Ricercare [ricercar, recercar(e), recerchar(e), ricercata] (It.

: ‘to
search for’; Fr. recherché; Sp. recercada)
John Caldwell

https://doi.org/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.23373
Published in print: 20 January 2001
Published online: 2001

In its widest sense, a piece of an esoteric nature; a technical exercise either of a practical nature or
illustrative of some device of composition.

1. Introduction.

The general notion of musical composition as a process of seeking or finding is ancient: it is referred to
in the Vulgate by the very word from which ‘ricercare’ is derived (‘requirentes modos musicos’,
Ecclesiasticus xliv.5; Revised Standard Version: ‘those who composed musical tunes’; Authorized
Version: ‘such as found out musical tunes’) and is presumably the concept expressed in the terms
‘troubadour’ and ‘trouvère’, although these were primarily used of poets or poet-musicians rather than
simply of composers. The idea reappears in the term Invention, and there is much to be said for the
view that links the tradition of the didactic duet, often called ‘ricercare’ (see §3), with Bach's two-part
inventions.

Originally the term ‘ricercare’ was used for a piece of preludial character for lute or keyboard
instrument (as in the expression ‘ricercare le corde’, ‘to try out the strings’), giving it a meaning
comparable to that of ‘tastar’, ‘tañer’, ‘tiento’ etc. (see Toccata and Tiento). The commonest type
subsequently was the imitative ricercare, similar in scope to the fantasia and fugue. Some uses appear
to combine two different meanings of the word, as, for example, imitative ricercares designed as
exercises in vocalization, or elaborate and technically difficult compositions for viol illustrating the
technique of setting a cantus firmus.

Few early authors attempted a comprehensive definition of the ricercare. For Vincenzo Galilei (Dialogo,
1581, p.87) it was a fugal form, comparable in its excessive complexity to the verse form known as the
sestina. For Michael Praetorius also (Syntagma musicum, iii, 1618, pp.21–2) it was imitative, the
equivalent of the fuga, which by that date had come to acquire something like its present-day meaning.
Many 18th- and early 19th-century compilers of dictionaries mentioned its preludial function, often
without referring to its fugal connotation; they include Brossard (1703), Walther (1732; his is a fuller
definition than most, citing among others Galilei, Praetorius and Brossard), Rousseau (1768) and
Lichtenthal (1826). All referred to the literal meaning of the Italian verb, which is usually glossed by
the Latin ‘exquirere’ and similar words; and Rousseau, who gave only the French form ‘recherché’,
added that it was also used as the equivalent of ‘cadence’, a cadenza or improvisatory flourish over a
cadential pedal point (see the full title of Giovanni Bassano's Ricercate referred to in §2 below).

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2. The preludial or rhapsodic ricercare.

The term first occurs in Spinacino's Intabulatura de lauto libro primo (Venice, 1507/R). The 17
ricercares are placed at the end, and while in most of them the title is unqualified, in two cases it
suggests a preludial function by referring to a chanson intabulated earlier in the volume (e.g.
Recercare de tous biens). There are another ten in Spinacino's second book of the same year. In J.A.
Dalza's Intabolatura de lauto libro quarto (1508), four of the pieces called ‘tastar de corde’ are followed
by ricercares, usually called ‘ricercare dietro’ (‘following’). Thus there may already have been a
distinction between the most simple kind of ‘trying-out’ and the more artistic, purely rhapsodic piece.
Most of these early ricercares, like those in the Capirola Lutebook (see Capirola, Vincenzo), include
both chordal and scale passages and are as much ancestors of the toccata as of any other type.

The preludial style of ricercare was transferred to the keyboard in M.A. Cavazzoni's Recerchari,
motetti, canzoni … libro primo (1523/R). Here the two ricercares serve as preludes to two motet
transcriptions, Salve virgo and O stella maris respectively. They are extended compositions of
considerable interest, with passages of imitation but not primarily based on an imitative principle. One
of their chief attractions is the idiomatic keyboard writing, chords and runs being blended together
with great skill into a full yet clear texture. Several similar pieces, including another by M.A. Cavazzoni
and one by ‘Jaches’ (perhaps Jacques Brunel, organist at Ferrara, 1532–64) are found in a source from
Castell'Arquato (see Sources of keyboard music to 1660, §2, (i)). That source also includes some of the
earliest surviving examples of the imitative ricercare, including one by ‘Jaches’ and four by Giacomo
Fogliano.

The non-imitative ricercare did not entirely die out after the early 16th century; examples for solo viol
are found in the works of Sylvestro di Ganassi dal Fontego and Diego Ortiz. The former included eight
solo ricercares in his two instruction books of 1542–3. Ortiz, in his Trattado de glosas (1553), used the
term ‘recercada’ not only in the sense of a rhapsodic piece for solo viol but also for viol and keyboard
works based on various grounds (in which case the keyboard player added chords above the bass line),
and transcriptions of vocal polyphonic pieces for the same medium. The six pieces based on the basse
danse melody known as ‘La Spagna’ belong to a whole tradition of didactic works using this
widespread cantus firmus. Those of Ortiz are perhaps the first to be designated ricercares; most of
their successors, however, belong to the imitative type rather than to the improvisatory type cultivated
by Ortiz. The close association between the ricercare and the Renaissance practice of diminution is
exemplified in Giovanni Bassano's Ricercate, passaggi et cadentie (1585).

3. The imitative ricercare.

The precise origin of the imitative ricercare is disputed. Many scholars have assumed that it was the
instrumental counterpart to the motet and derived directly from it. The study of the earliest
instrumental ricercares cast doubt on this premise and suggested that the purely imitative type arose
from the use of occasional imitation in the rhapsodic type; but this hypothesis overlooks the place of
the ensemble ricercare in the development of the form. The anthology Musica nova (RISM 1540²²)
contains 18 compositions (out of 21) labelled ‘R’ for ‘ricercare’, all of which (together with two of the
untitled works) are in motet style with pervading imitation. When it is remembered that the term
‘motet’ does not exclude cantus firmus and chordal techniques, its relevance to the history of the

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ricercare is seen to be considerable. The ricercares of M.A. Cavazzoni are strikingly similar to what
one might expect of a keyboard arrangement of an inconsistently imitative motet; they are indeed
closely related in style to the motet arrangements that follow them in the printed source. Thus the
motet has a direct bearing on the early history of both the imitative and (at least in the case of
keyboard music) the non-imitative or partly imitative forms. A similar transition from the non-imitative
to the imitative type of ricercare is found in lute sources, probably through the influence of the
keyboard form, as for example in the publications of Simon Gintzler (1547), Bakfark (1552) and Galilei
(Intavolature de lauto … madrigali e ricercate, libro primo, 1563).

The ricercares of Musica nova, by Julio Segni, Willaert, Girolamo Cavazzoni and others, have the form
of a consistently imitative motet. Several short themes are given fugal treatment in turn. Although
some works use more themes than would a motet of the same length, the general similarity to the
sacred vocal style of the generation of Clemens and Gombert is unmistakable. The parts (all but one of
24
which have to be reconstructed from a French reprint, Musicque de joye, RISM c1550 ) show severe
melodic lines, but these may have been ornamented in performance.

The early type of imitative organ ricercare is represented by the four examples in Girolamo Cavazzoni's
Intavolatura cioe recercari canzoni himni magnificati (1543). They differ from the ensemble form only
in the provision of ornamented melodic lines, notably at cadences. Sometimes the ornamentation
blossoms out into lengthy scales and runs, resulting in a climactic effect peculiar to the early keyboard
form, as, for example, towards the end of no.2. Although a few organ works of this period are virtually
unornamented in the sources, there can be little doubt that they would have been embellished in
performance.

The title-page of Musica nova indicates that its contents could be sung, or played on organs or other
instruments, and the implied flexibility is found in the title-pages of many of its successors. These
include Jacques Buus, Recercari … da cantare et sonare d'organo et altri stromenti (1547 and 1549);
Giuliano Tiburtino, Fantasie et recerchari … da cantare et sonare per ogni instrumento (1549);
Willaert, Fantasie recercari contrapunti a tre voci di M. Adriano et de altri autori appropriati per
cantare et sonare d'ogni sorte di stromenti (1551); and Annibale Padovano, Il primo libro de ricercari a
quattro voci (1556). One of the pieces from the second volume of Buus's work is actually included in his
Intabolatura d'organo di recercari published in the same year (1549); thus it is possible to compare an
embellished intabulation of the period with its plain original. The technique of ornamentation, in this
as in his other organ ricercares, is more elaborate than in those of Cavazzoni. A written-out and
embellished keyboard score of an ensemble ricercare is a rarity in this period, and organists normally
had to make their own copies from the printed partbooks, until in the late 16th century publishers took
to providing an open score (‘partitura’), either in addition to or instead of the separate parts.

Singers could perform these works to the appropriate solmization syllables. The term ‘ricercare da
cantare’ occurs as late as Claudio Merulo’s third book (1608), while the four-part ensemble ricercare
itself was cultivated at least until the publication of Antonio Cifra's Ricercari e canzoni franzese … libro
primo (1619), published in four partbooks, with a separate organ score. (The second book, also 1619, is
in score only and was probably originally for keyboard, though considered an ensemble work by
Frotscher and Apel.) Of particular interest in the history of the ensemble ricercare are the works on
‘La Spagna’ by Mayone (1609) and Trabaci (1615). The element of vocal exercise is also provided by
numerous collections of duets in imitative style, such as Francesco Guami's Ricercari a due voci (1588),
Lassus's Motetti et ricercari (1585) and the famous Ricercari a canto e tenore by Grammatio Metallo

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(possibly first published in 1591; a 1595 edition, also lost, is mentioned by Fétis; for extant 17th-
century editions see below). Such didactic duets do not always bear the heading ‘ricercare’: there are
no specific titles to the pieces in Eustachio Romano's Musica duorum (1521) nor to those in Morley's A
Plaine and Easie Introduction (1597) (see also Bicinium).

The use of the term Fantasia to denote a piece in fugal style probably arose from the development of
the monothematic ricercare, in which the main structural feature of the motet, the contrapuntal
treatment of several themes in turn, was abandoned in place of a much stricter design. Later still,
when the term ‘ricercare’ had acquired an archaic connotation, ‘fantasia’ was used even for
monothematic works (such as those by Sweelinck and Frescobaldi) if they were in a modern style or
contained elements of rhythmic liveliness. Nevertheless, at least one of Sweelinck’s fantasias is called
‘ricercare’ in its two sources, and one should not set too much store by the vagaries of 16th- and 17th-
century nomenclature.

One of the earliest examples of a monothematic ricercare comes from Buus's first book. It is an arid
piece, as one might expect of a lengthy experimental composition devoted to the exploration of a new
technique. The form was further developed by Andrea Gabrieli, whose four volumes containing
ricercares were printed posthumously in 1595, 1596 and 1605. The Libro secondo (1595) contains 11
ricercares (together with two by his nephew Giovanni); the Libro terzo (1596) has a further six; the
Libro quinto (1605; a fourth book of which the contents are unknown has disappeared altogether) gives
seven more, while the Libro sesto of the same year includes one. Gabrieli's ricercares illustrate a
gradual reduction in the number of subjects, five actually being monothematic. Gabrieli made frequent
use of inversion, augmentation, diminution and other fugal techniques. Moreover, he was perhaps the
initiator of the device that can only be called the countersubject, invertible and appearing with most
occurrences of the subject. Although the technique is not used with the regularity found in the later
fugue, it clearly foreshadows that treatment. Gabrieli did not introduce the countersubject until the
second entry of the subject (in other words, it is a continuation of the first voice), but later composers
introduced two, three or even four subjects simultaneously from the outset. This technique is the
ancestor of the double, triple and quadruple fugue and is not to be confused with the earlier method of
working several themes in succession. In a sense, works such as these are monothematic fugues on a
single two-, three- or four-part subject.

Andrea Gabrieli's fifth book contains seven works described collectively on the title-page as ‘ricercari
ariosi’. In the body of the book four of them are designated simply ‘ricercar arioso’, while the
remaining three are based on French chansons: ‘Ricercar sopra Martin menoit’, ‘… Orsus au coup’ and
‘… Pour ung plaisir’. Each follows a canzona based on the same material; but whereas the canzonas
are fairly strict intabulations of their vocal models, the ricercares are rather freer fugal paraphrases
and use longer note values. The ‘ricercari ariosi’ may also be based on vocal models. Although most
organ music of the 1560s and later tended to use shorter note values, semiquavers now being as
frequent as quavers had been in the works of Girolamo Cavazzoni, the development in the organ
ricercare stopped short at the point reached by Buus, and in some cases reverted to a still plainer
manner, perhaps as a conscious archaism.

The ricercares of Annibale Padovano, Sperindio Bertoldo and Claudio Merulo, like those of Andrea
Gabrieli, survive only in posthumous prints or reprints. Merulo's ricercares (originally published in
1567) are not representative of his best work and include no monothematic examples. The ricercares
of the Neapolitans Rocco Rodio (1575) and Antonio Valente (1576) are more significant. Rodio,

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particularly, included passages requiring virtuoso technique and extremes of chromaticism which
recall the pedagogic significance of the term ‘ricercare’. The collections of Mayone and Trabaci follow
in the same tradition.

Volumes six and seven of the Giordano collection in Turin (see Sources of keyboard music to 1660, §2,
(iii)) are devoted to ricercares. Although the word is there also applied to non-Italian works, given
other designations by their composers, there are genuine examples of the form, including six that may
be attributed to Giovanni Gabrieli with some confidence. These ricercares, like two by Giovanni
Gabrieli printed in Andrea's Libro secondo (1595), use shorter note values than do those of his uncle
and include antiphonal passages between high and low groups of parts in a manner reminiscent of
Giovanni Gabrieli's ensemble music. While the Turin manuscripts separate the genres, several other
sources include ricercare-canzona pairs based on the same material.

The high point of the organ ricercare was reached in the works of Frescobaldi. His Ricercari et canzoni
was first published in 1615 and was reprinted with the capriccios in 1626. Some of the ten ricercares
have several sections devoted to different subjects; others treat one or more subjects simultaneously
from the beginning or nearly the beginning of the piece. In the first, three subjects are combined in
this way. The ninth is based on four subjects; the fourth, sixth, seventh and tenth are based on
solmization syllables; in the last case the subject is repeated throughout in the top voice only, against a
multi-sectional ricercare that unfolds in the lowest three voices. The second consists in effect of three
double fugues in which both subject and countersubject are treated alternately in their original form
and in inversion. The eighth is subtitled ‘obbligo di non uscir in grado’: that is, no part may at any time
proceed by step. These ricercares, in spite of their severity, their archaic flavour and their comparative
immaturity, are interesting for their single-minded pursuit of the contrapuntal ideal. The ricercares of
Frescobaldi's Fiori musicali (1635), which were intended to replace the liturgical offertory, give a
rather different impression. Four are multi-sectional in form. The sections are marked off by pauses,
probably to indicate possible terminations in the context of liturgical performance. The ricercare of the
first mass is an example of what may be called the variation ricercare: in each of its two sections the
main theme is combined with different counterpoints. This technique is seen to perfection in the
magisterial ‘recercar cromaticho’ from the second mass, which is in three sections and is preceded by
a short toccata. The first ricercare of the third mass is similar in scope. In the alternative piece from
the second mass, on the other hand, the main subjects, presented separately in the first three sections,
are combined in the last. The last of these works has an optional fifth part, an ostinato which the
performer must not only fit correctly into the polyphonic texture but also sing himself.

The tradition of the keyboard ricercare continued in Italy with such composers as Giovanni Salvatore
(1641), G.B. Fasolo (1645), Bernardo Storace (1664), Luigi Battiferri (1669), Fabrizio Fontana (1677)
and Gregorio Strozzi (1687). It seems fairly clear that one of its main functions in this period was to
replace the liturgical offertory, and perhaps also other items of the Proper, when these were not
explicitly provided for in the numerous organists' handbooks of the day; indeed, it is explained in
Fasolo's Annuale that they may be used instead of the short substitutes provided for both the Gradual
and the Offertory. Though the regular four-part ensemble ricercare virtually disappeared after
Giovanni Cavaccio's Sudori musicali (1626), the two-voice type continued with G.B. Cali (1605), Giorgio
Gentile (1642), Cristofano Piochi (1671 and 1673) and Stefano Corti (1685), as well as with Metallo’s
ricercares, which passed through at least 12 editions between 1605 and 1685. Piochi's 1671 volume
also includes three-part works, to which his publication of 1675 is devoted. The character of a technical
exercise is preserved in the 12 short unaccompanied fanfare-like ricercares from Girolamo Fantini's

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Modo per imparare a sonare di tromba (1638), and in such later publications as G.B. Degli Antoni's
Ricercate sopra il violoncello o cembalo (1687) and Ricercate a violino e violoncello o cembalo (1690),
as well as in the manuscript Ricercari per violoncello solo by Domenico Gabrielli (1690).

In Austria and Germany the severe manner of Frescobaldi was continued by Froberger, whose 14
ricercares are monothematic and employ the variation principle. The works in C♯ minor and F♯ minor
exhibit the growing tendency towards tonal experimentation (both the severity and the tonal
adventurousness are reflected in the fugues of J.C.F. Fischer's Ariadne musica). Other German
composers of ricercares include Johann Krieger and Pachelbel; but the form did not undergo any
rejuvenation until the time of Bach, who was probably thinking of its monothematic aspect when he
revived the term in the Musical Offering. The king's subject, unsuited to stretto, is surrounded by a
wealth of different counterpoints in the three-part work which begins the collection and in the massive
six-part work which is its culmination. Though the latter exists in a two-staff version in Bach's own
hand and was certainly intended primarily for the keyboard, he published it in open score and in so
doing (as in the Art of Fugue, where the term ‘contrapunctus’ is chosen) revived an old Italian notation
with all its implications of an idealized counterpoint irrespective of medium. The few modern
composers who have used the term have generally implied by it a severe fugue with archaic
mannerisms.

Bibliography
ApelG

BrownI

FétisB

FrotscherG

MeyerMS

SartoriB

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H. Opieński: ‘Quelques considérations sur l'origine des Ricercari pour luth’, Mélanges de
musicologie offerts à M. Lionel de la Laurencie (Paris, 1933), 39–45

A. Einstein: ‘Vincenzo Galilei and the Instructive Duo’, ML, 18 (1937), 360–68

K. Jeppesen: Die italienische Orgelmusik am Anfang des Cinquecento (Copenhagen, 1943,

2/1960)

G. Sutherland: ‘The Ricercari of Jacques Buus’, MQ, 31 (1945), 448–63

W. Apel: ‘The Early Development of the Organ Ricercar’, MD, 3 (1949), 139–50

H.H. Eggebrecht: ‘Terminus “Ricercar”’, AMw, 9 (1952), 137–47

H.H. Eggebrecht: Studien zur musikalischen Terminologie (Mainz, 1955, 2/1968)

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O. Gombosi: Preface to Compositione di Meser Vincenzo Capirola:Lute-book (circa 1517)
(Neuilly-sur-Seine, 1955/R)

R.M. Murphy: ‘Fantaisie et ricercare dans les premières tablatures de luth du XVIe siècle’, Le
luth et sa musique: Neuilly-sur-Seine 1957, 127–42

I. Horsley: ‘The Solo Ricercar in Diminution Manuals: New Light on Early Wind and String
Techniques’, AcM, 33 (1961), 29–40

H.C. Slim: The Keyboard Ricercar and Fantasia in Italy, ca. 1500–1550 (diss., Harvard U., 1961)

H.C. Slim: ‘Keyboard Music at Castell'Arquato by an Early Madrigalist’, JAMS, 15 (1962), 35–47

R.S. Douglass: The Keyboard Ricercare in the Baroque Era (diss., North Texas State U., 1963)

E.E. Lowinsky: Foreword to Musica nova, ed. H.C. Slim, MRM, 1 (1964)

S. Bonta: ‘The Uses of the Sonata da Chiesa’, JAMS, 22 (1969), 54–84

H.R. Chase: German, Italian and Dutch Fugal Precursors of the Fugues in the ‘Well-Tempered
Clavier I’, 1600–1722 (diss., Indiana U., 1970)

D. Kämper: Studien zur instrumentalen Ensemblemusik des 16. Jahrhunderts in Italien, AnMc,
no.10 (1970)

H.M. Brown and E.E. Lowinsky: Introduction to Eustachio Romano: ‘Musica duorum’, Rome
1521, MRM, 6 (1975)

E. Selfridge-Field: Venetian Instrumental Music from Gabrieli to Vivaldi (Oxford, 1975)

W. Kirkendale: ‘Ciceronians versus Aristotelians on the Ricercar as Exordium, from Bembo to

Bach’, JAMS, 32 (1979), 1–44

A. Silbiger: Italian Manuscript Sources of Seventeenth-Century Keyboard Music (Ann Arbor,

1980)

A. Silbiger: ‘The Roman Frescobaldi Tradition, c. 1640–1670’, JAMS, 33 (1980), 42–87

R. d'A. Jensen: ‘A Computerized Approach to the Early Italian Lute Ricercar’, JLSA, 17–18 (1984–
5), 106–13

See also

Fugue, §3: 16th-century instrumental music

Toccata, §1: The Renaissance

Variations, §6(ii): The later 17th century

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