Throughout the Middle Ages and Renaissance, Venice, the "Most Serene Republic," was one of the most exciting cities in Europe. The center of trade with the east, Venice was an extraordinarily wealthy, powerful, and cosmopolitan city. The ruling doge was selected by the ruling oligarchy and was more of a protector of the republic than a ruler. During the 16th century, high renaissance Venice was at a cultural pinnacle. Composers like Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli, Adrian Willaert, and Claudio Merlo thrived in a musical environment that called for grand works that reflected the glory of Venice.
Venice and St. Mark's in particular had very unique cultural and religious traditions. The cathedral was under the authority of the ruling doge instead of any ecclesiastical authority. Because of this, Venice had a different musical and liturgical tradition than Rome, though it was considered a strong Catholic stronghold. Venice had a love affair with processions, ceremonies and pomp. The celebrations of feast days like St. Mark's day and Ascension day were important not only to instill patriotic pride in Venetians, but also served to impress foreigners with Venice's wealth and importance. Instrumental works and choral madrigals accompanied the processions of the doge and other celebrations. But the center of Venetian music was St. Mark's cathedral itself. Built in the manner of eastern basilicas, it had 2 choir lofts with 2 organs that came to define Venetian music. Composers learned to write for "cori spezzati" or separate choirs and exploit the effects possible. The acoustics of St. Mark's made polyphony sound muddled and caused composers to begin to write music that was more chordal with emphasis on sound and clarity of text. The Venetians love of pomp also led composers to include instruments as part of the choir and in 1567, salaried musicians were hired at St. Mark's. These styles and techniques would have a large influence on composers all over Europe as Venice became the musical center of Italy.
Adrian Willaert was a maestro di cappella of Saint Mark's. A composer of mostly choral sacred music, his began the Venetian tradition of clear text by placing syllables specifically with musical notes. His music was more chromatic than other music of the time, though his masses were generally in the style of Josquin de Prez. He was one of the first composers of 16th century madrigals, but is mainly remembered for his motets. A very influential musician, his pupils included Andrea Gabrieli and Gioseffe Zarlino.
Zarlino was the first maestro di cappella of Saint Mark's. He studied under Willaert and was an important theorist of the renaissance, writing 2 large treatises, Institutioni Armoniche and Dimostrationi Armoniche in which he tried to summarize and develop Greek music theory.
Gabrieli was an organist at Saint Mark's and a prolific composer. In addition to his large body of organ works, he also composed many works for Venetian festivals and major religious holidays. His music could best be described as festive and is known for exciting rhythms, simple harmonies, and meticulous counterpoint. He also exploited the tone qualities, colors, and antiphonal effects made possible by the cori spezzati. He was largely influenced by Orlando di Lasso and was a teacher for his nephew Giovanni Gabrieli and Giovanni Croce.
Merulo was an organist at Saint Mark's at the same time as Andrea Gabrieli. He published a large collection of organ works including toccatas. He taught Giovanni Gabrieli much about ornamentation and improvisation. His grand choral works are known for his use of large forces and their resulting greater sonority.
Guami was a student of Willaert and a colleague of Giovanni Gabrieli in Munich and Saint Mark's. The use of counterpoint and imitative tags in his motets are in the same style as Lasso. He wrote large scale motets with 10-12 voices like other Venetians, but did not use split choirs!
Giovanni Gabrieli is the most important Venetian composer and quite possibly one of the most influential composers of the high renaissance. Like his uncle, Andrea Gabrieli, he studied with Orlando Di Lasso in Munich. He also studied with Andrea in Venice before becoming the second organist at Saint Mark's (his uncle was the other organist). A very prolific composer, he is known for his many motets and madrigals and was one of the first composers to write instrumental music.
Gabrieli's music exemplifies the Venetian style. His grand pieces are known for their use of contrasts, (high notes vs. low notes, contrapuntal sections vs. chordal sections, rhythmic sections vs. sublime sections) frequent cadential progressions, and use of harmony rather than counterpoint. His motets contain very little dissonance, clear words in a simple texture, and use lots of common tones to allow for smooth counterpoint. He also made use of the anachrusis to create tension and switch between the choirs. His motets also almost abandoned counterpoint in favor of chordal harmony. Like most other Venetians he tried to make the music match the text.
Gabrieli was a pioneer in writing instrumental music. When he used brass and string instruments in combination with a choir, they did more than just double singers. The independent instrumental lines in choral music are known as sinfonia. He wrote many virtuosic canzonasthat had separate, antiphonal choirs and made use of syncopation, change in meter, and bass lines moving in 4ths and 5ths. He also wrote several sonatas for brass choirs, but these were largely identical to choral motets with the parts written in SATB.
Another pupil of Zarlino, Croce is considered to be the true musical successor of Andrea Gabrieli. He published several madrigals annually that were based on relatively few, simple progressions. His music is pretty light and straight-forward in the style of Andrea and the words and music are very good at combining the music and text. Besides publishing madrigals and motets, he also wrote music for Venetian festivals.
Besides being one of the most prolific composers of the renaissance with over 2000 compositions, Orlando Di Lasso was also a major influence on the Venetian school. While serving at the Bavarian court in Munich, he taught both Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli. His music is also like the Venetians in his use of textual clarity, tonal cadences, full triads, and a bass line moving in 4ths and 5ths. The way he matched text and music in his choral works was also very important in influencing the Venetian composers.
A composer in both Augsburg and Nuremberg, Hassler studied with Andrea Gabrieli in Venice. He helped to export the Venetian style to Germany in his use of large choirs, including his motets for 8 to 12 voices.
Heinrich Schütz is considered the most important German composer of the renaissance. He studied with Giovanni Gabrieli in Venice before becoming the chapel master for the Elector of Saxony in Dresden. His use of contrasting vocal colors, cori spezzati, and large choirs are all techniques he learned from Gabrieli and the Venetians. In addition, he combined the lyric and dramatic elements of Venetian music with German polyphony.
Not much can be said about Schein except that he served as a bridge between the Venetian music of the high renaissance and the Baroque period. His choral works were written in the Venetian style with large, split choirs but they had German text and included a basso continuo.