"Whole Meaning Lies in the Words"

"'Uncle' sang as peasants sing, with the full and naive conviction that the whole meaning of a song lies in the words, that the tune comes of itself and exists only to give measure to the verse, apart from which it is nothing. Consequently this unconsidered tune, like the song of a bird, had an extraordinary charm." (Tolstoy, War and Peace.)

Live Performance and Praetorius' Polychorality

"Praetorius' music stems from a tradition of congregational involvement which is at the core of Lutheranism. Although his output includes some of the most elaborate sacred repertoire of the time, most of it is skilfully written to allow for the inclusion of the various musical groups that took part in music within the church: town waits, school children, the Collegium Musicum of amateur musicians, and the professional Kantorei. ...In addtion, Praetorius offers advice regarding the displacement of the musicians, who were frequently positioned around the church, especially in galleries. This basic polychorality allows the music to envelop the congregation in the act of worship." - Paul McCreesh and Robin A. Leaver

Schoenberg on Emancipation and History

"The procedure [of the "atonal" school] is based upon my theory of 'the emancipation of the dissonance.' Dissonances, according to this theory, are merely more remote consonances in the series of overtones. Though the resemblance of the more remote overtones to the fundamental tone gradually diminishes, their comprehensibility is equal to the comprehensibility of the consonances. Thus to the ear of today their sense-interrupting effect has disappeared. Their emancipation is as justified as the emancipation of the minor third was in former times."

(Arnold Schoenberg, Structural Functions of Harmony, from "Apollonian Evaluation of a Dionysian Epoch".)

Michael Praetorius

Schoenberg on Pre-Bach

"To base the teaching of counterpoint on Palestrina is as stupid as to base the teaching of medicine on Aesculapius. Nothing could be more remote from contemporary ideas, structurally and ideologically, than the style of this composer. Besides, his contrapuntal technique...does not demonstrate the more difficult problems and their solutions discovered only shortly after him." (Some Aspect of Counterpoint in Selected Works of Arnold Schoenberg, Boris William Pillin.)

It may be chronological snobbery, but it's an excellent example of a common, understated attitude amongst academia of (at least) the early 20th century toward Renaissance polyphony.