Andrea Gabrieli

Italian musician

• Born: c. 1520
• Birthplace: In or near Venice, Republic of Venice (now in Italy)
• Died: 1586
• Place of death: Venice, Republic of Venice (now in Italy)

Gabrieli was one of the most versatile Venetian musicians of his generation, helping to make Venice an important center of musical activity in Europe. His compositional output includes sacred vocal music, secular vocal music, instrumental ensemble music, and organ music.

Early Life

Very little is known about the early life of Andrea Gabrieli (ahn-DRAY-ah gah-bree-EHL-ee). He was born probably in the northern (or Canareggio) section of Venice. Although most biographers have stated that he was born around 1510, the lack of available information on Gabrieli until the 1550’s suggests a birth date of around 1520. It is possible that he may have received some early training from the organist at San Geremia in Canareggio (Baldassare da Imola), and that he may have been a singer at St. Mark’s Cathedral in Venice in 1536, although there is no documentation to prove either of these assumptions. Nor is there evidence to suggest that he was a pupil of Adrian Willaert, the chapel master of St. Mark’s at that time.

Since Gabrieli’s first published composition appears in a 1554 collection of madrigals by Vincenzo Ruffo, it is possible that he may have been a musician at the Verona cathedral, where Ruffo worked during the 1550’s. The first indication of Gabrieli’s activities as a church organist dates from 1557-1558, when he was organist at San Geremia. Although he competed unsuccessfully for the position of second organist at St. Mark’s Cathedral in 1557, he must have already been an accomplished organist, for he was a member of the Accademia della Fama in Venice by 1558.

Perhaps the most significant event in Gabrieli’s musical training is his connection with the court of Munich during the early 1560’s. As court organist to Duke Albert V of Bavaria in 1562, he accompanied the duke on several journeys and became friends with the duke’s music director, Orlando di Lasso . Before his period at the court of Munich, Gabrieli had published only four compositions, all madrigals that suggest the influence of Cipriano de Rore. This contact with Lasso heavily influenced Gabrieli’s many subsequent publications of both sacred and secular compositions and assured his future position as one of the most important musicians in Venice.

Life’s Work

Gabrieli became second organist at St. Mark’s in 1564. His growing popularity in Venetian musical life is attested to by the fact that he composed ceremonial music for various state occasions the visit of Archduke Karl of Graz (1569), the festivities after the Venetian republic’s victory against the Turks (1571), and the visit of King Henry III of France (1574). During these mature years, he also attracted a number of talented students, including Hans Leo Hassler, Ludovico Zacconi, and his nephew Giovanni Gabrieli. He became first organist at St. Mark’s in 1584, a position that he retained until his death late in 1586.

Unfortunately, much of Gabrieli’s music was published late or posthumously, making it difficult to trace the development of his musical style. For this reason, his life’s work is best discussed by types of compositions, divided into the following categories: madrigals, villanelle, sacred vocal music, ceremonial music, instrumental ensemble music, and keyboard music. Gabrieli’s seven books of mature madrigals were published between 1566 and 1589. With these collections, he established himself as a master of the lighter type of madrigal that became a fashionable reaction to the serious, avant-garde madrigals of many late sixteenth century composers. Petrarch’s texts are set in a less serious style, and many madrigals use the lighter pastoral verses of such poets as Battista Guarini and Torquato Tasso. Gabrieli achieves a less contrapuntal, more appealing style in these madrigals through the use of closely spaced imitative entries and through a greater tendency toward homophonic writing with various combinations of voices. Some phrases have two melodic voices and a harmonic bass, a tendency that anticipates the texture of Baroque music. The harmonic style shows a preference for major triads and a feeling for tonal clarity resulting from the use of few altered notes. In these madrigals, Gabrieli is still attentive to the words but avoids the manneristic tendency to disturb the musical flow of a composition by his lighter treatment of the texts.

Gabrieli also contributed to the development of the villanella, a light type of secular vocal composition that was a reaction to the more serious sixteenth century madrigal. He composed two types of local Venetian villanella, greghesche and giustiniane, both influenced by the villanelle of Lasso. Greghesche have verses that characterize commedia dell’arte figures and are written in a mixture of Venetian and Greek. Giustiniane have texts that repeat certain syllables to portray the stuttering of a Venetian patrician. In most cases, both types of pieces have three voice parts that move in a simple, homophonic style.

Gabrieli’s sacred music also shows the influence of Lasso and suggests that he may have been attentive to the requirements of the Council of Trent. The words are easily understood because of the tendency toward homophonic writing, the syllabic text setting, and the clear-cut phrases. These masses and motets are generally diatonic with a harmonically oriented bass. Like Lasso, Gabrieli was interested in setting the penitential psalms to music. His Psalmi Davidici (1583; psalms of David) reflect the Council of Trent’s goals by taking a greater interest in sonority, simplifying the texture, and avoiding obvious word painting.

Gabrieli’s ceremonial music includes compositions set to both sacred and secular texts. His eight-voiced madrigal“Felici d’Adria” was composed in 1567 for the visit of Archduke Charles of Carinthia to Venice. In the Concerti, published posthumously by his nephew Giovanni in 1587, motets for eight or more voices are found that have texts dealing with major festivals of the Venetian year. Some ceremonial works by Gabrieli have separate choirs that alternate unpredictably in phrases of different lengths. At other times, he creates variety by constantly changing the grouping of the voices and by mixing homophonic with contrapuntal writing. His last occasional music may have been written for the opening of the Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza, for which he composed sixty-four choruses to a translated version of Sophocles’ Oidipous Tyrannos (c. 429 b.c.e.; Oedipus Tyrannus, 1715).

Gabrieli’s contributions to the development of instrumental music have never been fully appreciated. For four-part instrumental ensembles, Gabrieli composed a number of ricercars that are suitable for many combinations of early string or wind instruments. His interest in thematic unity is clearly seen in these ricercars, which are usually based on one or two melodic ideas that are repeated extensively in all four instrumental parts. He achieves variety by writing duet passages, by alternating overlapping imitative entries with entrances of the thematic material that do not overlap, and by developing one thematic idea sometimes and juxtaposing two thematic ideas at other times.

Gabrieli composed several types of pieces for keyboard instruments: intonazioni, toccate, canzone, and ricercar. His intonazioni and toccate reflect the spirit of sixteenth century improvisation and could have served as preludes to other compositions. Gabrieli composed two types of keyboard canzone, those that are not based on vocal compositions and those that are based on secular chansons of well-known composers. The canzone that are not derived from vocal works are characterized by the imitation of a number of successive thematic ideas and have sections in contrasting meters and tempos. Those that are based on chansons follow their vocal models but add extensive ornamentation.

Some of Gabrieli’s keyboard ricercars are freely composed, while others are based on vocal compositions. Those belonging to the latter category do not follow the vocal model as closely as Gabrieli does in his canzone. In these ricercars, each melodic motive is treated at greater length than in the vocal model itself. Thus, instead of imitating each motive once in each of the four polyphonic parts, they show their clearly instrumental character by normally having five to ten imitative entries for a melodic motive.

The freely composed ricercars can be divided into three categories: those that have one thematic idea prevailing throughout, those that employ two complementary thematic ideas, and those that have a number of thematic ideas that are derived from the opening idea. Some of the imitative entries over these thematic ideas overlap in typical Renaissance fashion. At other times, the imitative entries anticipate Baroque fugal procedure by not overlapping. Some ricercars demonstrate Gabrieli’s contrapuntal skill by lengthening the thematic idea to two or four times the length of the original note values (augmentation), or by inverting the melodic intervals of the thematic idea. Whatever the special devices, the opening thematic idea or one of the other main thematic ideas is present most of the time.

Significance

During his lifetime, Gabrieli made significant contributions to many of the genres current in his day secular vocal music, sacred vocal music, ceremonial music, and keyboard music. His villanelle and madrigals are important to the development of secular vocal music, for they represent a lighter alternative to the more serious, highly expressive avant-garde madrigals that many other composers were writing. Because of their humorous texts, his villanelle are important predecessors of the early seventeenth century madrigal comedies by Adriano Banchieri and Orazio Vecchi.

His sacred vocal music reflects the needs of the Council of Trent; the simpler textures and diatonic style of writing served as a model for other composers wishing to compose in a style acceptable to the Catholic Church. His ceremonial music influenced other composers, particularly because of the changing textures or the alternation of separate choirs. Although the origins of Baroque style lie primarily in the works by those composers who believed in more serious text expression, Gabrieli’s vocal works do anticipate certain Baroque traits in their tendency toward homophonic writing, clear-cut phrases, a simpler harmonic style, and an increased vertical orientation.

Gabrieli’s greatest impact, however, was in the realm of keyboard music. His intonazioni and toccate reveal much about sixteenth century improvisation. His sectional canzone anticipate the early Baroque canzona and sonata, while his chanson-based canzone are excellent examples of Renaissance ornamentation practices. Gabrieli’s ricercars, because of their tendency toward thematic unity, the persistent use of imitation, and the use of special contrapuntal devices, foreshadow the fugal procedures of the seventeenth century. Although the works of Gabrieli are not as well known as those of his nephew Giovanni, Andrea is far more significant, for he contributed to a wider variety of vocal and instrumental genres than did his nephew and had a greater influence on more composers.

Bibliography

Apel, Willi. The History of Keyboard Music to 1700. Translated by Hans Tischler. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1972. The most thorough description of Gabrieli’s keyboard music. Stresses the importance of Gabrieli’s ricercars as predecessors of the Baroque fugue and describes his canzone, intonazione, toccate, and organ masses.

Arnold, Denis. “Ceremonial Music in Venice at the Time of the Gabrielis.” Proceedings of the Musical Association 82 (1955/1956): 47-59. States that music for separated choirs fulfilled the need for ceremonial music on important festive occasions in Venice. Discusses Gabrieli’s role in the history of Venetian ceremonial music and describes the major influences on his music for separated choirs.

Arnold, Denis. Giovanni Gabrieli and the Music of the Venetian High Renaissance. New York: Oxford University Press, 1979. Although primarily about Andrea Gabrieli’s nephew, this book contains some useful biographical information and general discussions of Gabrieli’s motets, masses, instrumental ensemble music, and keyboard music. Emphasizes the influence of Gabrieli on his nephew but clearly distinguishes their musical styles.

Brown, Howard M. “The Madrigalian and the Formulaic in Andrea Gabrieli’s Pastoral Madrigals.” In The Pastoral Landscape, edited by John Dixon Hunt. Hanover, N.H.: University Press of New England, 1992. Examination of the relationship between Gabrieli’s pastoral madrigals and the general conventions of the genre. Includes illustrations and bibliographic references.

Einstein, Alfred. The Italian Madrigal. Translated by Alexander H. Krappe, Roger H. Sessions, and Oliver Stunk. 2d ed. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1971. A dated but useful discussion of Gabrieli’s villanelle and madrigals. Emphasizes Gabrieli’s role in the development of the madrigal and suggests that his light madrigals reflect sixteenth century Venetian life. The musical style of several madrigals is described in detail.

Fenlon, Iain. Music and Culture in Late Renaissance Italy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. Much of this study is devoted to the creation and performance of music in Gabrieli’s Venice. Includes illustrations, bibliographic references, and index.

Gabrieli, Andrea. Andrea Gabrieli: Complete Madrigals. 12 vols. in 7 books. Edited by A. Tillman Merritt. Madison, Wis.: A-R Editions, 1981-1984. The introduction contains information about Gabrieli’s life and musical style. It also lists the major sources of his vocal and instrumental works. All the volumes have detailed discussions of the texts and music edited in each volume.

Whitwell, David. Aesthetics of Music in Sixteenth Century Italy, France, and Spain. Northridge, Calif.: Winds, 1996. General study of the aesthetic theories, principles, and conventions shaping Gabrieli’s compositions and their reception. Includes bibliographic references.