Everything about Ruggiero Giovannelli totally explained
Ruggiero Giovannelli (c.
1560 –
January 7,
1625) was an
Italian composer of the late
Renaissance and very early
Baroque eras. He was a member of the
Roman School, and succeeded
Palestrina at
St. Peter's.
Life
He was born in
Velletri, near
Rome. It has been claimed that he was a student of Palestrina, but there's no documentary evidence of this; stylistic similarities between their music, and an obvious close career association, make it a reasonable assumption. Not much is known about Giovannelli's life until
1583 when he became
maestro di cappella at S Luigi dei Francesi, a post which he held until
1591, at which time he went to the
Collegio Germanico. In addition to these posts he was
maestro di cappella for Duke Giovanni Angelo of
Altaemps, at his private chapel, probably concurrently with his other jobs.
Giovannelli's most important appointment was as the replacement for Palestrina as the
maestro di cappella at the
Julian Chapel at St. Peter's, on March 12,
1594, a position which he held until
1599, when he became a singer at the
Sistine Chapel. In
1614 he became
maestro di cappella at the Sistine Chapel, and he retired in
1624.
Music and influence
Giovannelli wrote both sacred and secular music. As could be expected for a composer of the Roman School, his sacred music was conservative, and mostly in the Palestrina style for the first part of his career; however, after
1600 he experimented with some of the stylistic innovations which defined the beginning of the Baroque era, such as the
concertato principle and the
basso continuo. His output of sacred music fell off dramatically late in his life, and at least one scholar has suggested that this was because he was uncomfortable with the new style.
He wrote
masses and
motets, some of which are for as many as 12 voices, and which often use
polychoral techniques.
For a Roman School composer and a priest he wrote a surprising amount of secular music, mostly
madrigals and
canzonettas, some of which are in a light-hearted style influenced by northern Italian models, or by
Luca Marenzio, who had spent time in Rome. He wrote three books of madrigals for five voices and two books for four voices, as well as a large quantity of other secular songs which were not collected in publications; most have been dated to the
1580s and
1590s.
Giovannelli's music was reprinted widely, in Italy and elsewhere, indicating his broad popularity.
References and further reading
Further Information
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