Three topics that are of defining interest to our world today are democracy, individualism, and psychology. These did not emerge overnight. Reflect on what you have learned about music history so far in this course (Middle Ages to the Age of Enlightenment) and choose the statement below that best illustrates, in the world of music, the emergence of democracy, individualism, and psychology.
A. In the Middle Ages everyone went to church for free. By the eighteenth century, people had to buy tickets to attend concerts and operas. The ticket prices were so expensive that the people became angry, sparking revolutions.
B. Near the end of the Middle Ages, composers began to sign their names to their scores, to claim individual authorship. By the year 1800, some composers and performers were self-made celebrities, popular with the middle class for their performances and published scores. They understood what the people wanted in musical expression and style.
C. The advent of humanism in the Renaissance created a new interest in the human species. But people became so depressed by what they learned about themselves that, seeing no hope for the future, they wasted their money at casinos, and Mozart wrote a symphony in a minor key about death.
D. The advent of humanism in the Renaissance created a new interest in the human species. This new interest soon focused on human emotions and moods (an early interest in psychology), which led to the Doctrine of Affections in music. Although psychology has continued to develop since then, music lost its ability to express human emotions in the Age of Enlightenment, when the strictures of Classical form were imposed on music.
