Seconda pratica, Italian for "second practice", is the counterpart to prima pratica and is sometimes referred to as Stile moderno. The term "Seconda pratica" first appeared in 1603 in Giovanni Artusi's book ''Seconda Parte dell'Artusi, overo Delle imperfettioni della moderna musica'' (''The Second Part of The Artusi, or, Imperfections of Modern Music''), where it is attributed to a certain L'Ottuso Accademico. In the first part of ''The Artusi'' (1600), Artusi had severely criticized several unpublished madrigals of

Claudio Monteverdi Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi (baptized 15 May 1567 – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, choirmaster and string player. A composer of both secular and sacred music, and a pioneer in the development of opera, he is considered ...

. In the second part of this work, L'Ottuso Accademico, whose identity is unknown, defends Monteverdi and others "who have embraced this new second practice". Monteverdi adopted the term to distance some of his music from that of e.g. Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina and Gioseffo Zarlino and to describe early music of the Baroque period which encouraged more freedom from the rigorous limitations of dissonances and counterpoint characteristic of the prima pratica. ''Stile moderno'' was coined as an expression by Giulio Caccini in his 1602 work ''

Le nuove musiche ''Le nuove musiche'' ("The New Musics") is a collection of monody, monodies and songs for solo voice and basso continuo by the composer Giulio Caccini, published in Florence in July 1602. It is one of the earliest and most significant examples of ...

'' which contained numerous monodies. New for Caccini's songs were that the accompaniment was completely submissive in contrast to the lyric; hence, more precisely, Caccini's Stile moderno-monodies have ornamentations spelled out in the score, which earlier had been up to the performer to supply. Also this marks the starting point of

basso continuo Basso continuo parts, almost universal in the Baroque era (1600–1750), provided the harmonic structure of the music by supplying a bassline and a chord progression. The phrase is often shortened to continuo, and the instrumentalists playing th ...

which also was a feature in Caccini's work. In the preface of his 5th Book of Madrigals (1605) Monteverdi announced a book of his own: ''Seconda pratica, overo perfettione della moderna musica'' (''Second Practice, or, Perfection of Modern Music''). Such a book is not extant. But the preface of his 8th Book of Madrigals (1638) seems to be virtually a fragment of it. Therein Monteverdi claims to have invented a new “agitated” style (''Genere concitato'', later called

Stile concitato ''Stile concitato'' (rather ''Genere concitato'') or "''agitated style''" is a Baroque style developed by Claudio Monteverdi with effects such as having rapid repeated notes and extended trills as symbols of bellicose agitation or anger. Kate Van ...

) to make the music "complete/perfect" ("perfetto").Gerald Drebes: ‘‘Monteverdis ''Kontrastprinzip'', die Vorrede zu seinem 8. Madrigalbuch und das ''Genere concitato''‘‘, in: ''Musiktheorie'', Jg. 6, 1991, p. 29-42, online:

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