Baldasario Monteverdi Research Paper

Claudio Monteverdi - The original Renaissance man Baldasario Monteverdi was a doctor and apothecary, as well as an amateur surgeon and a barber in the mid-1500s during the Renaissance period. His Marriage to a Goldsmith's daughter brought him a son, Claudio, In 1597. Though May 15, 1597 is usually reported as Claudio Monteverdi's birthday, the actual day of his birth is unknown. May 15th is the first record of him at the time of his baptism In the Catholic Church. This is an indication of the power that the church still had over records and people's lives in the 1500s. Not much is known about his life as a child, except that he had two siblings, and that his mother, Maddalena Zignani, died when he was nine. His father remarried and had three more children with his new wife, Giovanna Gadio. By then Claudio was most likely looking for every chance to leave the house. His father married a third time after his second wife died, but by then Claudio was well on his way to becoming a musician and composer. Once Claudio was in his teens, he studied under Marc Antonio Ingegneri, who was the maestro di cappella at the Cremona Cathedral in Italy at the time. By age fifteen he was publishing motets and madrigals, mainly complex and polyphonic compositions. His work was so astonishing to those who heard it that it soon became published, and his first book of madrigals was a success. Once a Venetian publishing house took up his work, Claudio started writing his own ticket to fame. His success as a composer caused him to leave home by the age of twenty in order to work in the court of Duke Ganzaga of Mantua, Italy. In Mantua, he started working as a vocalist and viola player for the court. His exceptional telant was noted by the nobles year after year, and within twelve years he was promoted to conductor. As such, he started traveling with the Duke's traveling court during his military expeditions throughout Europe. This allowed his to see and experience lands and places originally foreign to him, and gave him a deeper inspiration for his music. After years in the Duke's service, he had disagreements with the court and left. It is not known what those disagreements were. He did not stay unemployed for long. He went on to become the maestro di cappella at St. Mark's Cathedral in Venice, and kept composing. His Opera L'Orpheo is one of the earliest operas of the period, and is still performed today. He wrote a total of eight books of madrigals, the last four while in Venice. Many of his choral and organ compositions are quite beautiful and melodic, such as “Lamento Della Ninfa”. After a brief introduction by the organ and …show more content…
In “Diving The Oracle – Monteverdi's Seconda Prattica”, Massimo Ossi, the author, claims that Claudio Monteverdi was to the music of the period what William Shakespeare was to literature. By many standards, it was he that gave the Baroque its splendor, and it was he that most others attempted to emulate. He is known as a crucial figure in the history of music, as he was one of the main composers to transition from the Renaissance to the Baroque period music styles. As such, here referred to the old, Renaissance style as the “prima prattica”, and the newer style of the Baroque as the “seconda