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ARCHITECTURAL SPACES FOR MUSIC: JACOPO SANSOVINO AND ADRIAN WILLAERT AT ST MARK'S

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 September 2004

LAURA MORETTI
LAURA MORETTI
Affiliation:
IUAV Università degli Studi
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Extract

Sopra i sedili di questo coro vi sono due pergoli di marmo uno per lato, posti sotto due volti piccioli uno sopra l'altro, i quali formano, anco nelle braccia per traverso, la Chiesa in tre navi con mirabile, & inesplicabile architettura. In questi veggonsi sei quadri d'historie, tre per pergolo, scolpite in bronzo con bellissimo artificio da Giacomo Sansovino.

In 1550 Antonio Gardano's printing shop issued a collection of psalms entitled Di Adriano et di Jachet: I Salmi appartinenti alli vesperi per tutte le feste dell'anno, parte a versi & parte spezzadi accomodati da cantare a uno & duoi Chori. Half of the works included were compositions for eight voices, designated for cori spezzati. Composed by Adrian Willaert (c. 1490–1562), maestro di cappella at St Mark's from 1527 until his death, they are the first published salmi spezzati known to us. The performance of Vespers psalms in polyphony was reserved for particularly important moments in St Mark's liturgical calendar, and both of the main ceremonial books in use at the basilica, the Rituum ecclesiasticorum caerimoniale (1564) of Bartolomeo Bonifacio and the Ceremoniale magnum sive Raccolta universale di tutte le ceremonie spettanti alla ducal regia cappella di San Marco (1678) of Giovanni Pace, include precise instructions concerning the performance of Vespers by two choirs on specific days of the year.

Type
Research Article
Information
Early Music History , Volume 23 , October 2004 , pp. 153 - 184
Copyright
© 2004 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

   The first results of this study appeared in my dissertation, ‘Architettura, liturgia e musica a San Marco nell’età del doge Andrea Gritti (1523–38)', Istituto Universitario di Architettura, Venice, 1999–2000, a project that owes much to the valuable help of Francesco Amendolagine, Claudia Caffagni and David Bryant. I also thank Donatella Calabi and Caroline Bruzelius for inviting me to present the results of my research at the Summer Institute in the Humanities: ‘The Venetian Renaissance: Tradition and the Circulation of Knowledge’, Venice International University, Venice, Island of San Servolo, 7–12 July 2003, where I had the pleasure of meeting Iain Fenlon and Deborah Howard, with whom at various times I have discussed many aspects of my work and to whom I express my warmest thanks: without their help this article would never have been brought to completion. I am also indebted to Bernard Aikema for reading and translating certain passages from the sixteenth-century diary of Arent Willemsz, kindly made available to me by Iain Fenlon. And finally, my deepest gratitude to all those who liberally gave advice, criticism and support (both moral and material): to them all I dedicate this work.