2.2.1: Introduction & Historical Context

A Changing View of the World

Science

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Scientific discoveries transformed how Europeans understood nature and the universe. Johannes Kepler used astronomical observations to conclude that planets travel around the sun in elliptical rather than perfectly circular orbits. William Harvey’s anatomical research described the circulation of blood through the body.

Later in the century, Isaac Newton developed major ideas concerning motion and universal gravitation. These discoveries strengthened a growing confidence that the physical world could be investigated through observation, mathematics, and reason.

Philosophy and the Enlightenment

René Descartes explored questions of knowledge, certainty, the relationship between mind and body, and the classification of human emotions. These interests paralleled a growing fascination among Baroque artists and musicians with the ability of art to produce powerful emotional responses.

John Locke became an important figure in Enlightenment philosophy. His writings emphasized natural rights, obligations of government toward citizens, and limits on political authority. Such ideas contributed to changing European understandings of the individual and the state.

Michelangelo and Bernini: Two Davids

Compare Michelangelo’s Renaissance David (1501–1504) with Bernini’s Baroque David (1623–1624). Michelangelo presents the figure before action: upright, balanced, and apparently absorbed in thought. Bernini instead captures a fleeting instant of physical action, with David twisting his body as he prepares to release the sling.

The contrast provides a useful visual analogy for Baroque music. Rather than avoiding order or structure, Baroque artists often used structure to intensify movement, tension, contrast, and emotional expression.

Art, Architecture, and Power

Elaborate architecture and formal gardens also communicated political power. In France, highly ordered gardens used geometry, symmetry, and enormous scale to suggest human control over nature. Such displays became closely associated with royal prestige and absolutist government.

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Literature and the Theater of Emotion

Baroque-era literature frequently explored dramatic conflicts and intense human emotions. William Shakespeare’s plays continued to influence composers, and works such as Hamlet later became sources for opera and other musical adaptations.

Other important writers included Miguel de Cervantes, whose Don Quixote was published beginning in 1605; Jean Racine, known for psychologically intense tragedies; John Milton, author of Paradise Lost; John Dryden, whose theatrical works sometimes incorporated music by Henry Purcell; and Jonathan Swift, author of Gulliver’s Travels.

This fascination with drama and emotional conflict has a direct musical parallel. During the Baroque period, genres such as opera and oratorio made storytelling, theatricality, and emotional expression central musical concerns.

Absolutism and Patronage

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Nation-states such as France and England developed into major European powers. Absolute monarchs accumulated wealth and authority and displayed both through architecture, ceremony, music, and the arts. Patronage therefore remained an important source of employment for composers and performers.

Religion

The religious divisions created during the Reformation continued to shape European music. Protestantism became firmly established across much of northern Europe. Johann Sebastian Bach, for example, spent his career in Lutheran Germany and composed a large repertory of music for Lutheran worship.

Colonialism and Global Trade

European colonial expansion accelerated during the seventeenth century. France and England established colonies in North America, while expanding trade networks connected Europe more intensely with Africa, Asia, and the Americas. These systems generated enormous wealth while also depending heavily on conquest, displacement, and the transatlantic slave trade.

Events including the English settlement at Plymouth (1620), the establishment of Boston (1630), and the founding of Harvard College (1636) occurred within this larger process of colonization and expansion.