The Italian Canzona and Its Migration North

Abstract

ABSTRACT The birth of the Italian canzona occurred at about the same time as Petrucci’s first printing of music by moveable type at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Initially the canzona involved the intabulation of secular French chansons, but it soon became an independent musical genre. The factors that led to the spread of the canzona genre throughout Europe included the wide dissemination of Frescobaldi’s Fiori Musicali, the regular pilgrimages by young musicians to study in Italy, and the spread of Italian musicians throughout European courts and churches during the late Renaissance and early Baroque periods. This document compares the development and characteristics of the canzona in the Venetian school with the Neapolitan school in a period from 1523 to about 1700. It also examines the ways in which northern European composers embraced the canzona while adapting to the requirements of producing both secular concert works and liturgical music.