GABRIELI, GIOVANNI

Pioneer baroque church composer whose creative innovations forwarded virtually every musical form; b. Venice, c. 1557; d. Venice, Aug. 12, 1612. He was the nephew and pupil of Andrea gabrieli, his only known relative, and rounded out his education in the Bavarian ducal chapel under lasso. In 1585, when Andrea Gabrieli succeeded merulo as first organist at St. Mark's in Venice, Giovanni succeeded his uncle at the second organ and kept this post until his death. He published chiefly his uncle's works and only a few of his own; many of his MSS disappeared during Napoleon's occupation of Venice. Preserved are 2 Mass fragments, 7 Magnificats (parts of 3 more), 1 litany, and some 85 symphoniae sacrae, choral works with or without instrumentation, destined for the Proper, Offices, and specifically Venetian holidays. Next in importance are his instrumental works: some 40 for organ and 37 for ensembles of from 8 to 22 parts. He produced also 30 madrigals (one a spiritual madrigal) and excelled in the Venetian dialogue and echo-madrigal.

The strong long-range influence of his printed output was in surprising contrast with its small quantity. The sacrae symphoniae, with their instrumental preludes and interludes, alternation of vocal solos, duets, and choirs, homophonic texture, and basso per l'organo, shaped the evolution of the baroque cantata perfected by J. S. bach. His stylistic innovations appear in initial and end repetition, recapitulation of the beginning at the end, ritornels, and use of register levels developed in the divided-choir technique for structural purposes. He assigned instrumental parts to specific instruments (first attempt at orchestration) and was one of the first to use dynamic signs, and the first to differentiate between canzone and sonata and to use sequential episodes in ricercari. Two top parts in imitation foreshadow the trio-sonata form basic to later baroque composition. His harmony is clear and simple; chromaticism is reserved for expressiveness in vocal works, while chordal declamation used in choral works is transferred to instrumental ensembles. These and other departures from tradition were soon reflected in the work of his many northern pupils, especially that of Heinrich schÜtz.

Bibliography: Opera omnia, ed. d. arnold, 3 v. (Corpus mensurabilis musicae, ed. American Institute of Musicology, v. 1–12.1–12.3; 1956–62). c. g. a. von winterfeld, Johannes Gabrieli und sein Zeitalter, 3 v. in 2 (Berlin 1834). e. f. kenton, Giovanni Gabrieli: His Life and Works (Rome 1966); "The Late Style of G. Gabrieli," Musical Quarterly (New York 1915–) 48 (1962) 427–443. d. arnold, "Music at the Scuola di San Rocco," Music and Letters 40 (1959) 229–241. g. reese, Music in the Renaissance (rev. ed. New York 1959). Histoire de la musique, ed. roland-manuel, 2 v. (Paris 1960–63); v. 9, 16 of Encyclopédie de la Pléiade v. 1. Enciclopedia della Musica (Milan 1963–). d. arnold and e. m. arnold, "Giovanni Gabrielli," in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. s. sadie, v. 7 (New York 1980) 54–60. r. charteris, "Newly Discovered Manuscript Parts and Annotations in a Copy of Giovanni Gabrieli's Symphoniae sacrae (1615)" Early Music 23 (1995) 487–496. h. pyun, "Modal Structure in Sixteen Instrumental Works from Giovanni Gabrielli's Sacrae Symphoniae (1597)" (Ph.D. diss. Rutgers University 1994). d. m. randel, ed., The Harvard Biographical Dictionary of Music (Cambridge, Mass. 1996) 289. n. slonimsky, ed., Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians (8th ed. New York 1992) 589.

[e. f. kenton]