Baroque Music
The Baroque Age followed the Renaissance, lasting until the mid-eighteenth century. This period was witness to large-scale changes in the way music was written and performed.
The patrons who financed Baroque composers considered music a disposable commodity to be listened to and thrown away, usually without being published. Of more than a thousand surviving pieces by Bach, only eight were published in his lifetime.
Previously, music was mostly used to complement lyrics. But Baroque composers found a different approach — they used music directly, to express emotions and tell stories. While Renaissance music stressed polyphony (several competing melodic lines), Baroque music used homophony (chords played under a single melody). Moreover, musicians of the Baroque period were expected to embellish and improvise upon the written parts.
