What was claudio monteverdi known for

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Claudio monteverdi most famous works
Claudio monteverdi death

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Monteverdi, Claudio

Read on for our guide to the great Italian Renaissance/Baroque composer and father of opera, Claudio Monteverdi.

When was Monteverdi born?

Claudio Monteverdi was born in 1567 in Cremona, the northern Italian town also well known as a production centre for violins, home of Antonio Stradivari, Giuseppe Guarneri and other famous luthiers.

This minor town in northern Italy turned out to be a surprisingly beneficial one for the composer. First, it was the home of the respected and well-connected church musician Marc’Antonio Ingegneri, under whom Monteverdi learned to write correct counterpoint in the old style (stile antico) by basing his compositions on works by other composers. His early motet Quam pulchra es, for example, is modelled on a setting of the same text by the composer Costanzo Festa, and his earliest madrigals borrow from pieces by Marenzio, from Ingegneri himself, and several others.

Another advantage for Monteverdi was that Cremona was home to the Amati family, famous for their manufacture of stringed instruments. We usua

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Biography

Claudio Monteverdi lived in a time of great change, as the vocal polyphony of the Renaissance gave way to the textures of the early Baroque. He harnessed both styles with great skill, sometimes contrasting them in the same work, and wrote successfully in every vocal genre. His liturgical works can be heard as a culmination of the choral traditions of previous centuries. But his operas embody the lyrical and dramatic innovations that were shortly to sweep across Europe. As a court musician, Monteverdi would have composed many dances and ceremonial pieces, yet almost all of his surviving works are for voices. His training with the music director of Cremona Cathedral, Marc’Antonio Ingegneri, included learning several instruments as well as composing and singing. In 1590 or 1591 he was appointed as a viol player at the court of the Duke of Mantua, Vincenzo I of Gonzaga. Monteverdi had already published several sets of vocal music, both sacred and secular. The first, Sacrae cantiunculae, appeared in 1582 when he was just 15 years old. The Mantuan court was small but cultural

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We will study Claudio Monteverdi in both the Renaissance and Baroque periods. His music, especially his madrigals, demonstrates the transition from late Renaissance to early Baroque style. His first four books of madrigals feature the late Renaissance style that you hear in “Ecco mormorar l’onde.” Starting with the fifth book of madrigals, he adopts the new practices that we’ll come to know as early Baroque style.

Introduction

Figure 1. Monteverdi by Bernardo Strozzi, c. 1630

Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi (15 May 1567 (baptized)–29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, gambist, singer and Roman Catholic priest.

Monteverdi’s work, often regarded as revolutionary, marked the change from the Renaissance style of music to that of the Baroque period. He developed two styles of composition—the heritage of Renaissance polyphony and the new basso continuo technique of the Baroque. Monteverdi wrote one of the earliest operas, L’Orfeo, a novel work that is the earliest surviving opera still regularly performed. He is widely recognized a