Music of the Trecento

Francesco Landini, the most famous composer of the Trecento, playing a portative organ (illustration from the 15th century *Squarcialupi Codex*)

The Trecento was a period of vigorous activity in Italy in the arts, including painting, architecture, literature, and music. The music of the Trecento paralleled the achievements in the other arts in many ways, for example, in pioneering new forms of expression, especially in secular song in the vernacular language, Italian. In these regards, the music of the Trecento may seem more to be a Renaissance phenomenon; however, the predominant musical language was more closely related to that of the late Middle Ages, and musicologists generally classify the Trecento as the end of the medieval era.^[1] Trecento means "three hundred" in Italian but is usually used to refer to the 1300s. However, the greatest flowering of music in the Trecento happened late in the century, and the period is usually extended to include music up to around 1420.^[2]

^ Richard H. Hoppin, Medieval Music. New York, W.W. Norton & Co., 1978. ISBN 0-393-09090-6, pp. 433ff.
^ The series, Polyphonic Music of the Fourteenth Century includes whole volumes which overlap with the series, Early Fifteenth Century Music.

[1] Richard H. Hoppin, Medieval Music. New York, W.W. Norton & Co., 1978. ISBN 0-393-09090-6, pp. 433ff.

[2] The series, Polyphonic Music of the Fourteenth Century includes whole volumes which overlap with the series, Early Fifteenth Century Music.

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