Masqued Mysteries Unmasked: Early Modem Music Theater and Its Pythagorean Subtext. (Historical Topics).

Masqued Mysteries Unmasked: Early Modem Music Theater and Its Pythagorean Subtext. By Kristin Rygg. (Interplay, 1.) Hillsdale, N.Y.: Pendragon Press, 2000. [xxxix, 267 p. ISBN 0-945193-035-0. $45.]

Kristin Rygg examines Pythagorean influences in the English masque and the French ballet de cour during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. While much previous scholarship focused on these works and their music through the disciplines of history, art history, or musicology, often through the recovery and analysis of primary sources or the interpretive lens of political allegory, Rygg's book can more readily be categorized as part of the history of ideas. Masqued Mysteries Unmasked is the first volume in a new series by Pendragon Press, Interplay, which promises to focus on the interaction among the arts and various disciplines.

In her introduction, Rygg states, "The overriding intention of this study has been to acquire an understanding of the phenomenon of the English court masque, to grasp more of its meaning. I believe that this book will show that the genre was quintessentially music theater, in which the various forms of music were not only integral and indispensable parts of its form, but where the existence and the powers of music represent the very foundation out of which this theatrical form grew" (p. xv). Later in the introduction, Rygg explains that the structure of her book was chosen to attempt to replicate her sense of discovery regarding Pythagorean philosophy and its relation to the series of "Jonsonian" masques (so-called after poet and playwright Ben Jonson, the most dominant producer of masque texts) enacted at the English court during the first decades of the seventeenth century.

Following the introduction, Rygg begins with a brief overview of the masque and ballet de cour. The largest space, however, is given to the summarization of Pythagorean ideas and ideals, entitled "Pythagorean Mysteries," the central section of the book. Here, in addition to the classical references she compiles, Rygg associates the work of Renaissance scholars and theorists, such as Marsilio Ficino, with a "Pythagorean-Platonic" tradition, emphasizing the use of initiation rites and the continuation of an esoteric legacy. The final section returns, first to the ballet de cour and then to the masque, summarizing suggestively Pythagorean references in the published texts overall and discussing a couple of works in greater detail. A brief conclusion balances the opening introduction. This overall structure creates a beautifully symmetric arch form, anchored by the opening and closing sections on the English masque; however, I feel it does not always serve the reader as well as it might.

Rygg's stylistic habit of asking openended questions for which the reader must then wait until some later section to read her answer can sometimes be frustrating, rather than enticing. See, for example, the final sentences of "The Crane Mystery" (pp. 41-44): "... why is the early ballet, so clearly related to official occasions and even political situations, also described as divine? It seems that we may truly speak of a mystery of cranes, and this in turn leads us to ask: in what way is the ballet divine?" This is immediately followed by a separate subsection on the founding of the Academie de Poesie et de Musique. Rygg's Pythagorean explanation of the dancing cranes, "The Crane Mystery Unveiled," comes much later (pp. 165-67). Although Rygg states her study began with her interest in the English masque, the masque actually receives less space in her work than the ballet de cour, while the central section, "Pythagorean Mysteries," is substantially longer than any of the others.

One of the difficulties I encountered while reading Rygg's book was determining the intended audience. In her introduction, Rygg states that she wishes her work to be accessible to readers who are not familiar with masques or ballet de cour. Yet a useful discussion of harmonia (harmony) as understood by classical and Renaissance philosophers and its distinct differences from the most common modern understanding ...