Past Events

Gabrieli Consort and Players return to the 42nd Festival International d’Opera Baroque & Romantique, Beanue in July 2024. Directed by Paul McCreesh, the ensemble performs the repertoire that first made their name over 40 years ago. In this recreation of a 400-year-old Coronation Mass for the grand Basilica di San Marco in Venice, they explore anew the extraordinary musical riches of composers Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli, Bendinelli, Gussago and Merulo.

Paul McCreesh, conductor

Gabrieli A Venetian Coronation 1595

To read more about the International d’Opera Baroque & Romantique, Beaune: https://festivalbeaune.com/en/

Programme Notes: A Venetian Coronation 1595

Music and Ceremony at St Mark’s 

The Basilica of St Mark served a dual function as both private chapel of the Doge and principal church of the State, and as such figured prominently in Venetian political life. With its own distinctive liturgy, a minutely detailed ceremonial, sumptuous mosaic decoration, works of art and magnificent music, the Basilica not only reflected vividly the worldly glories of the Serenissima Repubblica, but also served to illustrate a complex fusion of political and religious ideology. Differing ranks of feasts called for specific types of music: in particular, the formal appearance of the Doge at Mass and Vespers on thirty or so days each year required the exposition of the great golden altar-piece the Pala d’oro, the presence of instrumentalists and the performance of elaborate music. Every few years a major event would demand yet more lavish celebration: the signing of a treaty, a naval victory, the end of a plague, the visit of a prince or ambassador, or the coronation of a Doge. These festivals are frequently described in Venetian histories and, even judged by Venetian standards of opulence, would be of quite stupendous extravagance. This performance recreates one such event, the Coronation Mass of Doge Marino Grimani celebrated on the morning of 27 April 1595. 

The election of Marino Grimani (1532-1605) was welcomed with particular enthusiasm by revellers who ripped up stalls in the Piazza to fuel a huge bonfire. Grimani was particularly fond of ceremonial life, and the numerous state festivals he devised during his reign form the background to the extraordinary musical riches of the period, and especially to the works of Giovanni Gabrieli (1553-1612). 

The Cappella Marciana 

In 1595 Giovanni Gabrieli served as one of the organists, and composed much large-scale festival music. The Cappella Marciana comprised some sixteen singers with an instrumental ensemble of cornetts, sackbuts and string players. The Doge’s own piffari e trombone and retinue of fanfare-trumpeters were also present at major events, contemporary descriptions mentioning up to 24 trumpeters and drummers. In addition to the Basilica’s two famed organs it was customary to hire additional chamber organs.

There were at least seven areas around the altar area from which musicians performed, including the two organ galleries and the pulpitum magnum cantorum or bigonzo by the screen. The division of forces into two, three or four spacially separated vocal and instrumental ‘choirs’ is one of the most characteristic features of Venetian sacred music. The musicians almost certainly faced inwards towards the altar and the Doge’s seat, the aim being to tickle the ears of the dignatories rather than fill the Basilica. 

The Music 

Much of the Venetian repertoire, especially sacred music, is difficult to date exactly. It was often published in large, retrospective collections, and remained in repertoire for many decades, with older styles of polyphony rubbing shoulders with more up-to-date motets and concerti. 

The Kyrie, Gloria and Sanctus are performed in settings by Andrea Gabrieli (c.1533-1585), Giovanni’s uncle and a previous organist at the Basilica. The four-choir Gloria may date from the Mass of the Japanese Princes in 1585. The more expansive settings of Kyrie and Sanctus are a masterful blend of poised polyphony and the rich sonorities of three contrasted choirs. The Communion motet O sacrum convivium, probably the earliest work included, is altogether more intimate, at once restrained and ecstatic. 

Giovanni Gabrieli’s compositions also feature prominently, including a brilliant setting of the Collect for St Mark, Deus qui beatum Marcum. The festive motet Omnes Gentes, one of the few four-choir pieces written before the new century, is included as a final motet of praise. The text, from Psalm 46, refers in passing to the Ascension, but as this Psalm occurs in the office for all three major feasts of St Mark, Venetians may well have viewed this work as suitable for any festival of state rejoicing. Giovanni Gabrieli’s canzonas and sonatas are a landmark in instrumental music: extensive, elaborately scored works of a wide expressive range. 

There is no extant Venetian trumpet music, but judging from concordances between the few surviving sources of early trumpet music the repertoire seems to have been pan-European. The fanfares and sonata are taken from a contemporary tutor by the Italian trumpeter Cesare Bendinelli and a manuscript compiled by the Danish court trumpeter Magnus Thomsen. Organ toccatas and intonations by both Gabrielis punctuate the service at various points. There are also descriptions of both St Mark’s organs playing together, but again no music survives. Following the widespread sixteenth-century practice of organ intabulation, Cesario Gussago’s Sonata La Leona has been transcribed for two organs. The chant is taken from a number of Venetian sources, including a previously inaccessible sixteenth-century Gradual from the Basilica’s treasury. 

The Reconstruction 

The sequence of music in this performance takes the form of a liturgical reconstruction, not only incorporating the texts and ceremonial procedures of the Venetian Rite, but also reflecting the musico-liturgical practices of the era. In northern Italy it was customary to suppress certain items of the liturgy in order to place greater emphasis on extra-liturgical music. Most often the official text was said by the celebrant in secreto at the High Altar. This practice was never sanctioned by the official (Roman) authorities but in Venice, more than anywhere else, it allowed music to take an ever-increasing importance in services – at St Mark’s there was even a rule allowing priests to be fined if they interrupted the music. It is not yet clear how much of the official text was spoken, sotto voce, under such music, and in any case there seems to have been considerable flexibility in practice. In Venice, the Agnus Dei was frequently omitted, and it is quite possible that almost all the chant items from the Preface onwards were covered by the multiplicity of musical substitutes. 

In any case such details are relatively unimportant – the reconstruction is of necessity speculative in terms of the actual music performed on that April morning over 400 years ago. More interesting is the possibility of recreating something greater than the sum of the individual pieces, and to put all the music into a richer, more colourful, and more dramatic perspective. We may have lost our ability to respond to religious and civic ritual so beloved of renaissance Venetians, but in reconstructing such events we can perhaps rediscover something of the artistic and spiritual riches of this great city at the zenith of her powers. 

@Paul McCreesh