The ''ballo'' was an Italian dance form during the fifteenth century, most noted for its frequent changes of tempo and meter. The name ''ballo'' has its origin in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

''ballō'', ''ballāre'', meaning "to dance", which in turn comes from the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

"βαλλίζω" (''ballizō''), "to dance, to jump about". In

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...

there is the

Greek dance Greek dance (''choros'') is a very old tradition, being referred to by authors such as Plato, Aristotle, Plutarch and Lucian. There are different styles and interpretations from all of the islands and surrounding mainland areas. Each region forme ...

named

Ballos The Ballos ( el, Μπάλος) is a Greek folk dance and a form of sirtos. There are also different versions in other Balkan countries. The Ballos is of Greek origin, with ancient Greek elements. The name originates in the Italian ''ballo'' ...

Renaissance

During the

Quattrocento The cultural and artistic events of Italy during the period 1400 to 1499 are collectively referred to as the Quattrocento (, , ) from the Italian word for the number 400, in turn from , which is Italian for the year 1400. The Quattrocento encom ...

''balli'' were written by various composers, primarily the dance masters

Domenico da Piacenza Domenico da Piacenza (c. 1400 – c. 1470), also known as Domenico da Ferrara, was an Italian Renaissance dancing master. He became a very popular teacher with his students – most notably Antonio Cornazzano and Guglielmo Ebreo da Pesaro – who b ...

and

Guglielmo Ebreo da Pesaro Guglielmo Ebreo da Pesaro (c. 1420 – c. 1484) was a Jewish Italian dancer and dancing master at some of the most influential courts in Renaissance Italy, including Naples, Urbino, Milan, and Ferrara. His byname ''wikt:ebreo, Ebreo'' means s ...

, who also wrote treatises including choreographies to their works. Domenico wrote of the balli as dealing with four ''misure'': * The bassadanza, from the

basse danse The ''basse danse'', or "low dance", was a popular court dance in the 15th and early 16th centuries, especially at the Burgundian court. The word ''basse'' describes the nature of the dance, in which partners move quietly and gracefully in a s ...

, consisting of what would now be labeled as a slow or * The quadernaria, one-sixth faster than the Bassadanza * The

saltarello The ''saltarello'' is a musical dance originally from Italy. The first mention of it is in Add MS 29987, a late-fourteenth- or early fifteenth-century manuscript of Tuscan origin, now in the British Library. It was usually played in a fast tr ...

, two-sixths faster than the Bassadanza * The

piva Piva may refer to: * Piva (river), a river in Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina * Piva, Montenegro, a region in Montenegro and tribe * Piva River, Bougainville, Papua New Guinea * Piva Trail, Bougainville, Papua New Guinea ** Battle for Piva Tr ...

, twice as fast as the Bassadanza

Baroque

The

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...

dance should be distinguished from the early

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

ballo, which was enlarged to include vocal numbers by such composers as

Monteverdi Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi (baptized 15 May 1567 – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, choirmaster and string player. A composer of both secular and sacred music, and a pioneer in the development of opera, he is considered ...

(''

Il ballo delle ingrate ''Il ballo delle ingrate'' (''The Ballet of the Female Ingrates'') is a semi-dramatic ballet by the Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi set to a libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini. It was first performed in Mantua on Wednesday, 4 June 1608 as part of t ...

''), and

Francesco Lambardi Francesco Lambardi (1587–1642) was a Neapolitan Baroque composer who participated in the staging of ''feste a ballo'' with Giovanni Maria Trabaci. He was born in Naples. Recordings *''Canto d'Amore'' on ''Festa teatrale'', Thomas Hengelbr ...

(''Una festa a ballo'').

References

External links

The 15th Century "balli" Tunes: A Look

Italian dances Renaissance dance {{medieval-music-stub

Renaissance

Baroque

See also

References

Further reading

External links