Gian Francesco Malipiero – composer and musicologist

Musician revived interest in Monteverdi and composed music in the same spirit

Malipiero was born into an 
aristocratic Venetian family

A composer and editor whose work helped to rekindle interest in pre 19th century Italian music, Gian Francesco Malipiero, was born on this day in 1882 in Venice.

Malipiero’s own output, which included operas and orchestral works, has been assessed by experts as fusing modern techniques with the stylistic qualities of early Italian music.

The composer was born into an aristocratic Venetian family and was the grandson of the opera composer Francesco Malipiero. He studied music at the Vienna conservatory and then returned to Venice to carry on his studies.

He used to copy out the music of Claudio Monteverdi and Girolamo Frescobaldi at the Biblioteca Marciana in Venice, which inspired his love of music from that period.

He moved to Bologna to continue his studies and after graduating, returned to Venice and became an assistant to the blind composer Antonio Smareglia, which he later said taught him a great deal.

In 1913 he travelled to Paris where he was influenced by the music he heard there, from composers such as Ravel and Debussy. He attended the premiere of an opera by Stravinsky, La Sacre du Printemps, and described this experience as like awakening from a ‘long and dangerous lethargy.’ This was also when he first met the composer Alfredo Casello and the poet and playwright Gabriele D’Annunzio.

Malipiero found support from the
influential Gabriele D'Annunzio

For a while Malipiero was on good terms with Benito Mussolini, but he fell out of favour when the dictator did not like him writing the music for a Pirandello libretto. Although he dedicated his next opera to Mussolini, this did not help him regain the support of the Fascists.

Malipiero was appointed professor of composition at the Parma Conservatory in 1921 and subsequently became director at the Istituto Musicale Pollini in Padua.

In 1923 he joined with Casello and D’Annunzio in creating the Corporazione delle Nuove Musiche.

In the same year, he went to live permanently in the small hill town of Asolo in the Veneto, where he worked on editing a complete edition of Monteverdi’s work, making an invaluable contribution to the recovery and promotion of the composer’s music. He also collaborated with the Istituto Antonio Vivaldi in the publication of the complete instrumental works of the Venetian composer.

Malipiero was a prolific composer of operas, orchestral music, chamber music and music for the piano and the voice and said he found Asolo the ideal location for composing his own music. His work has been judged to reflect the spirit of 17th and 18th century Venetian music.

Malipiero died in Asolo in 1973 at the age of 91.

Malipiero used to study the music of Claudio
Monteverdi at the Biblioteca Marciana in Venice

Travel tip:

The Biblioteca Marciana in Venice, where Malipiero used to study the music of Monteverdi, is also known as the Sansovino Library after the architect Jacopo Sansovino, who designed it. It is opposite the Basilica in St Marks Square and is named to commemorate the patron saint of Venice. It is one of the earliest surviving public libraries and repositories of manuscripts in Italy and holds one of the world’s most important collections of classical texts. The library was founded in 1468 when a Cardinal and scholar donated his entire collection of Greek and Latin manuscripts to the Republic of Venice. The library is open to the public from Monday to Saturday but is closed on Sundays and Italian Bank Holidays.

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The Piazza Giuseppe Garibaldi is the main square
in the beautiful Veneto town of Asolo

Travel tip:

The beautiful hill town of Asolo in the Veneto, where Malipiero settled in later life, is known as ‘the pearl of the province of Treviso’ and ‘the city of a hundred horizons’ because of its beautiful views over the countryside and the mountains. The poet Robert Browning spent time in Asolo after he became a widower. He published Asolando, a volume of poetry written in the town, in 1889. The main road leading into the town is now named Via Browning in his honour. Asolo is also where the Queen of Cyprus, Caterina Cornaro, spent her last years. One of the main sights is the Castle of Caterina Cornaro, which now houses the Eleonora Duse Theatre.

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More reading:

How Monteverdi put the opera genre on the musical map

Why Girolamo Frescobaldi is seen as one of the 'fathers' of Italian music

The complicated genius of Gabriele D'Annunzio

Also on this day:

1848: The Five Days of Milan

1925: The birth of musician Alessandro Alessandroni

1944: The last eruption of Mount Vesuvius

1945: The birth of pop singer Bobby Solo

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Girolamo Frescobaldi – composer

Organist was a ‘father of Italian music’

Girolamo Frescobaldi was a strong influence on
a number of composers, including Bach

Girolamo Alessandro Frescobaldi, one of the first great masters of organ composition, was born on this day in 1583 in Ferrara.

Frescobaldi is famous for his instrumental works, many of which are compositions for the keyboard, but his canzone are of historical importance for the part they played in the development of pieces for small instrumental ensembles and he was to have a strong influence on the German Baroque school.

Frescobaldi began his career as organist at the church of Santa Maria in Trastevere in Rome in 1607. He travelled to the Netherlands the same year and published his first work, a book of madrigals, in Antwerp.

In 1608 he became the organist at St Peter’s Basilica in Rome and, except for a few years when he was court organist in Florence, he worked at St Peter’s until his death.

He married Orsola Travaglini in 1613 and they had five children.

Frescobaldi published 12 fantasie that are notable for their contrapuntal mastery.

The title page of Frescobaldi's important and
influential work, Fiori Musicali

In a collection of music published in 1626 he provides valuable information about performing his work. He writes in the preface: ‘Should the player find it tedious to play a piece right through he may choose such sections as he pleases provided only that he ends in the main key.’

A lot of his keyboard music was intended for the harpsichord as well as the organ. In another collection of his music published in 1627 he gives valuable information about the interpretation of Baroque instrumental music. He advises: ‘Play the opening of a toccata slowly and arpeggiando…if one hand has a trill while the other plays a passage, do not play note against note, but play the trill rapidly and the other expressively.’ Such directions indicate the extent to which keyboard style had developed between the Renaissance and the early Baroque period.

One of Frescobaldi’s most influential collections of compositions, Fiori Musicali, was published in 1635.

His work is known to have influenced Johann Sebastian Bach, Henry Purcell, Johann Pachelbel and many other composers. Bach is known to have owned a manuscript copy of Frescobaldi’s Fiori Musicali.

Frescobaldi died in Rome in 1643, aged 59. He was buried in the Church of Santi Apostoli but his tomb disappeared during work carried out on the church in the late 18th century. However, a grave bearing his name and honouring him as one of the fathers of Italian music exists in the church today.

A plaque marks Frescobaldi's
birthplace in Ferrara 

Travel tip:


There is a commemorative plaque on the front of the birthplace of Girolamo Frescobaldi in Ferrara, a city in Emilia-Romagna, about 50km (31 miles) northeast of Bologna. Ferrara was ruled by the Este family between 1240 and 1598. Building work on the magnificent Este Castle in the centre of the city began in 1385 and it was added to and improved by successive rulers of Ferrara until the end of the Este line.

The Church of Santi Apostoli in Rome, where Girolamo
Frescobaldi was buried following his death in 1643

Travel tip:

Girolamo Frescobaldi was buried in the Church of Santi Apostoli - the Church of the 12 Holy Apostles - a minor basilica in Piazza Santi Apostoli near Palazzo Quirinale in Rome. The Church was dedicated to St James and St Philip, whose remains are kept there and later to all the Apostles. Among the many Cardinal Priests who have served there are Pope Clement XIV, whose tomb by Canova is in the church, and Henry Benedict Stuart, the final Jacobite heir to claim the thrones of England, Scotland, France and Ireland publicly.

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