The text of Per Quella Strada refers to "un carro...abrasato" and a "carro triumphal," the red bullock-cart of the arms of the Carrara, the family that controlled Padua from 1390 to 1405. The piece was likely composed to celebrate either Francesco Carrara's triumphant return to Padua from exile in 1390 or his coronation as Imperial General of the Holy Roman Empire in 1401. The text is filled with images of splendor. "Along the Milky Way...of beautiful stars fixed in the heavens/I saw a chariot...all on fire." This image of the fiery chariot clearly comes from poetic observations of comets in the night sky, and comets were regarded as world-changing occurrences in the Middle Ages. Ciconia's setting of the poem, which he probably wrote, is one of the finest examples of his gleeful Italianate style. It forms a stylistically coherent group with the three other Italian madrigals attributed to him. Their special allure comes from Ciconia's blending of French and Italian influences, a general cultural trend that he initiated. The "Frenchness" of Per Quella Strada, and of similar works, is clearly heard in the syncopations of the interlocking lines. The French Gothic spirit is said to be manifested in an "awareness of space as a tangible entity," eliciting an interest in strong rhythmic contours and attention to minute detail. Ciconia, as many Italians later would, softens these features (particularly the Italian madrigals) to balance the music's rational and the emotional qualities. Lifting off the flat planes of the severe syncopation, he writes lines of ebullient fluidity, long scalar runs, and makes the overlapping syncopations dance. The influences would seem at first to be at odds with each other, but the very friction between them is probably the key to the effectiveness of Ciconia's music. He manages to keep a fiercely complex, individualistic music from being overweening and makes it lovely and inviting.

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