Luca Marenzio
Luca Marenzio (* October 18, 1553 or 1554 Coccaglio, Brescia Province; † August 22, 1599 in Rome) was an Italian composer of the Renaissance.
Life
Luca Marenzio was probably a chorister at the cathedral in Brescia, whose chapel was by Giovanni Contino conducted from 1565 to 1567 (around 1513-1574 ). This was perhaps also his teacher. His first job was Marenzio in Rome with Cardinal Cristoforo Madruzzo († 1578); then he went there in the services of Cardinal Luigi d' Este ( brother of the Duke of Ferrara, Alfonso II d' Este ), who died in 1586. During this time he published his first madrigal collections and may even have contact with the court of Ferrara. His efforts to Conductor of the ducal chapel of Mantua were unsuccessful, so he went in 1588 to the court of Florence. At the local festivities for the wedding of Grand Duke Ferdinando I de ' Medici with Christine of Lorraine in 1589, he served as Composer ( second and third intermedium to comedy La pellegrina of G. Bargagli ) and participates as a singer. In the autumn of this year Marenzio returned to Rome, where he was a member of the Compagnia dei Musici Vertuosa and received the patronage of the Prince Virginio Orsini of Cardinal Aldobrandini Cinzio and even of Pope Clement VIII. In 1596 he stayed at the court of King Sigismund of Poland in Warsaw; then he is in Venice in 1598 and 1599 again witnessed in Rome, where he died the same year. His grave is located in San Lorenzo in Lucina.
Importance
The numerous reprints of the works of Marenzio witness to the fame he enjoyed in various musical circles of Italy and other European countries, and make his great influence on the composers of his time and the immediate posterity significantly. Here are particular to call in Italy Claudio Monteverdi, in Germany, Hans Leo Hassler, Heinrich Schütz and Johann Hermann Schein, England John Wilbye, Thomas Weelkes and John Dowland, who strove in 1595 about to study with Marenzio in Rome, a direct encounter took however, not take place, yet both corresponded with each other. In England and in 1580 twenty madrigals were in English neuverlegt ( RISM 1590/29 ). For a long time about Marenzio beyond death, his works were popular, yet in 1650 led the Venetian publisher Alessandro Vincenzi almost all Madrigal books and villanelles in its catalog on.
With Don Carlo Gesualdo and Monteverdi Marenzio was listed as Alfred Einstein to the full senders of the madrigal in the late 16th century. In the tradition of Cyprian de Rore (1516-1565) and Giovanni Gabrieli (1557-1612) are standing his madrigals characterized by the elegance of the melody, clarity and evenness of rhythm and a lyrical attitude of great color and Delicatezza. Marenzio knows how to let go learned counterpoint with quiet, gay rhythmically declaimed sections, and careful consideration to the prosody of words, especially in the madrigals, which date from the period after the action of the Camerata Fiorentina. His madrigal art has earned him the nickname of the piu dolce cigno d' Italla. Marenzio special attention to the musical expression of meaning and emotion of the lyrics ( Francesco Petrarca, Jacopo Sannazaro, Torquato Tasso and Giovanni Battista Guarini ), among others, with the help of chromaticism, which is, however, less bold than in Don Carlo Gesualdo di Venosa. Economical Marenzio is also in the use of musical and descriptive means.
Marenzio villanelles characterized by freshness, elegance and immediacy of the musical language. The two interludes from 1589 have the rivalry between the Muses and the Pierides and the victory of Apollo over the dragon Python to content. Get them are a short instrumental sinfonia and seven polyphonic vocal phrases via text by Ottavio Rinuccini. These are accompanied by instruments, ranging from the occupation of three votes to three choirs ( one with 18 votes ). They show a homorhythmic set way that gives the text a strong declamatory and dramatic profile. In contrast, a 1585 listed, composed by him intermedium Il combattimento d' Apolline col serpente is held ( The Battle of Apollo with the serpent ) still under the traditional Madrigal style. In Marenzio sacred works equally the Roman Palestrina tradition as expressive Venetian elements are effective.
Works (selection)
- Madrigals for 4 voices (Rome 1585 )
- Madrigals for 4-6 voices (Venice 1588)
- 9 books Madrigals for 5 voices (Venice 1580, 1581, 1582, 1584, 1585, 1594, 1595, 1598 and 1599)
- 6 books madrigal for 6 voices (Venice 1581, 1584, 1585, 1587, 1591 and 1595 )
- Madrigali spirituali for 6 voices (Rome 1584, expanded Nuremberg 1610)
- 5 books villanelles and canzonettas for 3 voices (Venice 1584, 1585, 1585, 1587 and 1587 ); a selection of them with German texts, edited by Valentin Haussmann (Nuremberg, 1606 )
- Numerous madrigals in about 100 collective printing from 1577 to 1627, several also in printed lute tablature of the 16th century
- Motet for 4 voices (Rome 1585 )
- Sacrae cantiones for 5-7 voices and basso continuo ( posthumously Venice 1616)
- Intermediate II and III. from 1589, to comedy La pellegrina listed in RISM 1591/7.