Donato da Cascia (also da Firenze or da Florentia) (fl. c. 1350 – 1370) was an Italian composer of the

Trecento The Trecento (, also , ; short for , "1300") refers to the 14th century in Italian cultural history. Period Art Commonly, the Trecento is considered to be the beginning of the Renaissance in art history. Painters of the Trecento included Giotto ...

. All of his surviving music is secular, and the largest single source is the

Squarcialupi Codex The Squarcialupi Codex (Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Med. Pal. 87) is an illuminated manuscript compiled in Florence in the early 15th century. It is the single largest primary source of music of the 14th-century Italian ''Trecento'' ( ...

. He was probably also a priest, and the picture that survives of him in the Squarcialupi Codex shows him in the robes of the

Benedictine , image = Medalla San Benito.PNG , caption = Design on the obverse side of the Saint Benedict Medal , abbreviation = OSB , formation = , motto = (English: 'Pray and Work') , foun ...

order. Nothing at all is known about his life except what can be inferred from his picture, his name, and the geographic distribution of his surviving music. He was probably from

Cascia Cascia () is a town and ''comune'' (municipality) of the Italian province of Perugia in a rather remote area of the mountainous southeastern corner of Umbria. It is about 21 km from Norcia on the road to Rieti in the Lazio (63 km). It is ...

, near

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...

, and all of his music, with one exception (the virelai), is found in sources in

Tuscany Tuscany ( ; it, Toscana ) is a Regions of Italy, region in central Italy with an area of about and a population of about 3.8 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence (''Firenze''). Tuscany is known for its landscapes, history, art ...

. Seventeen compositions by Donato survive, including: fourteen

madrigal A madrigal is a form of secular vocal music most typical of the Renaissance (15th–16th c.) and early Baroque (1600–1750) periods, although revisited by some later European composers. The polyphonic madrigal is unaccompanied, and the number o ...

s, one caccia, one

virelai A ''virelai'' is a form of medieval French verse used often in poetry and music. It is one of the three ''formes fixes'' (the others were the ballade and the rondeau) and was one of the most common verse forms set to music in Europe from the lat ...

, and one

ballata The ''ballata'' (plural: ''ballate'') is an Italian poetic and musical form in use from the late 13th to the 15th century. It has the musicapenim AbbaA, with the first and last stanzas having the same texts. It is thus most similar to the Frenc ...

. Except for one piece, his music is all for two voices, typical of mid-century practice in that regard, but unusually virtuosic; according to

Nino Pirrotta Nino Pirrotta (13 June 1908 in Palermo – 22 January 1998 in Palermo) was an Italian musicologist of international renown who specialized in Italian music from the late medieval, Renaissance and early Baroque eras. Life and career In 1931 Pir ...

, it "represents the peak of virtuoso singing in the Italian madrigal, and therefore in the Italian Ars nova as a whole." Donato's madrigals usually feature an upper voice part which is more elaborate than the lower, and often use

imitation Imitation (from Latin ''imitatio'', "a copying, imitation") is a behavior whereby an individual observes and replicates another's behavior. Imitation is also a form of that leads to the "development of traditions, and ultimately our culture. I ...

between the two voices, though usually the imitative passages are short. In addition he uses repeated words and phrases, often with a humorous intent; the influence of the caccia is evident in this device. Jacopo da Bologna was probably an influence on his work, as can be seen in the single-voiced transitional passages between different verses of the madrigals, typical of Jacopo.

Notes

# N. Pirrotta: ''The Music of Fourteenth Century Italy'', 5 vols, 1954-1964, Vol 3., p. ii. (Quoted in Hoppin)

See also

Notes

Further reading