Music plays a fundamental role in societies and cultures around the world between ca. 300-ca. 1700. Closely related to mathematics, it is a theoretical discipline seeking to understand proportion, harmonies, and the mathematical music of the cosmos. It is also an embodied practice using voices and varied instruments to create sensory experiences to please human audiences as well as transcendent ones in spaces secular and religious. As a discipline focused on harmony and dissonance, music also provided apt metaphors for other dimensions of medieval life such as canon law.
Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Carleton has a long history of supporting early music in collaboration with the Music Department. After coming to the College in 1974, the late professor emeritus Steven Kelly founded the ensemble Carleton Pro Musica in the 1970s which continued until the mid-2000s, and MARS has continued to invite artists and groups to campus as well as facilitate students, faculty, and staff attending area early music concerts.
The College is fortunate to own an extensive library of early instruments (pictures of which may be viewed here), and we are pleased that students continue to pursue early music and training on early instruments with Dr. Moira Hill and Janean Hall; the Carleton choir, under the direction of Matthew Olson, regularly includes early vocal pieces in its repetoire. With Professor Yaron Klein, students may learn oud and receive an introduction to musical traditions in the Arab world more broadly.