Personalities | Adriano Banchieri | Renaissance | Classical

(A-dre-a’-no Ban-kya’-re) 1568–1634
Italian composer

Banchieri is known for his books of music theory and for his contribution to a small, but fascinating repertory: the madrigal comedy. L’organo suonarino (‘The Sound of the Organ’, 1605), a handbook for church organists, is one of the earliest sources of practical advice for realizing a basso continuo. His madrigal comedies – collections of madrigals and canzonettas organized around a narrative thread – owe much to the commedia dell’arte. The most interesting is La barca veneta (‘The Venetian Boat’), with its cast of stereotypes articulating the prejudices of provincial northern Italy in the seventeenth century.

Recommended Recording:
Barca di Venetia per Padova, Ensemble Clément Janequin (Harmonia Mundi)

Introduction | Renaissance | Classical
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