice (Berkeley
and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1995).
10

Above all, Nono‘s ideas are confirmed by the literary and musical
theories of that time. For instance, a major source which had far-reaching
consequences for the development of the Cinquecento Italian madrigal, was
Pietro Bembo‘s famous Prose della volgar lingua (Venice, 1525).22 Bembo offered
careful analyses of Petrarch‘s sonnets, and praised them for their balance
between ―gravità‖ (gravity) and ―piacevolezza‖ (pleasingness). The two main
elements that contributed to this balance were ―numero‖ (rhythm) and ―suono‖
(sound).23 In view of the latter category, Bembo even discussed each individual
letter of the alphabet in terms of its quality, pronunciation, and effect. With his
theories, Bembo deeply influenced the poetic and musical tastes of his and later
generations.24 Indeed, as late as 1592 Cesare Crispolti still pays tribute to
Bembo‘s ideas by subjecting Petrarch‘s poetry to detailed sonic investigations in
his Lezione del sonetto.25 Above all, it is known that in Venice, Ferrara, Florence,
and other cities composers, singers, theorists, and writers gathered in salons and
academies, not only to discuss the poems of Petrarch and the ―Petrarchisti,‖ but
also to perform music set to these texts.26
In music theory from ca. 1540 onwards, too, we find a growing interest
in subjects such as the sonic qualities of a text and pronunciation matters.
Theorists such as Giovanni del Lago, Nicola Vicentino, and Gioseffo Zarlino all
devoted major sections of their treatises to this topic.27 A closer reading of
Zarlino‘s monumental Le istitutioni harmoniche (Venice, 1558) provides extremely
interesting information on a wide range of subjects.28 Scattered throughout the

22 Modern edition by Mario Marti (Padua: Livinia, 1955).

23 See also Dean T. Mace, ―Pietro Bembo and the Literary Origins of the Italian
Madrigal,‖ in The Musical Quarterly 55 (1969), pp. 65-86.
24 Bembo‘s followers include Bernardo Daniello (Della poetica [Venice, 1536]),

Bernardino Tomitano (Ragionamenti della lingua toscana [Venice, 1545-1546]) and

Lodovico Dolce.
25 Online available from Biblioteca italiana: <http://www.bibliotecaitaliana.it>.
26 For a brilliant example of such an interaction between poets, composers, and

musicians, see Martha Feldman, ―The Academy of Domenico Venier, Music‘s Literary
Muse in Mid-Cinquecento Venice,‖ in Renaissance Quarterly 44 (1991), pp. 476-512.
27 For Giovanni del Lago, see A Correspondence of Renaissance Musicians, ed. Bonnie J.

Blackburn, Edward E. Lowinsky, and Clement A. Miller (Oxford: Clarendon Press,

1991). Vicentino‘s L’antica musica ridotta alla moderna prattica (Rome, 1555) is also available
in facsimile (Documenta musicologica, I.17 [Kassel: Bärenreiter, 1959]). For an English
translation, see Maria Rika Maniates, Nicola Vicentino. Ancient Music Adapted to Modern
Practice. Music Theory Translation Series 13 (New Haven and London: Yale University
Press, 1996).
28 Zarlino‘s treatise can be consulted online as part of the project Thesaurus

Musicarum Italicarum: see <http://euromusicology.cs.uu.nl>. For an English trans-

lation of books III and IV, see Guy A. Marco and Claude V. Palisca, The Art of
 KATELIJNE SCHILTZ Luigi Nono and Polyphony 11

different chapters of the treatise, we find evidence about how poets as well as
composers, performers, and listeners are or should be aware of the importance
of the sonic qualities of a text. In Book I, Chapter 2, for example, he expounds
upon the way poets from classical antiquity took extraordinary care in choosing
the appropriate word-sounds for conveying the meaning of their texts. Zarlino‘s
shining example is Virgil, who in his works

adapts the sonority of the verse so skilfully to the writing, that it

seems as if through the sounds of the words he puts the things of
which he speaks in front of our eyes. Where he speaks of love, you
can see he has carefully chosen words that are soft, sweet, graceful,
and agreeable to the ear. When he needs to describe a feat of arms, a
naval battle, a maritime disaster or something similar, where
bloodshed, anger, outrage, displeasure and other odious things come
into play, he chooses hard, harsh, and unpleasant words, so that
hearing and pronouncing them gives you a fright.29

Such a poetic endeavour of course asks for an extremely attentive

listener, who should be equally sensitive to the subtle sonic richness. What is
more, in Book III, Chapter 41 of his Istitutioni harmoniche Zarlino states that only
―purgate orecchie‖ (refined ears) are capable of perceiving and appreciating
poetic euphony and ―varietas.‖ A few chapters later, the role of the singer and
(indirectly) of the composer are addressed: Zarlino spends most of Book III,
Chapter 45 fulminating against some ineradicable evils of music performances.
In addition to the irritating use of bodily gestures and the exaggerated opening
of the mouth, he also condemns the singers‘ disregard of correct pronunciation
and their corrupt rendering of the words. For example, he focuses on ―a
common error of changing the vowel sounds, singing a in place of e, i in place

Counterpoint, Gioseffo Zarlino. Part Three of Le istitutioni harmoniche, 1558. Music Theory
Translation Series 2 (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1968), and Vered
Cohen and Claude V. Palisca, Gioseffo Zarlino. On the Modes. Part Four of Le Istitutioni
harmoniche, 1558. Music Theory in Translation Series 7 (New Haven and London: Yale
University Press, 1983) respectively.
29 ―Accomoda la propia sonorità del verso con tale artificio, che propiamente pare,

che col suono delle parole ponga davanti a gli occhi le cose, delle quali egli viene a
trattare; di modo che dove parla d‘amore, si vede artificiosamente haver scielto alcune
parole soavi, dolci, piacevoli & all‘udito sommamente grate; & dove gli stato dibisogno
cantare un fatto d‘arme, descrivere una pugna navale, una fortuna di mare, o simil cose,
over entrano spargimenti di sangue, ire, sdegni, dispiaceri d‘animo, & ogni cosa odiosa,
hà fatto scielta di parole dure, aspre & dispiacevoli: di modo che nell‘udirle & proferirle
areccano spavento.‖
12

of o, or u in place of one of these.‖30 Indeed, according to Zarlino ―it is truly

reprehensible and shameful for certain oafs in choirs and public chapels as well
as in private chambers to corrupt the words when they should be rendering
them clearly, easily, and accurately‖.31
Aside from being an interesting (and credible) eyewitness account of
problems in performance practice, Zarlino‘s critique echoes the ideas of classical
and humanist authors such as Quintilian and Erasmus, who also spend much
time on explaining to their readers the importance of correct pronunciation and
the details of vocal inflection: see for example several chapters in the former‘s
Institutio oratoria and the latter‘s De recta latini graecique sermonis pronuntiatione. But
Zarlino‘s irritation has additional grounds: with their careless pronunciation the
singers not only violate the poet‘s intentions, but – equally (or even more)
importantly – they also ignore the extraordinary care the composer has taken in
translating these very intentions into music. The theorist illustrates his point
with the first line of a sonnet by Petrarch:

For example, if we hear singers shrieking certain songs – I cannot call

it singing – with such crude tones and grotesque gestures that they
appear to be apes, pronouncing the words ―Aspro core, e selvaggio, e
cruda voglia‖ so that we hear ―Aspra cara, e selvaggia, e croda
vaglia,‖ are we not compelled to laugh? Or more truthfully, who
would not become enraged upon hearing such horrible, ugly
counterfeits?32

With this example, Zarlino offers an interesting lesson in what could go

wrong with vocal performances in his time. In addition to this, one should
know that a six-voice setting of Petrarch‘s sonnet appears in Adrian Willaert‘s

30 ―Uno errore, che si ritrova appresso molti, cioè di non mutar le Lettere vocali
delle parole, come sarebbe dire, proferire A in luogo di E, ne I in luogo di O, overo U in
luogo di una della nominate.‖ On this aspect, see also Katelijne Schiltz, ―Church and
Chamber: The Influence of Acoustics on Composition and Performance Practice,‖ in
Early Music, 31 (2003), pp. 64-78.
31 ―Et è veramente cosa vergognosa, & degna di mille reprensioni, l‘udir cantare alle

volte alcuni goffi, tanto nelli Chori, & nelle Capelle publiche, quanto nelle Camere
private, & proferir le parole corrotte, quando doverebbeno proferirle chiare, espedite, et
senza alcun errore.‖
32 ―Se [per cagione di essempio] udimo alle volte alcuni sgridacchiare (non dirò

cantare) con voci molto sgarbate, & con atti, & modi tanto contrafatti, che veramente
parino Simie, alcuna canzone, & dire, come sarebbe ‗Aspra cara, e salvaggia e croda
vaglia:‘ quando doverebbeno dire; ‗Aspro core, e selvaggio, e cruda voglia:‘ chi non
riderebbe? anzi (per dir meglio) chi non andrebbe in colera; udendo una cosa tanto
contrafatta, tanto brutta, & tanto horrida?‖
 KATELIJNE SCHILTZ Luigi Nono and Polyphony 13

famous Musica nova (Venice, 1559), which means that Zarlino might be referring
to a rather unsuccesful execution of this piece.33 This must have been all the
more shocking, since Willaert‘s monumental collection of Latin motets and
Italian madrigals has often been considered to be the pinnacle of the profound
interaction between text and music in general, and the connection of word-
sound and musical texture in particular.34 Or, to quote the American
musicologist and performer Jonathan Miller: ―Willaert‘s skillful weaving of
vowels, consonants, and accents into a polyphonic fabric reveals a master at
work, one who seems as devoted to the sounds of the poetry he sets as he is to
the poem‘s structural and syntactical sense.‖35 The same goes for the madrigals
of his fellow countryman Cipriano de Rore. Indeed, more than ten years after
Rore‘s death, Giovanni Bardi still praised the composer in his Discorso sopra la
musica antica e’l cantar bene (ca. 1578-1579) because ―straining every fibre of his
genius, he devoted himself to making the verse and the sound of the words
intelligible in his madrigals.‖36
Although scholars have mainly focused on the madrigal, it should be
self-evident that the attention to word-sound can also be discovered in other
genres, such as the Latin motet and mass or the French chanson.37 In many of
these works too, a similar meticulous connection between the organisation of
the polyphonic fabric and word-sounds can be found. Besides, there are plenty
of sixteenth-century sources with analyses of Latin or French poetry and diction
similar to Bembo‘s Prose della volgar lingua. Indeed, nothing prevents composers
from forging the same close bond between word-sound and music in these
genres as they do in their madrigals. After all, a major source of inspiration for
Bembo and many other humanists was the poetry of classical antiquity. What is
more, in his famous Letter to Posterity, Petrarch himself even praises the ―dulcedo

33 Adriani Willaert: Opera omnia, ed. Hermann Zenck and Walter Gerstenberg,
Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae 3 (n.p.: American Institute of Musicology, 1966), vol. 5,
pp. 54-60.
34 The German vocal ensemble Singer Pur (<http://www.singerpur.de>) has made

a recording of the madrigals from Willaert‘s Musica nova (Oehms Classics OC 814). The
madrigals appeared in 2009, i.e. 450 years after Gardano‘s print; the motets are
scheduled for 2011.
35 Miller, Word-Sound and Musical Texture, p. 177. See also the analyses of Willaert‘s

Musica Nova-madrigals in Feldman, City Culture and the Madrigal at Venice, passim.
36 ―Si diede con tutti li nervi dell‘ingegno a far ben intendere il verso, e suono delle

parole.‖ For an analysis of Bardi‘s statement, see especially Stefano La Via, ―Cipriano de
Rore as Reader and as Read: A Literary-Musical Study of Madrigals from Rore‘s Later
Collections (1557-1566)‖ (Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, 1991).
37 See for example Katelijne Schiltz, ―Polyphony and Word-Sound in Adrian

Willaert‘s Laus tibi sacra rubens,‖ in Yearbook of the Alamire Foundation 6 (2008), pp. 61-75.
14

abdita‖ (hidden sweetness) of Biblical texts. Needless to say, the Bible was one
of the major sources of text for motet compositions.
In short, through their searching for common word-sounds and the
careful interweaving of the voices, Renaissance composers were able to create
works that are ―poly-phonic‖ in the true sense of the word. Here again Luigi
Nono hits the nail on the head. Near the end of his analysis of Gesualdo‘s Il sol,
qual or più splende, he writes: ―Through the many repetitions of syllables, words
or phrases, which contrapuntally overlap each other, the listener is submerged
in an incredible richness of combinations, among which the phonetic
constellations have a major musical meaning and impact.‖38 Music thus
becomes a ―pluridimensionale formato da costellazioni di paroli e di fonemi‖
(multidimensional construction of word and sound constellations).

Conclusions

What can Nono‘s views on early music mean for us today? I believe his ideas
can affect both performers and listeners. Now that we know that composers
were so sensitive to the inherent ―musicalità‖ of a text and tried to intensify it
via the polyphonic texture, singers nowadays can also do their share in
communicating this intention to the audience. The singers‘ commitment to the
text should go beyond an understanding of the structure and meaning of the
words, and could also entail a careful study of the sonic patterns and their
musical treatment before practise/rehearsal. A contemporary performance
should be as attentive to the sound of the words and the way they are woven
into the polyphonic fabric as the composer himself had been when writing the
piece. Listeners, too, can only gain from this. They can immerse themselves in
the symbiosis of music and text and enjoy the multidimensional richness of
early music, which can lead to a more sensual appreciation of polyphonic
sonority.
The fact that Nono substantiates his analytical considerations on the
relationship between word-sound and polyphony by scrutinizing madrigals by
two Italian composers undoubtedly reflects his alliance – either consciously or
unconsciously – with his national heritage. As I have shown, similar

38 ―Con numerose ripetizioni che si sovrappongono contrappuntisticamente, viene

presentata all‘ascoltatore una incredibile ricchezza di campi sonori, di efficacia musicale

determinante, basati su vocali‖ (Scritti e colloqui, p. 78). See also Enrico Fubini, ―Musica e
poesia: dalla polifonia alla monodia. Ipotesi per una ricerca,‖ in Ricerche musicali 4 (1980),
pp. 35-45 (p. 40): ―Il madrigale classico del Cinquecento è un organismo che si regge su
una legge di equilibrio perfetto in cui il suono delle parole, il suono di ogni sillaba, viene
armoniosamente potenziato nell‘intreccio delle voci: la parole vale sopratutto per il
suono che ha o che suggerisce al musicista più che per il suo significato semantico.‖
 KATELIJNE SCHILTZ Luigi Nono and Polyphony 15

compositional strategies can be discovered in other genres of that period.

However, it cannot be denied that both Gabrieli and Gesualdo had close
contacts with the fine fleur of the poetic scene of their time – the former in
Venice, the latter in Naples and Ferrara. Indeed, this interdisciplinary exchange
has left unmistakable traces in their respective works. The same goes for Luigi
Nono, for he too regularly collaborated with the leading poets of his time.
Above all, Nono‘s Darmstadt lecture of July 1960 offers an interesting
reflection upon the phenomenon of constants and hidden threads in the history
of music. In his own unparalleled way, Nono has convincingly demonstrated
that there are musical elements and ingredients that transcend the compositional
limits and characteristics of a given period and throw a fascinating light upon
the fundamental aspects of music.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Adriani Willaert: Opera omnia. Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae 3. Edited by

Hermann Zenck et al. American Institute of Musicology, 1950- : n.p.
Blackburn, Bonnie J. ―Leonardo and Gaffurio on Harmony and the Pulse of
Music.‖ In Essays on Music and Culture in Honor of Herbert Kellman. Edited
by Barbara Haggh. Paris: Minerve, 2001: pp. 128-149.
Carlo Gesualdo: Sämtliche Werke. Edited by Wilhelm Weismann. Hamburg: Ugrino
Verlag, 1958.
Claudio Monteverdi: Tutte le opere. Edited by Gian Francesco Malipiero. Vienna:
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A Correspondence of Renaissance Musicians. Edited by Bonnie J. Blackburn, Edward
E. Lowinsky, and Clement A. Miller. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991.
Dömling, Wolfgang. ―Simultane Mehrtextigkeit in der Motette der Ars Antiqua.
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Feldman, Martha. ―The Academy of Domenico Venier, Music‘s Literary Muse
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—. City Culture and the Madrigal at Venice. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University
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Fubini, Enrico. ―Musica e poesia: dalla polifonia alla monodia. Ipotesi per una
ricerca.‖ Ricerche musicali 4 (1980): pp. 35-45.
Gentilucci, Armando. ―Luigi Nonos Chortechnik.‖ In Luigi Nono Texte. Studien
zu seiner Musik. Edited by Jürg Stenzl. Zürich and Freiburg im Breisgau:
Atlantis-Verlag, 1975: pp. 394-408.
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Giovanni Gabrieli: Opera omnia. Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae 12. Edited by Denis
Arnold. Rome: American Institute of Musicology, 1956.
His, Isabelle. ―La Renaissance à défaut d‘Antiquité: Olivier Messiaen analyste du
Printemps de Claude Le Jeune.‖ In “…La musique, de tous les passetemps le
plus beau.” Hommage à Jean-Michel Vaccaro. Edited by François Lesure.
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La Via, Stefano. ―Cipriano de Rore as Reader and as Read: A Literary-Musical
Study of Madrigals from Rore‘s Later Collections (1557-1566).‖ Ph.D.
diss., Princeton University, 1991.
Mace, Dean T. ―Pietro Bembo and the Literary Origins of the Italian Madrigal.‖
The Musical Quarterly 55 (1969): pp. 65-86.
Miller, Jonathan Marcus. ―Word-Sound and Musical Texture in the Mid-
Sixteenth-Century Venetian Madrigal.‖ Ph.D. diss., University of North
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Nono, Luigi. Scritti e colloqui. Collana di studi musicali 35. Edited by Angela Ida
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—. Texte. Studien zu seiner Musik. Edited by Jürg Stenzl. Zürich and Freiburg im
Breisgau: Atlantis Verlag, 1975.
Schiltz, Katelijne. ―Church and Chamber: The Influence of Acoustics on
Composition and Performance Practice,‖ Early Music 31 (2003): pp. 64-
78.
—. ―Polyphony and Word-Sound in Adrian Willaert‘s Laus tibi sacra rubens.‖ In
Yearbook of the Alamire Foundation 6 (2008): pp. 61-75.
Vicentino, Nicola. L’antica musica ridotta alla moderna prattica. Rome, 1555.
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 KATELIJNE SCHILTZ Luigi Nono and Polyphony 17

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by Guy A. Marco and Claude V. Palisca. The Art of Counterpoint, Gioseffo
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ABSTRACT

During a lecture presented in Darmstadt, Luigi Nono offered an analysis of his

La terra e la compagna and Il canto sospeso. He stated that in these pieces the ―multi-
dimensional profusion of expressive and phonetic possibilities‖ had been fully
explored. Although Nono believed that this technique opens ―a world of new
combinatorial possibilities,‖ he was fully aware of the fact that precursors of this
phenomenon emerged in different stages of music history. Nono devoted
particular attention to sixteenth-century polyphony, giving examples of pieces
by Gesualdo and Giovanni Gabrieli and showing not only how the phonetic
material of the words played a crucial role in the organisation of the polyphonic
texture, but also how it complemented and stressed the text‘s semantic content.
His ideas are confirmed by the literary and musical theories of that time. Above
all, these insights can have important consequences for today‘s performance
practice of and listening attitudes towards early music.