Giovanni de' Bardi (5 February 1534 – September 1612), Count of

Vernio Vernio is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Prato in the Italian region Tuscany, located about northwest of Florence and about north of Prato. History Vernio's name derives from that of an ancient Roman winter camp ('' castra ...

, was an Italian literary critic, writer, composer and soldier.

Biography

Giovanni de' Bardi was born in

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 ...

. While he received a deep classical education, becoming proficient in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...

and

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

as well as learning the craft of music composition, his early years were largely spent as a soldier. Under Grand Duke Cosimo I of Tuscany he fought against

Siena Siena ( , ; lat, Sena Iulia) is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena. The city is historically linked to commercial and banking activities, having been a major banking center until the 13th and 14th centur ...

, and later he fought at the Siege of

Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...

(1565) against the Turks. After Malta, and now a captain, he assisted Maximilian II in defeating the Turks in

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Cr ...

. But when he was not away on military campaigns, he was busy in Florence and elsewhere as a patron of music and the arts. Bardi is mainly famous for being host, patron, and inspiration to the group of composers, music theorists and scholars who made up the

Florentine Camerata The Florentine Camerata, also known as the Camerata de' Bardi, were a group of humanists, musicians, poets and intellectuals in late Renaissance Florence who gathered under the patronage of Count Giovanni de' Bardi to discuss and guide trends i ...

, the group which attempted to restore the aesthetic effect of ancient Greek music to contemporary practice. The group included

Vincenzo Galilei Vincenzo Galilei (born 3 April 1520, Santa Maria a Monte, Italy died 2 July 1591, Florence, Italy) was an Italian lutenist, composer, and music theorist. His children included the astronomer and physicist Galileo Galilei and the lute virtuoso and ...

(father of the astronomer

Galileo Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642) was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a polymath. Commonly referred to as Galileo, his name was pronounced (, ). He was ...

Giulio Caccini Giulio Romolo Caccini (also Giulio Romano) (8 October 1551 – buried 10 December 1618) was an Italian composer, teacher, singer, instrumentalist and writer of the late Renaissance and early Baroque eras. He was one of the founders of the genre o ...

, and Pietro Strozzi (composer), and derived its inspiration from a correspondence with

Girolamo Mei Girolamo Mei (27 May 1519 – July 1594) was an Italian historian and humanist, famous in music history for providing the intellectual impetus to the Florentine Camerata, which attempted to revive ancient Greek music drama. He was born in Flor ...

, the foremost scholar of ancient Greek drama and music at the time. The result of the association was the invention of monody, and shortly thereafter,

opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libr ...

; in addition, the innovations brought to music by the Camerata under the guidance of Bardi were one of the defining characteristics of what we now know as

Baroque music Baroque music ( or ) refers to the period or dominant style of Western classical music composed from about 1600 to 1750. The Baroque style followed the Renaissance period, and was followed in turn by the Classical period after a short transit ...

. Although he was also a composer, relatively few of his works survive: only a handful of madrigals. Curiously, he seems not to have tried his hand at the new monody himself. He also either organized or wrote parts for various ''

intermedi The intermedio (also intromessa, introdutto, tramessa, tramezzo, intermezzo, intermedii), in the Italian Renaissance, was a theatrical performance or spectacle with music and often dance, which was performed between the acts of a play to celeb ...

'' in Florence, the popular court entertainments which took place between the acts of spoken dramas (and which included acting, singing, dancing, and mime — thus being another important precursor to opera). He also wrote plays, including some of the plays for which he also provided the ''intermedi''.

thought highly of Bardi, and dedicated his famous ''Dialogo della musica antica et della moderna'' to him. In the ''Dialogo'', Galilei condemns

polyphony Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, ...

, praises monody, and expresses the wish that the musical practice of the ancient Greeks would be restored; corrupt and incomprehensible contemporary music would be replaced with an idealized version of the supposed music of the ancient time. The

Counter-Reformation The Counter-Reformation (), also called the Catholic Reformation () or the Catholic Revival, was the period of Catholic resurgence that was initiated in response to the Protestant Reformation. It began with the Council of Trent (1545–1563) a ...

Council of Trent The Council of Trent ( la, Concilium Tridentinum), held between 1545 and 1563 in Trent (or Trento), now in northern Italy, was the 19th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. Prompted by the Protestant Reformation, it has been described a ...

had just finished condemning polyphonic practice, for the same supposed fault (it was too hard to understand the sung text), but for spiritual rather than secular reasons.

References and further reading

* "Camerata", "Giovanni de Bardi" in ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'', ed. Stanley Sadie. 20 vol. London, Macmillan Publishers Ltd., 1980. * Gustave Reese, ''Music in the Renaissance''. New York, W.W. Norton & Co., 1954.

External links

* * Francesca Chiarelli a
goldsmiths.ac.uk
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