All Africa House

43 Stanley Road - Middle Campus - University of Cape Town 

Rondebosch - 7701 - South Africa

10th of December 2025

Time: 19:30 - 20:00

Speaker: Francesco Russo

Title: An Algorithmic Approach to the Madrigals of Gesualdo da Venosa

Affiliation: University of Camerino, Camerino, Italy

Abstract: The algorithmic music is a proper field of study in many schools of music around the globe, but is experiencing rapid developments in the times of the artificial intelligence (AI) and of the topological data analysis (TDA).  However standard methods, which do not involve AI and TDA, can still provide interesting perspectives, in order to understand the logic of composition of a melody.   After all, Counterpoint and Harmony are largely studied in the schools of music since they are  at the origin of the logic of composition of several vocal forms and instrumental forms in classical music. 

The Italian vocal tradition is well-established in the History of the Western Music and there were some particular vocal forms (the madrigals), which were common in the Renaissance and  influenced many Baroque dances,  the Empfindsamer Stil and the Italian Opera.  The madrigals are very interesting in terms of Harmony and Counterpoint and may be analyzed through an algorithmic approach, that is, with a language which is naturally closer to that of mathematics and of physics. More precisely it is possible to simulate the Madrigal n.1 of the Book III of Gesualdo da Venosa by means of a standard software of electronic composition and compare its structure with a Canon of Johan Sebastian Bach (both of them contain what is called an ``imitation'' in the musical language). The choice of the madrigals of Gesualdo is due to the fact that this composer (along with Claudio Monteverdi) is generally considered one of the ``fathers'' of the madrigal; in other words, Gesualdo and Monteverdi defined the rules to write madrigals.

The main idea of this talk is to identify symmetries in a music score and rephrase them via translations and rotations of the usual plane, finding that this mathematical framework can be useful to recognize better the process of construction of the melody.

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Time: 20:00 - 21:30   A refreshment is offered by the Consul of Italy in Cape Town (Dr. Giulio Mignacca)

                                                and by the  Science and Technology Attache’ of the Embassy of Italy in South Africa (Prof. Luca Tiano)

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