Essential Monteverdi
A near-contemporary of Shakespeare's, Claudio Monteverdi (1567–1643) did for vocal music what the playwright did for theatre. Inheriting the handsome but unyielding forms of the renaissance, Monteverdi moulded them into the newly expressive, fluid shapes of the baroque. Emotion once kept at arm's length was now the engine of musical drama.
Read more…In many ways Monteverdi's career was a mirror of his age – a world moving from old-fashioned feudal systems to new forms of democracy. He started out in the courtly world of the Italian aristocracy, producing elegant entertainments for the Gonzaga Duke of Mantua, including the early opera 'L'Orfeo', and several volumes of madrigals, and ended his career in the vibrant city republic of Venice. Here he served two masters: the church and the new public opera houses. The former gave us the splendour of his magnificent 1610 Vespers, and the colourful motets of the 'Selva Morale', while the latter staged the two late, great operas 'L'incoronazione di Poppea' and 'Il ritorno d'Ulisse'. "The aim of all good music," Monteverdi wrote, "is to affect the soul." It’s a philosophy that really marks the beginning of modern music, one that carries us all the way through to Wagner, Mahler and beyond. But Monteverdi was its father, a composer who transformed music, whether sacred or secular, from exquisite artifice – beautiful but cool to the touch – to the messy, fleshy truth of the human experience.