Giovanni Gabrieli

Giovanni Gabrieli (1553–1556? – August 12, 1612) was an Italian composer and organist. He was one of the most influential musicians of his time, and represents the culmination of the Venetian School, at the time of the shift from Renaissance to Baroque style.

Life

Gabrieli was born in Venice. While not much is known about his early life, he probably studied with his uncle, the composer Andrea Gabrieli, and he may also have studied with Orlando de Lassus while he was in Munich at the court of Duke Albrecht V; most likely he stayed there until about 1579. By 1584 he had returned to Venice, where he became principal organist at the church of San Marco in 1585, after Claudio Merulo left the post; and following his uncle's death the following year also took the post of principal composer. Also after his uncle's death he took on the task of editing much of his music, which would otherwise be lost; Andrea evidently had little inclination to publish his own music, but Giovanni's opinion of it was sufficiently high that he devoted a lot of his own time to compiling and editing it for publication.

Related Topics:
Venice - Andrea Gabrieli - Orlando de Lassus - Munich - Duke Albrecht V - 1579 - 1584 - Organ - San Marco - 1585 - Claudio Merulo

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San Marco had a long tradition of musical excellence and Gabrieli's work there made him one of the most noted composers in Europe. The vogue which began with his influential volume Sacrae symphoniae (1597) was such that composers from all over Europe, especially from Germany, came to Venice to study. Evidently he also made his new pupils study the madrigals being written in Italy, so not only did they carry back the grand Venetian polychoral style, but also the more intimate madrigalian style to their home countries; Hans Leo Hassler, Heinrich Schütz, Michael Praetorius and others helped transport the transitional early Baroque music north to Germany, an event which was decisive on subsequent music history. The productions of the German Baroque, culminating in the music of J.S. Bach, were founded on this strong tradition which had its original roots in Venice.

Related Topics:
Europe - 1597 - Madrigal - Venetian polychoral style - Hans Leo Hassler - Heinrich Schütz - Michael Praetorius - J.S. Bach

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Gabrieli was also associated with the Confraternity of San Rocco, another Venetian church, at which some of the most renowned singers and instrumentalists in Italy performed; a vivid description of the music there survives in the travel memoirs of the English writer Thomas Coryat.

Related Topics:
Confraternity of San Rocco - Thomas Coryat

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Gabrieli was increasingly ill after about 1606, at which time church authorities began to appoint deputies to take over duties he could no longer perform. He died in 1612, of complications from a kidney stone.

Related Topics:
1606 - 1612

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