Renaissance Venice was like no other place in Italy, or in the known world. It was a maritime culture dependent on trade instead of agriculture. Unlike most other Italian cities, Venice did not inherit its history from the ancient Romans or Greeks. Its mythological founding was noon, 25 March 421 AC by refugees fleeing the ravages of Attila the Hun. Not only did Venice have a unique history and streets of water, but it was its own political entity, the Most Serene Republic, whose center of authority and religion was the church of St. Marks. Most of Venice's peer cities did not have the freeing advantage of independence in both political and religious arenas, but were instead strongly tied to Rome and papal authority. This alternative leadership allowed Venetians religious and political independence within their Republic that was not found in the Papal states, or in areas more directly tied to the Pope and the church in Rome. The music of Venice is directly impacted by this--indeed, "Had the Venetians not steadfastly rejected papal pronouncements in the seventeenth century, there would be little of their instrumental music to discuss."VIM Because of this independence, the musical developments of Venice were unparalleled in Italy, and unique to their age.
The instruments present in the orchestra of San Marco changed throughout the centuries. The basic wind ensemble by the end of the sixteenth century included a mixture of cornetts and trombones. Other instrumentalists, such as shawmists or trumpeters, could be called in for special occasions or festivals. The cornett (typically spelled with a terminal double "t" to distinguish it from the nineteenth century brass band instrument) is unlike anything that exists in the modern instrumentarium. It is a hybrid wind instrument, combining a brass mouthpiece with woodwind finger technique. There were three varieties of the cornett, the first and most popular being the curved cornett, which was the one most frequently used for virtuostic displays, as well as the one used by the pifarri players of St. Marks. The curved cornett was given a conical bore by cutting a piece of wood in half, removing the center, gluing the two halves back together, and finally binding them with black leather. The straight cornett, while easier to make, was much less common. It could be turned on a lathe, and had a much less laborious production process. It has a softer tone than its curved cousin, and was not typically used by the pifarri players. The mute cornett, also less common than the curved, is described as having "an exquisitely soft tone." ODM, p. 195 The cornett was described as having a mellow, flexible tone that could sound much like a human voice, while handling difficult virtuosic passages a voice would be unable to. The modern trumpet that now usually plays the parts of the cornetts is a much louder, brighter instrument than its sonorous Renaissance counterpoint. The standard cornett had a range roughly analogous to that of the violins of the Renaissance, playing from a g to a", or perhaps a little higher in the hands of an exceptional cornett player.
The pairing of cornett and trombone seems to be a fairly stable arrangement during the sixteenth century, "Two trombones and two cornetts constituted the usual wind band a 4; in music a 5, three trombones normally played with two cornetts, and in music a 6 four trombones with two cornetts."Brown, p. 61 While closely related to the shawm pifarri, it appears that the cornett and trombone ensemble also had roots in a pure trombone consort. The smallest trombones were not very satisfactory in the highest roles because they were a hazard to the teeth of whomever played them, and were less easily played in tune than the cornetts. A consort of tenor trombones was retained for melancholy effects in theatrical productions, but in general practice, the higher trombones gave way to the more flexible and less dangerous cornetts. This was only possible as the Medieval concept of the pure consort gave way to the more practical considerations about music performance.
The cornett and trombone band was a flexible ensemble. It was quite capable of including other instruments, especially those that played in the middle register, such as the dolzaine, crumhorns, bassoons, shawms, flutes, and recorders. The additional instruments were not always even wind instruments. Giovanni Gabrieli's Sonata pian e forte, for example, uses a violin in one of the inner parts. Viols or various other string instruments might be included as well. The cornett and trombone pifarri might also be called upon to perform with one or more organs, whether permanent church organs or portable organs, especially when the ensemble was performing in a liturgical situation. The pifarri might also perform with voices, "Shortly after 1500 we find the cornett and trombone performing together with human voices, not only in secular feasts and in the theater, but also during Mass."CMRM, p. 150 Again, this was only possible because the Medieval ideal of separating loud and soft voices was not adhered to. This freedom of ensemble was more specific to Venice, although not unknown in other places, such as the neighboring cities of Treviso, Vicenza, and Udine. The mixture of string, brass and woodwind was fairly unique to the Most Serene Republic and its neighbors. Germany during the period was much more interested in all wind ensembles (like the pifarri dance band) and France, England and Rome were focusing their musical attention on all-string ensembles.VIM, p. 13
The cornett and trombone pifarri was popular all over Western Europe, not just in Venice. There is, for example, documentation of this cornett and trombone pifarri ensemble in the Court of Ferrara. However, the most striking examples and some of the best documentation of the use of pifarri was in Venice, where the ensemble is highlighted by the groundbreaking achievements of the Gabrielis. The church of St. Marks was central to the life of Venetians. It was at St. Marks, too, that some of the most interesting developments in instrumental music took place. The pifarri ensemble was probably established on a permanent basis around 1565 by Andrea Gabrieli, who was the organist for St. Marks during the 1560s. He had spent a few years in Munich, where he was exposed to some excellent wind bands. This experience of his was probably instrumental in encouraging St. Marks to develop its own ensemble of wind players. Of course, the competitive nature of Italian municipalities probably played a role, as most of Venice's neighbors already had such ensembles.
Much of the music performed in St. Marks was done so by two, or on the most festive occasions three, choirs. A choir in St. Marks could consist of singers, a combination of vocalists and instrumentalists, or simply the instrumentalists by themselves. Music performed by multiple choirs is known as antiphonal, and this antiphonal music was a trademark characteristic of the Gabrielis' music. St. Marks has two lofts on either side which contain organs and room for choirs (although, in all probability there were additional platforms, known as palchetti, built at need to accommodate the instrumentalists during the larger festivals). VIM, p. 6-7 Thus the two choirs playing together would be separated and elevated, playing across the cathedral to each other with the congregation between them. It must have been a glorious sound.
The pifarri players did not perform in every single service held at St. Marks. Indeed, their duties were light enough that many of them were able to hold a second job. They were generally only called upon to play for the larger celebrations and occasions as, "It is fairly certain that the main purpose of these players was to swell the sound in the sung parts of mass and vespers." Giovanni, p. 130 It was these pifarri ensembles that performed the polychoral polyphonic music of Giovanni Gabrieli. The music was probably composed for special occasions, "There can be no doubt about it: Giovanni composed his polychoral canzoni for the festivities in San Marco. This explains the instruments he indicated in the score."Kenton, p. 476 One example of such a use of the pifarri was recorded by the Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Duval, who was in St. Marks for a mass on Christmas Day, 1607, when he records, ". . .the double organs and different instruments, such as trombones, cornettos and treble voices of the singers, and all this indeed filled the church and produced a grand harmony." Kenton, p. 35
St. Marks was not the only place in Venice where music was made. Venice had a very strange phenomenon called, six fraternal organizations called confraternities, or scuoli. The Venetian confraternities resemble, in some ways, more modern fraternal organizations such as the Elks or the Lions Clubs easily found in small town America today. Venice was blessed with a merchant middle class due to its position as a maritime trading center, something not frequently found in feudal Italy of the Renaissance and as such, ". . .Venice was also home of a host of rich and music-loving patricians who could bestow favors as only the ruling houses of Mantua, Ferrara or Urbino could offer."Kenton p. 470 Members of this middle class could not necessarily afford to support an ensemble of musicians by themselves, but through the confraternities they could pool their resources to do good deeds, such as maintaining orphanages, as well as build places of worship, and supply those places with decent musicians.
The most affluent and musically significant of the confraternities is the Scuole de San Rocco (a.k.a. S. Rocco). The salaried musicians at S. Rocco were mainly harp, lute, and lirone or viol players, all of which are soft instruments. Some of the authorities in the field find the emphasis on these soft string instruments mildly confusing, "But it remains a little puzzling that the cornetts and trombones in common use in St. Marks were not employed [by S. Rocco]," Givoanni, p. 193 while others attribute the difference in instrumentation to other reasons, "It would seem that the fact that San Marco had mainly cornetto and trombone players in steady employ, and that San Rocco had harp, lute and lirone players, can be ascribed to the acoustical situation in both places." Kenton, p. 521 Whatever the cause, S. Rocco had a very different ensemble than did St. Marks, and did not employ the pifarri players.
Not all the Venetian confraternities focused on music the way S. Rocco did. The Scuole di San Giovanni Evangelista, for example, patronized the visual arts, and commissioned Jacobo and Gentile Bellini to portray Venetian ceremonial life. The Scuole di Santa Maria della Carita was primarily interested in the patronage of drama. The Scuole di San Marco (not to be confused with the Basilica of St. Marks, which may also be referred to as San Marco) supported music, but not to the same extent as did the more affluent S. Rocco. Whatever the artistic interest of each confraternity, all the scuoli were obliged to participate in processions, in which the pifarri players did play.
The principal processions in which all confraternities were called upon to participate were on Good Friday, St. Mark's Day, Corpus Domini, the Feast of St. Vito, and the Feast of the Redeemer. Processional participation was not limited to these few occasions, however, in the 1570s there were roughly forty processions a year!VIM, p. 34 These processions were a primary venue for free-lance wind instrumentalists in Venice and supported at least six bands of pifarri--one for each confraternity, "In addition to the doge's group there were at least six independent pifarri companies in Venice, for each of the six principal confraternities was to be represented by one at a lavish procession on the feat of Corpus Domini." VIM, p. 14 These processions would include not only singers, but might also have the trumpets of a trombetti group, trombones, cornetts, shawms, bagpipes, drums, recorders, viols, transverse flutes, and any other instrumentalists the scuoli could hire.
In addition to hiring members of pifarri bands and other wind instrumentalists for processions, the confraternities might also call upon their services for concerts. Thomas Coryat, an English visitor to Italy in 1608, heard a concert held at the Scuole de San Rocco on the Feast of San Rocco which he described in glowing terms, "This feast consisted principally of Musicke, both vocal and instrumentall, . . .so superexcellent, that it did ravish and stupifie all those strangers that never heard the like. . ."VIM, p. 35 Among the instrumentalists present at this concert, he reports ten trombones, four cornetts, two double bass voils, a treble viol, two theorbos, and seven pairs of organs, all in various ensemble combinations.
What with the large ensembles at major festivals in St. Marks, frequent musical processions by the confraternities, and various concerts, Venetian musicians must not have been able to rely upon the limits of an oral tradition to supply enough music to these various and diverse groups. Indeed, unlike the shawm pifarri, they were provided with a significant body of composed music. It is this composition that makes Venice so very significant in the eyes of musicologists. As I mentioned earlier, Andrea Gabrieli (c.1510-1586) was the organist at St. Marks from 1566-1586, during which time he succeeded in establishing the resident pifarri band. Andrea, as well as being an organist, was a composer. During Andrea's tenure the pifarri players of St. Marks most frequently played music written for vocalists during masses. Music written specifically for instrumentalists was rare during Andrea's time. One interesting and notable exception is a composition by Andrea, a battaglia, or a battle piece. Another period composer, Annibale Padovano, had written a piece in this genre, played by cornetts and trombones, previously for the wedding of Duke Wilhelm of Bavaria in March 1567. With his example, and Jannequin's La Bataille da Marignan, Andrea wrote his own version. As a piece of music, it is not particularly distinguished but, in the course of music history, it holds its own. What is most interesting about it is its idiomatic nature and the fact that it was specifically written and composed for the pifarri, ". . .but because it borrows fanfares for wind, it is really idiomatic in its use of the instruments in a way that adaptations of vocal music could never be."Giovanni, p. 142
The next important step in the evolution of Venetian instrumental music was the publishing of Concerti by Andrea and his more famous nephew Giovanni Gabrieli (c.1554-1612). The publication included a piece called Lieto godeo, per sonar ("per sonar" means for playing, as opposed to "per cantar" which would indicate that the piece was designed for singing). Before this publication there were not many significant examples of music composed specifically with instrumental players in mind, "Music for ensembles was an arrangement of chansons or their imitation, of motets, or of, again, dance pieces. Important instrumental music of the length and complexity of motets first appeared in the Concerti of 1587 by the Gabrielis, and the first tentative piece was Lieto godeo per sonar."Kenton, p. 489
Giovanni Gabrieli was the second organist in St. Marks from 1585, as well as holding a second job as organist for S. Rocco. Like his uncle Andrea, Giovanni spent some time in Germany, theoretically familiarizing himself with the brass and wind ensembles. What his uncle tentatively started in writing the battaglia and other instrumental pieces, Giovanni continued, built upon, and is remembered for: instrumental ensemble compositions. Most music historians cannot overemphasize Giovanni's importance in the evolution of the ensemble as we now know it. Egon Kenton claims that, "By transmitting the technique of polychoral writing to instrumental ensembles, Giovanni Gabrieli laid the foundation of the modern orchestra!" Kenton, p. 487-488 Denis Arnold says that while the Gabrieli's madrigals and organ pieces might not be of the greatest significance in music history, their music for pifarri is very influential, ". . .the music for instrumental ensemble. . . is of the highest aesthetic quality and of unique importance for its epoch." Giovanni p. vii
Simply put, the Gabrielis, especially Giovanni, were among the first to write music for wind ensembles that was intended for those ensembles--music that had no vocal model and that could not be easily sung. Giovanni published a number of works specifically for instruments. He also designated specific instruments (like a cornett) to a specific line of music, something that had never been done before in quite the same way. The combination of idiomatic writing, specific instrumentation, and publication of works that reflected these innovations influenced composers of that period, and formed the course of music history.
It is Giovanni Gabrieli that makes Venice at the turn of the sixteenth century so important to music historians. In studying the innovations of the Renaissance, it is important to remember that the ensemble Giovanni made history writing for was the cornett and trombone pifarri of St. Marks! One influential effect of the pifarri upon the compositions of Giovanni was the virtuosic cornett playing of Giovanni Bassano, who was added to the permanent establishment of St. Marks in 1576. Bassano's affect upon Giovanni's writing can be seen in the agility and tessitura required to play the upper lines of the La Spiritata canzoni. The florid and un-vocal nature of these lines exemplifies Giovanni's freedom to write for a instrument, instead of for voices as had been done previously. It is in the specifically cornett-designed music that Giovanni exploited the ability of instruments as they had never been used before. In 1596, Bassano was given a position at the seminary, which is a strong statement on the respect held for him and his playing, ". . .since instrumentalists were considered both musically and socially inferior to the singers, and a senior member of the capella would normally have been chosen." Giovanni, p. 35 Bassano was not the only virtuosic cornett player during Giovanni's tenure at St. Marks, the playing of Girolamo dalla Casa, who replaced Bassano, allowed Giovanni to continue writing for a technically excellent cornettist. Thus the instrumentalists at St. Marks enable Giovanni Gabrieli to develop the use of instrumentation.
The make-up of the pifarri ensemble obviously also influenced Giovanni's compositions. The Sacrae Symphoniae, an extremely influential publication of Giovanni's canzoni, exhibits this influence, "Such a piece [as 'Canzona Duodecimi Toni'] could not have been written except in the Venice of the later 1580s and 1590s. It is an obvious reflection of the structure of the ensembles led by Girolamo dalla Casa, with its virtuoso salariati in particular the superb cornettists. . ."Giovanni, p. 157
It is hard to focus on the pifarri ensembles with the fascinating and influential figure of Giovanni Gabrieli in the foreground. If you are interested in the composer, I would refer you to the biographies of D. Arnold and E. Kenton, both of which are excellent. The pifarri ensemble's importance and legacy is inexorably intertwined with that of its greatest composer, the only one well-remembered by our age. The cornett and trombone pifarri was a force in Venice and in Italy for roughly a century, from the early sixteenth century until the early seventeenth century, ". . .most Venetian composers had stopped scoring for cornetts and trombones in the 1620s."VIM, p. The pifarri ensemble lingered on into the eighteenth century in the more northern countries, such as Germany, but in Venice it did not stay much past Giovanni's tragic death because of kidney stones. Cornetts and trombones (along with bassoons) carried some interesting associations in the intermedii and the earliest operas (such as those by Cavalli, 1602-76) of Hell and the underworld, but their status as a major part of the instrumentarium gradually diminished.
The legacy of the cornett and trombone ensemble is obvious and important. It was the ensemble that inspired brand new thinking on the part of Giovanni Gabrieli about instruments and instrumental writings. Music written for cornetts and trombones is still in the repertoire today, played by modern brass ensembles. D. Arnold says the sixteen instrumental pieces included in Giovanni's Sacrae Symphoniae marks, "a turning-point in the history of instrumental music". Giovanni, p. 148 It was Giovanni's ingenuity and innovation that led to this turning point, but the pifarri were the instrumental vehicle that made it all possible.