10.30am Eucharist – a Mass setting and anthem by Giovanni Gabrieli
accompanied by trumpets and trombones
6.0pm Evensong – Magnificat and anthem Beatus Vir by Claudio Monteverdi
accompanied by two violins and continuo
To put us all in the mood for the Hampstead Players’ production of The Merchant of Venice from 9-11 July, the service music on the preceding Sunday 5 July will feature historic music from Venice. The musicians (both singers and by tradition also instrumentalists) sang from choir galleries in the famous Basilica di San Marco – you can see the galleries at the upper level on both sides of the centre aisle below. But it was difficult in such a resonant building to get them to synchronise well, so composers began writing music for ‘cori spezzati’ or ‘separated’ choirs, singing alternately. Giovanni Gabrieli devised further contrasts between the groups, with upper voices in some, lower in others, and different instrumental tones such as bright brass trumpets and trombones. We shall hear some of his colourful music at the morning service.
Monteverdi arrived in Venice about 10 years later and took the idea further by contrasting solo voices against choral groups. This enabled him to write in a more free and expressive modern style – his anthem Beatus vir uses a tune from a secular canzonetta. This was the beginning of the musical Baroque, an era when composers began to express real human emotions in their music.
(Oh, and after Evensong there will be strawberries and prosecco in the churchyard …)
Venetian Music – Sunday 5 July
Gill Perrin