Remarks to "GIULIO CACCINI" - a brief visit to Florence at the time of the Medici princes around 1600 Giulio Caccini (1551-1618) was born in Rome and was the most successful composer in Italy around 1600 alongside Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643). He introduced a new type of music: arias and madrigals written especially for solo voice and basso continuo. Caccini was accepted into the boys' choir of the “Cappella Giulia” of St. Peter's in Rome at a very young age. It is assumed that Caccini started there as a 5-year-old (1556) and after just one month in Florence sang the role of Psyche in an intermedium to “La Cofanaria”. From 1564 to 1565 he was a singing pupil of Giovanni Animuccia (1514-1571) in Rome. In 1565 he also sang in Florence at the wedding ceremonies of Francesco I de Medici (1541-1587) and Joan of Austria (1547-1578). In his adopted home of Florence, Caccini, who was known simply as Giulio Romano due to his Roman origins, was able to build on the favor of the Medici. From 1566, his place of work was the ducal court of Francesco I de Medici (1541-1587) and later of Ferdinando I de Medici (1549-1601). In late Renaissance Florence, courtly festivities - including obligatory ballets and “intermedia” - were lavishly decorated. The star singers of the court, including Caccini himself, were given a visual and acoustic setting for their art that today's opera singers can only dream of. Giulio himself provided works for this most magnificent genre of the time - music for courtly festivities. He played the lute, chitarrone, double harp and lira da braccio. As a member of the Camerata Florentina, which held its meetings in Giovanni de' Bardi's palazzo, he is credited with a large part in the invention of this new type of singing, the monody, which led to opera. The works transcribed here for the organ are taken from Giulio's volume of music “Le Nuove Musiche”, printed in 1601, as far as the melody and bass are concerned. For this edition, Caccini wrote many solo songs with the accompaniment of a theorbo, in which the same form of artificial love poetry is used as in the polyphonic madrigal, except that here a single voice sings in a recitative or arioso style. This seemingly simple solo singing unfolds over free or walking basses, sometimes melancholically pining as in the touching “Amarilli mia bella”, sometimes hopefully sighing as in “Tu ch'ai le penne amore”, and always adorned with astonishing manners. His works became so well known that even the English-born composer Peter Philips (c.1560-1628), who spent most of his life on the European continent (Italy, Flanders), dedicated a harpsichord version of his madrigal “Amarilli, mia bella” to Cassini, which was printed in the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book (a collection of harpsichord music of the late 16th and early 17th centuries). Robert Dowland (1591-1641), an English composer and the English king's first lutenist, also arranged Caccini's “Amarilli, mia bella” and published the piece in London in 1610 as part of his collection of lute music “A Musicall Banquet”. The setting of “Ave Maria” attributed to Caccini, which only contains the words “Ave Maria” in repetition, is part of the repertoire of many singers and choirs today. However, the composition, which is also available in countless arrangements for instruments, was actually written by the Russian guitarist, lutenist and composer Vladimir Fedorovich Vavilov (1925-1973). As a successful singing teacher, Caccini taught his wife Margherita della Scala and his daughters Francesca and Settimia, as well as his son Pompeo, and together they formed a famous singing ensemble that undertook concert tours to the French royal court in Paris in 1604-1605. But above all, Caccini's name is associated with the creation of opera. From the very beginning, he belonged to the Camerata Fiorentina, a society of musicians, poets and scholars, where he was valued above all as a practical musician. As people of the Renaissance, they wanted to revive the ancient theater and the theatrical music of the Greeks. In view of the development of opera at the time and Caccini's printed works on the art of singing, Giulio is considered one of the inventors of the so-called “stile recitativo” and monody and is one of the earliest representatives of the “arioso style”, which paved the way for bel canto.
Remarks to "GIULIO CACCINI" - a brief visit to Florence at the time of the Medici princes around 1600
Giulio Caccini (1551-1618) was born in Rome and was the most successful composer in Italy around 1600 alongside Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643). He introduced a new type of music: arias and madrigals written especially for solo voice and basso continuo.
Caccini was accepted into the boys' choir of the “Cappella Giulia” of St. Peter's in Rome at a very young age. It is assumed that Caccini started there as a 5-year-old (1556) and after just one month in Florence sang the role of Psyche in an intermedium to “La Cofanaria”. From 1564 to 1565 he was a singing pupil of Giovanni Animuccia (1514-1571) in Rome. In 1565 he also sang in Florence at the wedding ceremonies of Francesco I de Medici (1541-1587) and Joan of Austria (1547-1578).
In his adopted home of Florence, Caccini, who was known simply as Giulio Romano due to his Roman origins, was able to build on the favor of the Medici. From 1566, his place of work was the ducal court of Francesco I de Medici (1541-1587) and later of Ferdinando I de Medici (1549-1601).
In late Renaissance Florence, courtly festivities - including obligatory ballets and “intermedia” - were lavishly decorated. The star singers of the court, including Caccini himself, were given a visual and acoustic setting for their art that today's opera singers can only dream of. Giulio himself provided works for this most magnificent genre of the time - music for courtly festivities. He played the lute, chitarrone, double harp and lira da braccio.
As a member of the Camerata Florentina, which held its meetings in Giovanni de' Bardi's palazzo, he is credited with a large part in the invention of this new type of singing, the monody, which led to opera.
The works transcribed here for the organ are taken from Giulio's volume of music “Le Nuove Musiche”, printed in 1601, as far as the melody and bass are concerned. For this edition, Caccini wrote many solo songs with the accompaniment of a theorbo, in which the same form of artificial love poetry is used as in the polyphonic madrigal, except that here a single voice sings in a recitative or arioso style. This seemingly simple solo singing unfolds over free or walking basses, sometimes melancholically pining as in the touching “Amarilli mia bella”, sometimes hopefully sighing as in “Tu ch'ai le penne amore”, and always adorned with astonishing manners.
His works became so well known that even the English-born composer Peter Philips (c.1560-1628), who spent most of his life on the European continent (Italy, Flanders), dedicated a harpsichord version of his madrigal “Amarilli, mia bella” to Cassini, which was printed in the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book (a collection of harpsichord music of the late 16th and early 17th centuries).
Robert Dowland (1591-1641), an English composer and the English king's first lutenist, also arranged Caccini's “Amarilli, mia bella” and published the piece in London in 1610 as part of his collection of lute music “A Musicall Banquet”.
The setting of “Ave Maria” attributed to Caccini, which only contains the words “Ave Maria” in repetition, is part of the repertoire of many singers and choirs today. However, the composition, which is also available in countless arrangements for instruments, was actually written by the Russian guitarist, lutenist and composer Vladimir Fedorovich Vavilov (1925-1973).
As a successful singing teacher, Caccini taught his wife Margherita della Scala and his daughters Francesca and Settimia, as well as his son Pompeo, and together they formed a famous singing ensemble that undertook concert tours to the French royal court in Paris in 1604-1605.
But above all, Caccini's name is associated with the creation of opera. From the very beginning, he belonged to the Camerata Fiorentina, a society of musicians, poets and scholars, where he was valued above all as a practical musician. As people of the Renaissance, they wanted to revive the ancient theater and the theatrical music of the Greeks.
In view of the development of opera at the time and Caccini's printed works on the art of singing, Giulio is considered one of the inventors of the so-called “stile recitativo” and monody and is one of the earliest representatives of the “arioso style”, which paved the way for bel canto.