Stile antico has been associated with composers of the high
Baroque and early
Classical periods of music, in which composers used controlled dissonance and
modal effects and avoided overtly instrumental textures and lavish ornamentation, to imitate the compositional style of the late
Renaissance.
Stile antico was deemed appropriate in the conservative confines of
church music, or as a compositional exercise as in
J. J. Fux's
Gradus Ad Parnassum (1725), the classic textbook on strict
counterpoint. Much of the music associated with this style looks to the music of
Palestrina as a model. The term
prima pratica was first used during the conflict between
Giovanni Artusi and
Claudio Monteverdi about the new musical style. For 18th-century composers such as
Johann Sebastian Bach, can refer to music composed as late as the early years of that century (e.g. by
Antonio Lotti,
Pietro Torri), a style Bach would imitate more frequently in his later compositions (starting in the 1730s, up to his death in 1750).
Monteverdi's era In the early Baroque
Claudio Monteverdi and his
brother coined the term
prima pratica to refer to the older style of Palestrina, and
seconda pratica to refer to Monteverdi's music. At first,
prima pratica referred only to the style of approaching and leaving
dissonances. In his ''Seconda parte dell'Artusi
(1603), Giovanni Artusi writes about the new style of dissonances, referring specifically to the practice of not properly preparing dissonances (see Counterpoint), and rising after a flattened note or descending after a sharpened note. In another book, his L'Artusi, overo Delle imperfettioni della moderna musica'' (1600) ("The Artusi, or imperfections of modern music") Artusi had also attacked Monteverdi specifically, using examples from his madrigal "Cruda Amarilli" to discredit the new style.
Late Baroque For 18th-century composers such as
Bach, can refer to music composed as late as the early years of that century, for example by
Antonio Lotti and
Pietro Torri. Bach's interest in this style grew in the 1730s, and in the last two decades of his life (1730s–1740s) he would write in this style more frequently, leading to an outspoken style shift in this composer's work around 1740.
Classical era Romantic era ==References==