During the Renaissance, musicians became increasingly aware of the possibilities of purely instrumental music, as opposed to the use of instruments as mere accompaniment for voices. Popular instruments of this period were woodwinds (shawm, krummhorn, oboe, and recorders of various sizes); strings (the viol family, which is the predecessor of the violin family, and the lute); brass (cornet, trumpet, and trombone); percussion, and keyboard instruments (organ, virginal, harpsichord, and clavichord).

Voices, woodwind, string, and percussion instruments are mixed in the humorous piece Rodrigo Martinez, by an unknown Spanish composer.

Keyboard instruments

William Byrd (1543-1623)

The greatest English composer of his generation, comparable in stature to his most distinguished continental contemporaries, William Byrd was a versatile composer. Although remaining a Catholic, loyalty that cost him considerable trouble in times of persecution in England, he served as a member of the Chapel Royal, providing music for the liturgy of the Church of England and, on a more private scale, for his fellow-Catholics.

Byrd was well known as a keyboard-player. He wrote a wealth of music for the virginal, including fantasias, pavans, and galliards, the fashionable paired dances of the time, and song variations. Qui passe is a virginal piece that showcases the composer's remarkable compositional skill.

The Lute

Instrumental Ensembles

In the Renaissance period, instrumental ensembles were called consorts. Very often, a consort consisted of instruments from the same family. For example, there were consorts of recorders, consorts of viols, etc. Galliard a 5, by John Dowland (1563-1626), exemplifies a string consort.

Still, most instrumental music was created for dancing, a popular activity during the Renaissance. The types of dances, which varied from region to region, included the galliard, allemande, courante, passamezzo, saltarello, and the pavan. Each dance has its own distinctive rhythmic structure or pattern.

John Dowland (1563-1626)

Tablature Notation

Even though notation for voices had improved considerably since 1300, Renaissance methods of notation for instruments were still in their infancy. Some instruments, such as the lute, used tablature, a shortcut method of writing notes that could not be transferred to another instrument. It told the performer little about the musical construction of the piece, only where to put their fingers. Tablature for the guitar is still used today, and may be found in print and at numerous sites on the Internet.

Renaissance composers did not generally specify which instruments were to be used on a particular piece. Often, the only distinction noted was between loud instruments for outdoor performances and soft ones for indoors.

New instrumental forms emerged, such as the ricercare and the canzona, which featured compositional techniques that, until then, had only been used in vocal music. Both forms were patterned on vocal forms, but used improvisation and instrumental embellishment.

Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625)

Examples for Renaissance Period Listening Test