Bartolomé Ramos de Pareja (ca. 1440 – 1522) was a

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas **Spanish cuisine **Spanish history **Spanish culture ...

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

music theorist Music theory is the study of theoretical frameworks for understanding the practices and possibilities of music. '' The Oxford Companion to Music'' describes three interrelated uses of the term "music theory": The first is the " rudiments", that ...

, and

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

. His only surviving work is the

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

treatise ''Musica practica''. By his own testimony at the end of his ''Musica practica'', Ramos de Pareja was born in Baeza, possibly around 1440. Most of the biographical details of his life must be culled from this treatise. He says that he was a student of Juan de Monte and that he obtained the chair of music at the

University of Salamanca The University of Salamanca () is a public university, public research university in Salamanca, Spain. Founded in 1218 by Alfonso IX of León, King Alfonso IX, it is the oldest university in the Hispanic world and the fourth oldest in the ...

for his commentaries on the works of

Boethius Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known simply as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480–524 AD), was a Roman Roman Senate, senator, Roman consul, consul, ''magister officiorum'', polymath, historian, and philosopher of the Early Middl ...

(''cum Boetium in musica legeremus''). At Salamanca he had many debates with Pedro de Osma concerning his musical theories. In 1482, when he published his ''Musica'', he revolutionarily proposed a new, five-limit division of the

monochord A monochord, also known as sonometer (see below), is an ancient musical and scientific laboratory instrument, involving one (mono-) string ( chord). The term ''monochord'' is sometimes used as the class-name for any musical stringed instrument ...

, breaking from the

Pythagorean system Numerology (known before the 20th century as arithmancy) is the belief in an occult, divine or mystical relationship between a number and one or more coinciding events. It is also the study of the numerical value, via an alphanumeric system, ...

that had dominated the medieval ''

ars antiqua ''Ars antiqua'', also called ''ars veterum'' or ''ars vetus'', is a term used by modern scholars to refer to the Medieval music of Europe during the High Middle Ages, between approximately 1170 and 1310. This covers the period of the Notre-Dam ...

'' through Boethius and

Guido of Arezzo Guido of Arezzo (; – after 1033) was an Italian music theorist and pedagogue of High medieval music. A Benedictine monk, he is regarded as the inventor—or by some, developer—of the modern Staff (music), staff notation that had a massive ...

. This system of

musical tuning In music, there are two common meanings for tuning: * #Tuning practice, Tuning practice, the act of tuning an instrument or voice. * #Tuning systems, Tuning systems, the various systems of Pitch (music), pitches used to tune an instrument, and ...

yielded

consonant In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract, except for the h sound, which is pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Examples are and pronou ...

perfect fourth A fourth is a interval (music), musical interval encompassing four staff positions in the music notation of Western culture, and a perfect fourth () is the fourth spanning five semitones (half steps, or half tones). For example, the ascending int ...

s and fifths, but the thirds and sixths were rough.Donald Jay Grout and Claude V. Palisca (2001), ''A History of Western Music'', 6th ed. (New York: W. W. Norton & Co, ), p. 148. Ramos de Pareja's new division was only slowly accepted. Afterwards he worked in

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

, primarily at

Bologna Bologna ( , , ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in northern Italy. It is the List of cities in Italy, seventh most populous city in Italy, with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nationalities. Its M ...

, where his theories engendered serious controversy, even polemics, from conservatives such as Franchino Gaffurio. After a long stay there he moved to

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

, where he died shortly after 1521. Ramos de Pareja sought to heal the divide between music in theory and in practice. To this end he sought to render the dissonant thirds and sixths consonant. He proposed the intervals 5/4, 6/5, 5/3, and 8/5 for the division of the monochord, subsequently accepted universally. Less successful was his attempt to replace hexachordal notation with a system of eight syllables denoting the eight sounds of a

diatonic scale In music theory a diatonic scale is a heptatonic scale, heptatonic (seven-note) scale that includes five whole steps (whole tones) and two half steps (semitones) in each octave, in which the two half steps are separated from each other by eith ...

: ''psal-li-tur-per-vo-ces-is-tas''. The ''Musica practica'' also contains interesting commentary on

mensural notation Mensural notation is the musical notation system used for polyphony, polyphonic European vocal music from the late 13th century until the early 17th century. The term "mensural" refers to the ability of this system to describe precisely measur ...

, chromatic alterations, examples of

counterpoint In music theory, counterpoint is the relationship of two or more simultaneous musical lines (also called voices) that are harmonically dependent on each other, yet independent in rhythm and melodic contour. The term originates from the Latin ...

musical instruments A musical instrument is a device created or adapted to make musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can be considered a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument. A person who pl ...

, and the division of music and its effects. Ramos de Pareja was the first theorist to label the method now known as the

Guidonian hand The Guidonian hand was a mnemonic device used to assist singers in learning to sight reading, sight-sing. Some form of the device may have been used by Guido of Arezzo, a medieval music theory, music theorist who wrote a number of treatises, incl ...

the ''manus Guidonis''; prior to him it was called the ''manus musicalis''. He chose the title ''Musica practica'' to emphasise the practical rather than the theoretical/mathematical component of music. Throughout Ramos de Pareja alludes to his own compositions, though few survive.

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ramos De Pareja, Bartolome 1440s births 1522 deaths Spanish music theorists Spanish composers 15th-century Spanish mathematicians University of Salamanca alumni Academic staff of the University of Salamanca