Claudio Monteverdi 1567 – 1643
Claudio Monteverdi was born in Cremona, Italy in 1567 becoming the fifth member of a family of four. Along with his mother and father, he had also had a brother and sister. He had somewhat of an eccentric childhood, to the point of being a bit strange and tragic. His father was a chemist but actually practiced medicine, which of course even at this time was illegal. His mother actually died when he was nine years of age. His father remarried again, but his second wife died when Monteverde was 16. His father remarried once again. You can imagine how difficult this must be on a child. Nevertheless, he received a fine musical education at the cathedral’s Maestro di Cappella. By the age of 16, he had already published many musical works, among them a three-part motet and eight books of madrigals.
A year after publishing his works, he started working for a powerful family, known as the Gonzaga family, in Mantua, working as a string player. It was because of this that his name grew. He played played the viola da gamba, a type of stringed renaissance instrument. You can only imagine what connections can be made working for such a court. He also travelled around Europe performing, having joined the Duke of Mantua’s travelling court. At the age of 34, he married one of the court’s singers whose name was Claudia. They had 3 children together, but unfortunately, one had died, leaving them only two remaining. Around 1607, after only 6 years of marriage, Monteverdi’s wife ended up dying.
It was around the time of his wife’s death that one of his great works ‘la favola d’Orfeo’ was premiered in Mantua. Although the piece was originally written by Jacopo Peri, Monteverdi’s version used a lot of instruments and focused more on musical aspects to perform the opera. Better said, he is ascribed as being responsible for this work’s orchestration. He used stringed instruments for example to portray the character Orpheus, a character which had always been associated with the lyre.
Eleven years before his death, he became a catholic priest. Even this did not take him away from his music. In 1637, due to the opening of the first public opera house in Venice, he was inspired to write two more works, ‘Il ritorno d’Ulisse’ and ‘L’incoronazion di Poppea.’ After visiting Cremona for the last time and shortly after returning to Venice, he died that very year.
Monteverdi lived during an interesting time of transition, namely the transition of the renaissance and baroque eras. It was a change that he encouraged with his genius and musical composition abilities, helping to change and develop existing musical styles. He is a man that lived through a lot of hardship in life, family death, a broken up family, losing the love of his life, but this did not stop him from being one of the most significant composers in history.
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