It is an underlying faith in music’s power, indeed, its obligation, to move the affections. This statement culminates the intention of composers during the Baroque era. The concept of moving the affections date back to ancient Greece with the philosophy of Plato, and continued on through the Renaissance. It was not until the Baroque era, however, that the term the Doctrine of the Affections came to fruition.
The Doctrine of the Affections served as a guide to composers during the Baroque era. It was “a revival of the ideas of antiquity.” It provided an understanding of music as a result of reason during the Enlightenment. The theory was based on the fact that music could elicit specific emotions from a listener. As a result, during the Baroque era, composers placed a greater emphasis on music’s ability to evoke these affections from audiences. The Doctrine of the Affections shaped the way music was composed during the Baroque era through the use of affective musical elements such as intervals, keys, and tempos.
The term affection is not synonymous with emotion. Palisca found:
A sixteenth-century poetic critic, Lorenzo Giacomini, defined an affection as “a spiritual movement or operation of the mind in which it is attracted or repelled by an object it has come to know.” He described it as a result of an imbalance in the animal spirits and vapors that flow continually throughout the body.”
Due to the imbalance of the animal spirits and vapors, individuals are then lead to certain emotions. The affections are the rational connection between tones and the soul. Because of this, music had the ability to evoke certain emotional responses.
Studies on how music affected human souls date back to antiquity. The first considerable attempt at an affective psychology was made by Plato. Greek philosophy included four temperaments: sanguine, choleric, melancholic and phlegmatic. These four temperaments governed the physiology of an individual. According to Greek philosophy, individuals are moved to certain affections through a change in balance of the temperaments, where the temperaments themselves correspond to a specific affection. Although all individuals produce each of the four temperaments, an individual’s personality reflects the affection of the temperament that is most dominant. For example, those believed to be sanguine-tempered typically were more loving and joyful. The affections of anger and fury characterized a choleric temperament. Melancholic individuals tended to be sorrowful, while phlegmatic individuals were more peaceful.
René Descartes published his treatise Les passions de l’âme (1649). In it, he detailed a systematic theory of the affections. Descartes said, “passions are actions of both the soul and the body.” Passions are perceptions, feelings, or emotions that are caused and maintained by the movement of animal spirits in what is now known as the pineal gland of the brain. According to Descartes, there are six primitive passions: wonder, love, hate, joy, sadness, and desire. These passions come about as a result of the soul “setting itself to conceive some object,” or what the soul does in response to some influence.
The studies of Descartes impacted composers and musicians of the Baroque era. In an early collaborative work, Compendium musicae, he states on the very first page: “The object of music is sound. The end of music is to delight and stir various feelings within us.” Descartes provides concrete and practical instructions for the affective use of intervals saying: “When representing happy emotions the intervals tend to widen, whereas when the mood is sad they narrow.” Descartes’ Les Passions de l’âme is perhaps “the single most influential philosophical work of the seventeenth century in relation to musical theory and aesthetics.”
Other theorists reflected the views of Descartes. Johann Mattheson was seventeenth-century German composer and theorist who was one of the proponents of the Doctrine of the Affections. Like Descartes, Mattheson wrote about the affective uses of intervals saying:
Joy is an expansion of our vital spirit… this affect is best expressed by large and expanded intervals. Sadness is a contraction of those same subtle parts of our bodies… The narrowest intervals are the most suitable…pride or arrogance: never be too quick or failing, but always ascending… Calmness, free of all extraordinary emotions and is quietly contented within itself. It can be represented nicely and naturally by means of gentle unison passages…
In Baroque music, the choice of key also had affective purposes in stirring emotional responses from listeners. In the Renaissance, the eight church modes were assigned expressive characteristics according to the ethos of the Greek modes. Steffano Vanneus, a music theorist during the time, wrote that each mode had fundamental affection. The first mode was cheerful, the second woeful, the third sharp and harsh, the fourth loving, the fifth moderate, the sixth pious and devoted, the seventh complaining, and the eighth, mild and sweet. In the Renaissance, the ideal was that feelings express, affectus exprimere. In the Baroque, that concept turned into the ideal that feelings move, affectus movere. Therefore, the principal of the Doctrine of the Affections was already known to the Renaissance. According to Palisca, “From the last decades of the sixteenth century the arousal of the affections was considered the principal objective of poetry and music.” The difference being the fundamental application of the method between the eras. The Renaissance favored the affections of restraint and noble simplicity, whereas the Baroque favored the extreme affections such as violent pain all the way to exuberant joy.
According to Mattheson, “keys are one of the musical elements, along with meter, intervals, tempo and rhythm to which composers should pay attention in order to write music affectingly.” He claimed that the affective properties of keys were caused by two elements: the pitch level (higher or lower pitch) and a slight difference in the size of intervals due to unequal temperament systems. Although not very comprehensive, Mattheson’s views reflect the affective ideals in music during the Baroque era.
Jean-Phillipe Rameau was another theorist who studied key signatures and their ability to prompt certain affections. In his Traite de l’harmonie (1722), he outlines the affective uses of keys stating:
The key of either C, D, or A in the major mode is suitable for songs of mirth and joy. Either F or B-flat is appropriate for tempests, furies, and such subjects. Either G or E is right for both tender and happy songs. Grandeur and magnificence can be expressed by the key of either D, A, or E. The minor mode in the key of either d, g, b, or e is apt for sweetness and gentleness. The key of either c or f minor is suitable for gentleness or laments; f or b-flat minor is appropriate for melancholy songs. The other keys are not in general use, and practical application is the best way to learn their properties.
Another contribution of Rameau was his explanation about the use of harmony to instill a certain emotion in the consciousness of the listener. He wrote: “There is no doubt but what harmony is able to excite the passions in us—depending on what chords are used.” He provides two opposing examples created either (1) by preparing a listener for a discord with other cords or (2) by taking them by surprise with no preparation for the discord:
(1) “Sweetness and tenderness are often well-expressed by the prepared dissonance in the minor.”
(2) “Despair and all the passions that bring forth fury or something extraordinary all demand the unprepared dissonance.”
Another theorist during the Baroque was Joachim Quantz. He too believed that different keys had the ability to depict certain affects or passions. David Lasocki studies on Quantz states:
A major key generally depicts the gay, bold, serious, or sublime; a minor key, the
flattering or melancholy (tender). In slow movements, the keys of A minor, C minor, D sharp major, and F minor (G minor is added later) ‘express a melancholy sentiment much better than other minor keys’, whereas ‘the other major and minor keys…are used for pleasing, singing and arioso pieces.’
Even with the differing views on key choice, it is evident that the Doctrine of the Affections governed composers’ choice of keys to stir specific passions and affects.
In addition to use of certain intervals and keys, the deliberate use of certain tempi also played a role in arousing the emotions of listeners. Mattheson describes different tempi saying, “Adagio expresses sadness; lamento, a lament; lento, relief [Erleichterung]; andante, hope; affetuoso, love; allegro, consolation; presto, desire; etc…” Mattheson also goes into detail relating affections to the tempo markings of Baroque dance forms:
The minuet typifies moderate delight, (mässaige Lustigkeit), the gavotte jubilant joy, (jauchzende Freude), the bourée contentment, (Zufriedenheit), etc. The various dance genres were to embody the affective characteristics in much the same way that the temperaments of individuals or stage actors typify a certain affection.