(It.).
An Italian dance in duple metre popular from the mid-16th century to about 1650; its musical scheme was frequently used as a subject for instrumental variations until the 1680s. The meaning of the term is uncertain. Among the various etymologies proposed in modern times, the most widely accepted suggests a derivation from passo e mezzo (‘a step and a half’), possibly referring to the step pattern of this dance. Mersenne proposed an analogous interpretation in his Harmonie universelle (1636–7), but he also subscribed to other hypotheses, providing an eloquent illustration of the uncertainty that, even in the early 17th century, surrounded the term.
A significant proportion of the pieces labelled ‘passamezzo’ are based on two different but related chord progressions known as the passamezzo antico (or passamezzo per B molle) and the passamezzo moderno (or nuovo, or comune, or passamezzo per B quadro). Although in the extant sources this distinction emerges only in the late 1550s, both types are already clearly defined in earlier examples simply entitled ‘passamezzo’. The most common progression for the passamezzo antico takes the form i–VII–i–V–III–VII–i–V–I, while the moderno usually follows the scheme I–IV–I–V–I–IV–I–V–I. The framework chords are spaced at metrically equal intervals as the music unfolds in two phrases, the first leading to V, the second to I. The basic musical scheme was usually repeated a number of times in succession during a dance. Intermediary harmonies, relating as V or IV–V to I, may precede or follow any framework chord. Ex.1 shows a passamezzo antico for lute published in 1552 by Hans Gerle. Ex.2, from an Italian keyboard manuscript of the early 17th century, illustrates both melodic and chordal variation applied to the opening two framework chords of a passamezzo moderno. According to the Renaissance practice of grouping dances in duple and triple time into pairs or suites, the passamezzo is often followed by one or more triple dances, such as the saltarello, gagliarda or paduana, based on the same chordal scheme. The triple dance and occasionally the passamezzo itself were sometimes provided with smaller units called riprese or ritornellos, which occurred in pairs between repetitions of the main scheme and in longer chains at the end.
The chord progression of the passamezzo antico is virtually identical to that of the Romanesca, with the exception of the opening chord (usually III in the romanesca). This has generated some confusion about the nature of such formulae, confusion also fostered by the fact that there has been a tendency in modern scholarship to equate these genres with their bass progressions. In all probability the passamezzo, like many other Renaissance dances, was defined not by a single chord sequence but by a complex of elements including metric patterns, reference pitches, characteristic melodic and rhythmic gestures and stylistic conventions tied to performance practice. Although deceptively similar in their bass lines, the passamezzo and the romanesca must have differed in other respects, equally vital to the identification of the genre. A clue may be found in Galilei’s Primo libro della prattica del contrapunto (1588–91), where the excited sound of the romanesca is compared with the quiet one of the passamezzo. Other characteristics of the passamezzo include smooth rhythmic motion, suggestive of walking dance steps, and recurring figurations consisting principally of regularly moving scale segments (Silbiger). The analogies between the chord progressions of the passamezzo and the romanesca (progressions partly recognizable in the Folia as well) seem simply to point to a common musical idiom characterized by certain standard sequences which cannot be regarded as exclusive to any single genre.
There is some evidence that the passamezzo was closely related to the pavana. Francisco de Salinas reported that the two terms were confused (‘pavana milanesa, sive passoemezzo vulgo vocatur’, De Musica, 1577), and Arbeau mentioned the passamezzo in his Orchésographie (1588) as a pavana ‘performed less heavily and to a lighter beat’. J.-B. Besard ignored this rhythmic distinction, stating in the preface to his Thesaurus harmonicus (1603) that ‘pavana’ is simply the Italian name for paduana, that is to say passamezzo; he added that most French composers called their passamezzos ‘pavanas’ (‘cum Pavana Italicum nomen nil aliud sit quam Paduana, id est Passemezzo, et plerique Galli non aliter suas passemezas quam pavanas nominent’). The few extant choreographies, which appeared much later than the earliest musical examples, in Fabritio Caroso’s Il ballarino (1581) and Nobiltà di dame (1600) and in Livio Lupi’s Libro di gagliarda, tordiglione, passa e mezzo, canari e passeggi (1607), seem to confirm such a connection. Sutton (p.39) concluded that ‘there is no simple choreography, nor is there any apparent vestige of what may once have been a step or step pattern generic to the passo e mezzo and different from other dances. What is certain is that all ‘passo e mezzo’ choreographies are elaborated variants of the pavana’. Although choreographically similar, the two dances did retain some individual features; and towards the end of the 16th century the passamezzo seems gradually to have superseded the pavana in popularity. The distinction between them probably rested in the music: although the two forms share many features, there are differences, particularly in the overall structure and in the presence of an ostinato bass controlling the harmonic design (see Pavan). The histories of each dance do appear ambiguously intertwined, however. There are examples of pavanas constructed upon the chord progression characteristic of the passamezzo, yet it is not difficult to find passamezzos in which the same progression is altogether absent. Titles such as pavana passamezzo (Claude Gervaise, Sixième livre de danceries, 1555; Antony Holborne, The Cittharn Schoole, 1597) or pavana in passo e mezzo (I-Vnm Ital.IV.1227) further emphasize the indistinctness of the two dances, while at the same time suggesting that the passamezzo and the pavana did indeed differ in subtle ways that encouraged some musicians to create hybrid forms by artfully exploiting their inherent ambiguities.
The passo e mezzo in Vnm Ital.IV.1227 (c1530) is perhaps the earliest extant composition based on the formula of the passamezzo antico. Although the passamezzo developed mainly in Italy, both types appeared in lutebooks published in Nuremberg by Hans Neusidler: the B molle type in 1536, with the curious title ein welscher Tantz Wascha mesa, the B quadro type in 1540 (Passa mesa, ein welscher Tantz). Hundreds of passamezzos in both printed and manuscript sources followed these early examples. Settings and variations for lute include works by Abondante, Domenico Bianchini, Antonio Rotta, Gorzanis, Terzi, Vincenzo Galilei and Simone Molinaro in Italy; Hans Gerle, Wolff Heckel, Matthäus Waissel, Kargel and Reymann in Germany; Adriaenssen, Denss and Le Roy in France and the Low Countries; and Alison and Holborne in England; numerous passamezzos may be found also in Phalèse’s collections. Keyboard examples appear in Gardane’s Intavolatura nova di varie sorti de balli (1551) as well as in works by Ammerbach, Bernhard Schmid (i) and Jacob Paix in Germany; Facoli, G.M. Radino, Valente and Andrea Gabrieli in Italy; Byrd, Morley, Philips and Bull in England; and Sweelinck from the Netherlands. Other 16th-century passamezzos were written for instrumental or vocal ensemble (examples by Bendusi and Mainerio and in the collections of Phalèse and Susato), guitar and cittern. Of particular interest are two manuscript collections from the second half of the 16th century, each containing a cycle of passamezzos composed on the 12 degrees of the chromatic scale. The first, compiled by Gorzanis (D-Mbs Mus.ms.1511a, 1567), contains 24 passamezzos, 12 per b molle and 12 per b quadro, paired with a saltarello. The second, completed by Vincenzo Galilei in 1584 (I-Fn Anteriori di Galilei, 6), extends the entire cycle to 24 passamezzo–romanesca–saltarello suites, 12 with a passamezzo antico and 12 with a passamezzo moderno, arranged according to the ascending series of semitones.
Passamezzos from the 17th century include works by Besard for lute, Kapsberger for chitarrone, Ercole Pasquini, Picchi, Scheidt, Martino Pesenti and Bernardo Storace for keyboard instruments, Biagio Marini, Gasparo Zanetti and G.B. Vitali for chamber ensemble, and a rare example for voices and instruments by Giovanni Valentini (1621). Most of these 16th- and 17th-century examples consist of sets of continuous variations on one of the harmonic grounds given above; many are very lengthy compositions. In addition to these variation forms, almost all the Italian guitar tablatures from the first half of the 17th century contain single statements of the passamezzo ground notated in the form of chord-strumming formulae. Several 16th-century passamezzos are not based on the musical structures of the antico and moderno types. Some bear descriptive names, such as passamezzo della bataglia, ala bolognese, de Bruynswick, de hautbois, du roy, la paganina. Other titles possibly refer to pre-existing popular tunes or vocal compositions, often French chansons, that provided the thematic material for the passamezzo. Examples are pas’e mezo sopra una canzon francese, pass’e mezo sopra Je presigne, pas’e mezo detto Loisa core per el mondo and pass’e mezo sopra Gie vo deser d’un bois ah in Gorzanis’s Opera nova de lauto (c1575–8), passo e mezo deto Caro fier homo in Gorzanis’s Secondo libro de intabulatura di liuto (1562), Gitene Ninfe, pass’e mezo a 5 in Orazio Vecchi’s Selva di varia ricreatione (1590), and passemezo Il est jour and passamezo Tuti porti core mio in Viaera’s Nova et elegantissima in cythara ludenda carmina (1564). That such pieces were identified as passamezzos reinforces the hypothesis that other characteristic genre markings were as important to the definition of the genre as the chord progression traditionally associated with it. By the 1560s, however, an increasing number of passamezzos display the familiar chordal schemes, and the great popularity of the dance no doubt helped in consolidating a dual system of modality in Italian popular music.
In English sources the names ‘passemeasure’, ‘passingmeasure’, ‘passy-measures’ or ‘passemeasure(s) pavan’ are usually associated with the chord progression of the passamezzo antico, whereas compositions entitled ‘quadro pavan’ or ‘quadran(t) pavan’ tend to exhibit the scheme typical of the passamezzo moderno (a chronological list of settings of both the ‘passingmeasure’ and the ‘quadro pavan’ may be found in Ward). The terms ‘quadro’ and ‘quadran(t)’, which appear from the 1570s, have been explained as a corruption of B quadratum, referring to the chord progression in the major mode underlying both the passamezzo per B quadro and the quadro pavan. However, it remains uncertain whether the quadro pavan may simply be equated with the passamezzo moderno. It is more likely that the English quadro pavan, like its continental counterpart, flourished in a stylistic climate that thrived on the ambivalence between the passamezzo and the pavana.
BrownI
MGG2 (S. Dahms)
M. Dolmetsch: Dances of Spain and Italy from 1400 to 1600 (London, 1954)
I. Horsley: ‘The 16th-Century Variation: a New Historical Survey’, JAMS, xii (1959), 118–32
W. Apel: Geschichte der Orgel- und Klaviermusik bis 1700 (Kassel, 1967; Eng. trans., rev., 1972)
K.H. Taubert: Höfische Tänze, ihre Geschichte und Choreographie (Mainz, 1968)
S.V. Martin: The Passamezzo in Germany in the Sixteenth Century (diss., U. of North Carolina, 1974)
E. Apfel: Entwurf eines Verzeichnisses aller Ostinato-Stücke zu Grundlagen einer Geschichte der Satztechnik, iii: Untersuchungen zur Entstehung unf Frühgeschichte des Ostinato in der komponierten Mehrstimmigkeit (Saarbrücken, 1977)
A. Silbiger: Italian Manuscript Sources of the 17th Century Keyboard Music (Ann Arbor, 1980), 39–44
J. Sutton and F.M. Walker, eds.: Fabritio Caroso: Nobiltà di Dame (Oxford, 1986)
J.M. Ward: Music for Elizabethan Lutes (Oxford, 1992)
GIUSEPPE GERBINO, ALEXANDER SILBIGER