Giovanni Bernardino Nanino (ca. 1560 – 1623) was an

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and Defi ...

, teacher and singing master of the late

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...

and early

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

eras, and a leading member of the

Roman School In music history, the Roman School was a group of composers of predominantly church music, in Rome, during the 16th and 17th centuries, therefore spanning the late Renaissance and early Baroque eras. The term also refers to the music they produ ...

of composers. He was the younger brother of the somewhat more influential composer

Giovanni Maria Nanino Giovanni Maria Nanino (also Nanini; 1543 or 1544 – 11 March 1607) was an Italian composer and teacher of the late Renaissance. He was a member of the Roman School of composers, and was the most influential music teacher in Rome in the late 16t ...

Life

Born in

Vallerano Vallerano is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Viterbo in the Italian region Latium, located about northwest of Rome and about southeast of Viterbo. Vallerano borders the following municipalities: Canepina, Caprarola, Carbognano, Fa ...

, he was first a boy

soprano A soprano () is a type of classical female singing voice and has the highest vocal range of all voice types. The soprano's vocal range (using scientific pitch notation) is from approximately middle C (C4) = 261 Hz to "high A" (A5) = 880&n ...

in the local cathedral, just like his brother. His first post may have been as ''maestro di cappella'' at

Santa Maria dei Monti Santa Maria dei Monti (also known as Madonna dei Monti or Santa Maria ai Monti) is a cardinalatial titular church, located at 41 Via della Madonna dei Monti, at the intersection with Via dei Serpenti, in the rione Monti (rione of Rome), Monti of ...

in 1588, and he is known to have acquired the post of ''maestro di cappella'' at

San Luigi dei Francesi The Church of St. Louis of the French ( it, San Luigi dei Francesi, french: Saint Louis des Français, la, S. Ludovici Francorum de Urbe) is a Roman Catholic church in Rome, not far from Piazza Navona. The church is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, ...

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

in 1591, after his brother left to join the papal

choir A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which ...

. The two brothers, however, were living together at this time in a house owned by the church, and spent a good deal of their time teaching choirboys. Following the appointment at San Luigi dei Francesi, he was associated with Cardinal Montalto, a wealthy and influential patron of art and music, and may have served as teacher, composer, and archivist for the Cardinal at his church,

San Lorenzo in Damaso The Minor Basilica of St. Lawrence in Damaso (Basilica Minore di San Lorenzo in Damaso) or simply San Lorenzo in Damaso is a parish and titular church in central Rome, Italy that is dedicated to St. Lawrence, deacon and martyr. It is incorporated ...

Works

Nanino's music of the 1580s and 1590s is conservative in idiom, avoiding the experimental tendencies of his brother and

Marenzio Luca Marenzio (also Marentio; October 18, 1553 or 1554 – August 22, 1599) was an Italian composer and singer of the late Renaissance. He was one of the most renowned composers of madrigals, and wrote some of the most famous examples of the fo ...

, preferring instead to incorporate the technique and expressive style of the earlier Roman composers such as

Palestrina Palestrina (ancient ''Praeneste''; grc, Πραίνεστος, ''Prainestos'') is a modern Italian city and ''comune'' (municipality) with a population of about 22,000, in Lazio, about east of Rome. It is connected to the latter by the Via Pren ...

. After about 1610 he adopted the technique of

basso continuo Basso continuo parts, almost universal in the Baroque era (1600–1750), provided the harmonic structure of the music by supplying a bassline and a chord progression. The phrase is often shortened to continuo, and the instrumentalists playing th ...

in his sacred works — hardly a conservative tendency — and, significantly, something his brother never did. Much of his earlier music is secular (such as

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), but he published several books of

motet In Western classical music, a motet is mainly a vocal musical composition, of highly diverse form and style, from high medieval music to the present. The motet was one of the pre-eminent polyphonic forms of Renaissance music. According to Margar ...

s after 1610, after his brother's death. It is tempting to speculate that when he wrote music in the same format as his brother, he chose opposite stylistic means, and after his brother's death he quickly adopted the progressive style of the time, using it to write music in the same forms which his brother had used more conservatively.

Sources, further reading

* * *

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Nanino, Giovanni Bernardino Roman school composers 1560s births 1623 deaths Italian Baroque composers Renaissance composers Pupils of Giovanni Maria Nanino People from the Province of Viterbo Italian male classical composers 16th-century classical composers 17th-century Italian composers 16th-century Italian musicians 17th-century male musicians