Rodolfo 
Baroncini
Monteverdi in Venice: new documents and
perspectives
W e know more about Monteverdi’s career in
Mantua than about his time in Venice, even
though it lasted longer and was relatively fruitful
in creative terms. Matters are still less clear in this
regard because save for his late operas from 1640–43,
scholars have tended to focus on the composer’s role
as maestro di cappella at St Mark’s Basilica.1 This
imbalance between Mantua and Venice has been
generated not just by the large number of studies
dedicated to reconstructing the musical and cul-
tural environments of the Gonzaga court, but also
by Monteverdi’s own surviving correspondence: his
letters provide important information on his biog-
raphy and on his views on musical aesthetics and
rhetoric, but save for a few cases, Venice appears
overshadowed in them, given that most are written
to individuals in Mantua.2
There is a pressing need to document Monteverdi’s
Venetian period in greater depth not just to fill out
his biography, but also because this is crucial to
understanding the context and content of the large
corpus of sacred, secular and theatrical music that
he produced during his three decades there. This
task has long been impeded, however, by two partly
connected issues: on the one hand, our limited and
somewhat haphazard grasp of the specific complexi-
ties of Venetian socio-cultural and musical contexts;
and on the other, the tendency to grant Monteverdi
too great an influence over other musicians in Venice
in this period. To avoid these pitfalls, we must strive
to define the musical and socio-cultural realities of
Venice in the first four decades of the 17th century—
by way of paying renewed attention to the sources—
and also to challenge the one-sided perspective from
which Monteverdi’s position within his new home
Early Music, Vol. xlv, No. 3 © The Author 2017. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.
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is normally considered, given that it likely involved
a more reciprocal give-and-take than some have
tended to assume.3 This invites us also to consider
the extent to which the Venetian context had an
impact on Monteverdi’s music from the last 30 years
of his life. For example, it is well known that his first
opera, Orfeo, can only be understood in light of the
cultural and musical environments of Mantua in the
first decade of the 17th century. On the other hand,
Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda—the work
by Monteverdi most easily linked to a specific act of
musical patronage in Venice—remains obscure in
terms of just how ‘Venetian’ it might be in its con-
tent and intent.
The new documents presented in this essay rep-
resent a few small steps down a path that seeks to
refine our reading of the Venetian Monteverdi in
these terms. They consist for the most part of brief
records of baptisms, marriages or the like in which
Monteverdi was somehow involved; they stem
mostly from my work in the Archivio Storico del
Patriarcato, one of the city’s archives less frequented
by scholars working on Venetian musicians and
institutions. These documents are typically terse,
and they may not seem to add much to the known
facts of Monteverdi’s biography. But they do cast
significant new light on the vast network—both
horizontal and vertical—of social relationships that
Monteverdi developed during his Venetian years.
They also place him within specific locations that
can be mapped on to what we know of the city dur-
ing his time there (see illus.1).
In terms of those relationships, take, for example,
the case represented by a number of these docu-
ments: where Monteverdi acts as godfather to the
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1  Map of Venice (engraved by Matthaeus Merian; Nuremberg, 1650), portion:

A = Basilica di S. Marco; B = Ca’ Foscari; C = Ca’ Bembo; D = Scuola Grande di S. Rocco; E = ‘Teatro’ Milani; F = Teatro S. Moisè; G = Teatro SS. Giovanni e Paolo
 child of a colleague and friend. In this period, god-
parenting (comparaggio) was a serious matter given
that the godparent not only had responsibilities to
the child being baptized but also declared a particu-
lar form of kinship relationship with the parents.
When established between two individuals of the
same social rank, comparaggio served to reinforce
and even sanctify some prior familiar associa-
tion. It also affirmed and strengthened the mutual
material interests that, as a rule, existed between
those involved. Such interests also lay at the base
of all those comparaggio connections established
between those of different social status (for exam-
ple, between a musician and a member of the
nobility), which normally involved some kind of
patron–client relationship built upon the exchange
of service and protection. Monteverdi had gone
down this path in choosing godparents for his own
children born in Mantua (for the most part, from
the ducal family). Once in Venice, Monteverdi, too,
became someone of influence to be cultivated in
various ways.4
Bartolomeo Barbarino and the Milani ‘theatre’
The first of these documents that tell us some-
thing about the network of relationships woven by
Monteverdi in Venice is a baptismal record from the
parish of S. Marcuola that reveals how the composer
2  Record of the baptism of the son of Bartolomeo Barbarino (Venice, Biblioteca dell’Archivio Storico del Patriarcato,
Parrocchia di S. Marcuola, Battesimi, reg.6, letter ‘M’, unnumbered folio)
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thereby cemented his contacts with the singer-com-
poser Bartolomeo Barbarino, called ‘Il Pesarino’ (see
illus.2).5
On 23 March 1615
Marin Guglielmo, son of Signor Bortolamio Pesarin;
mother, Felice; married; godfather the Magnifico Signor
Claudio Monte Verde, maestro di cappella of the Most
Serene Signoria of Venice. [Baptized by] the Very
Reverend Signor Parish Priest.6
It should come as no surprise that less than two
years after his arrival in Venice, Monteverdi had
established a relationship with Barbarino, a well-
regarded singer and a celebrated virtuoso of the
chitarrone who was the leading composer of secular
monody there. Barbarino was also somewhat unique
among the more significant musicians of the city for
his apparent reluctance to get bogged down in the
routine of performing in the cappella at St Mark’s,
save for occasional appearances there at Christmas
and for the ‘Sensa’ (the Feast of the Ascension as
it was celebrated specifically in Venice). Instead,
he made a successful living from his connections
to private ridotti and the numerous patrons of the
patrician and similar classes who supported them.
The long list of Venetian gentlemen associated with
Barbarino includes the merchant Antonio Milani,
who in 1610 was the prime mover behind the
Early Music  AUGUST 2017  367
 creation of a ‘theatre ... made for music’ (‘Theatro ...
fatto per la musica’)—as Barbarino described it in
the dedication of his Il terzo libro de madrigali ... da
una voce sola (Venice, 1610)—that was intended for
musicians such as Barbarino to show off their vocal
and instrumental talents (see letter ‘E’ on illus.1).7
By having him stand as godfather to his son,
Barbarino entered into a close relationship with
Monteverdi, one that provided a significant sign of
recognition of Barbarino’s own abilities as composer
and performer, considering Monteverdi’s authority
as maestro di cappella at St Mark’s. But Monteverdi
gained some benefit from this connection, too,
given his relatively recent arrival in Venice, and the
fact that he was perhaps not yet fully aware of the
opportunities available in the musical marketplace
beyond St Mark’s itself. He may not have needed
any formal introductions given his position, yet it is
plausible that Barbarino could have eased his access
to the ridotti of at least some of his many patrons.
We do not know if the composer was ever involved
in performances at Milani’s ‘theatre’. But Barbarino
may have helped Monteverdi in other ways, too.
He was also frequently involved in performances at
the Scuola Grande di San Rocco (see letter 'D' on
illus.1), and Monteverdi soon become involved with
the group of merchants that supported this influen-
tial institution, of which Antonio Milani was one.
Moreover, it was Milani’s cousin, Nicolò Passaggi,
who in 1623 became Guardiano of the Scuola, and
who involved Monteverdi in its annual feast-day
celebration that year. But the composer’s connection
with the Scuola di San Rocco probably went back to
1618, when Antonio Milani himself was Guardiano,
given that in a well-known letter to Alessandro
Striggio of 13 March 1620, Monteverdi refers to
being ‘invited ... again and again’ by those in charge
of the scuole, which gave him an additional income
of some 200 ducats per year.8
Two more baptisms and a wedding
On 11 May 1615, just three months after the baptism
of Barbarino’s son, Monteverdi stood as godfather
to the child of another singer, Sigismondo Zanetti,
who was certainly less important than Barbarino,
but with whom the composer had established a
strong relationship on grounds more to do with
the material side of musical production than with
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composition and performance per se. Although
Zanetti was intermittently active in St Mark’s, he was
also a practising scribe, which makes one suspect
that he would have been one of the first and most
trusted copyists that Monteverdi used in Venice.9 A
similar connection concerning musical materials is
apparent in a third comparaggio relationship that
Monteverdi established several years later, in 1626,
with a ‘Zuanne cartoler’ who sold ruled paper in the
area around S. Moisè.10
Another document brings us closer to St Mark’s
itself. The register of marriages in the parish of
S.  Pantalon in 1619 reveals that Monteverdi stood
alongside Alessandro Grandi as witnesses at the
wedding of the son of Nicolò Vandali, the latter a
long-time singer in the cappella of St Mark’s (see
illus.3):11
On 29 October 1619
Magnifica Signora Celestina, daughter of the deceased
Magnifico Signor Giacomo Stella living in her own
house in Campiello, called ‘delle Mosche’, and Signor
Giovan Battista, son of Signor Nicolo Vandali, singer in
St Mark’s, and an apothecary at the [shop under the sign
of] ‘Music’ in our parish in the residences in Ca’ Zorzi in
Corte Nuova, have contracted a marriage by the word of
those present in the presence of me, Priest Giovan Marini,
protonotary apostolic and parish priest ... present as wit-
nesses the Magnifico Signor Claudio Monte Verde, maes-
tro di cappella of the Most Serene Signoria, and Signor
Alessandro Grandi, singer in St Mark’s. [Later addition:]
and on 2 March 1620 they celebrated Mass and received
the benediction in the church of the Burgundian monks
at S. Margherita.12
This document shows Monteverdi seemingly well
integrated into St Mark’s and on cordial, even
friendly, terms with those under him. Clearly he also
had good relations with Alessandro Grandi—who
was named his vice-maestro on 17 November 1620—
even if they may have become more problematic in
subsequent years.13
Ca’ Bembo
Another quite different document concerning
St Mark’s takes us into secular spheres. A  brief
entry in the account books of the Procuratoria de
Supra dated 29 December 1617 does not mention
Monteverdi specifically, but it does refer to one
of his most important responsibilities as maes-
tro di cappella: the provision of extensive musical
 3  Record of the marriage of Celestina Stella and Giovan Battista Vandali (Venice, Biblioteca dell’Archivio Storico del
Patriarcato, Parrocchia di S. Pantalon, Matrimoni, reg.3, letter ‘C’, unnumbered folio).
performances in the basilica for Christmas festivi-
ties. It also reveals the typical osmosis between St
Mark’s and other Venetian musical circles—whether
sacred or secular—given that here we see the cap-
pella undertaking rehearsals in a private house: Ca’
Bembo in the Campo S. Maria Nova (part of the ses-
tiere of Canareggio, bordering that of Castello; see
letter ‘C’ in illus.1).
Per spese dette a cassa ducati do grossi 6 piccoli 6 contadi
alli bastasi per haver tolto l’organo al Seminario et porta-
tolo da Bortolo [Fonda] a far accomodar et poi portato a
Santa Maria a ca’ Bembo dove si provò la musica et poi
portato a San Marco et riportato al Seminario in tutto
L. 14.14
For the aforesaid expenses from the cashbox, 2 ducats,
6 grossi, 6 piccoli paid in cash to the porters for having
taken the organ from the seminary and having carried it
to Bortolo Fonda to tune it, and then having carried it to S.
Maria to Ca’ Bembo, where the music was rehearsed, and
then having carried it to St Mark’s and having brought it
back to the seminary: in total, £14.
Ca’ Bembo was the residence of Giovanni Matteo
Bembo, son of Marc’Antonio and a relative of the
letterato, Pietro Bembo. He was part of a differ-
ent branch of the family from the more influential
Bembos ‘di Riva di Biagio’ to which belonged the cur-
rent doge, Giovanni Bembo, himself an active musi-
cal patron.15 But the fact that music also had a role to
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play at Ca’ Bembo is confirmed in a letter of 1616 by
Angelo Grillo to Giovanni Matteo Bembo wherein
Grillo makes his excuses for not being able to come
‘to enjoy the music which is customarily done in your
house’ (‘a godere la musica che si suole fare in casa
sua’).16 It therefore seems clear that the ‘certain gen-
tleman of the Bembo family’ to whom Monteverdi
refers when writing to Alessandro Striggio on 1
February 1620 is none other than Giovanni Matteo.
In this letter, rich in details of Venetian musical life,
we discover that Ca’ Bembo was not only the site
of regular concerts frequented by the cream of the
nobility; it was probably where Monteverdi tried out
his now lost Lamento di Apollo, part of an eclogue
with a text by Striggio on which the composer had
been working for several months:
The Lamento di Apollo has been heard by certain gentle-
men here, and since it pleased them in the manner of its
invention, poetry and music, they think—after an hour of
concerted music which usually takes place these days at the
house of a certain gentleman of the Bembo family, where
the most important ladies and gentlemen come to listen—
they think (as I say) of having afterwards this fine idea of
Your Most Illustrious Lordship’s put on a small stage.
If Apollo was indeed performed complete, it was
the first music-theatrical work by Monteverdi done
in Venice, and probably one of the first staged in
Early Music  AUGUST 2017  369
 the stile rappresentativo ever heard in the city. The
performance context is also strikingly similar to the
well-known circumstances of Il combattimento di
Tancredi e Clorinda done at the Palazzo Mocenigo
in Carnival 1624, with ‘concerted music’ followed
by a work that was semi-staged.17 The performers
were almost certainly musicians from the cappella
of St Mark’s—as was the case later in the first ‘pub-
lic’ operas in Venice—who typically frequented Ca’
Bembo, together with their maestro, since at least
1617 (so we have seen from the procurators’ account
entry, above). This suggests the high level of musi-
cal activity supported by Giovanni Matteo Bembo’s
ridotto; it matters also for any reconstruction of the
contexts in which Monteverdi operated, as is con-
firmed not just by his 1620 letter (‘after an hour of
concerted music’) but also by Angelo Grillo’s of 1616
(‘the music which is customarily done’). Grillo’s let-
ter, in turn, might well shift the date of Monteverdi’s
involvement in these performances back by a year
or more.
Mantuans in Venice
Two more new documents from 1622 and 1624
concern Monteverdi’s sons, Massimiliano and
Francesco, but as we shall see, they tell us still more
about the networks in which Monteverdi operated.
These are certifications of the sons’ legitimacy (i.e.
their being born of legally married parents) issued
by the Cancelleria Patriarcale on the basis of sworn
statements in each case by two witnesses. Such doc-
umentation was usually needed to gain access to an
ecclesiastical career. In the case of Massimiliano,
we know from Monteverdi’s letters that after hav-
ing completed his studies in the humanities and
rhetoric, he was sent by his father to Bologna to
gain a doctorate in medicine: on 26 February 1622,
Monteverdi thanked Duchess Caterina de’ Medici
Gonzaga of Mantua for her intercession in enabling
Massimiliano to receive the certificate (patente) to
enter the Collegio of Cardinal Montalto.
In this light, it is not entirely clear why he also
sought to enter the Church, but it is possible that this
was somehow connected with his entering this pres-
tigious college in Bologna. Whatever the case, some
two months later, on 22 April 1622, Massimiliano
applied for, and obtained, a certification of legiti-
macy. He then received some kind of preferential
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treatment enabling him to short-circuit the various
intermediate steps to the priesthood so that, on 8
May, he was ordained. The ‘fast-track’ nature of this
procedure—which went beyond any norm—per-
haps suggests the reputation and influence that the
composer enjoyed in Venice during this period.18
Two years later, on 22 March 1624, Monteverdi
sought a similar certification from the Cancelleria
Patriarcale to support the entry into the Church of his
second son, Francesco, who received the tonsure and
took Minor Orders the very next day (23 March).19 In
contrast to Massimiliano, Francesco’s motives in this
regard are less obscure. He had some reputation as a
singer, had been occasionally active in St Mark’s since
1615, and was being courted for his abilities by culti-
vated patrons such as Giovanni Francesco Morosini.
He showed little interest in the studies in law that he
began in Padua and then continued in Bologna until
he abandoned them in 1620, prompted by a sudden,
if temporary, enthusiasm for joining the Discalced
Carmelites. His father appears to have accepted his
decision not to complete his degree at least by 1623,
when Francesco gained a fixed appointment as a
tenor in St Mark’s with a salary of 80 ducats per year.
Therefore, his taking orders in 1624 was entirely com-
patible with what now seemed to be his preferred pro-
fession: as a musician.20
The most interesting element of these two docu-
ments is, of course, the identities of the four wit-
nesses (two per certificate) enlisted by Monteverdi
in support of his sons. All of them were Mantuans
resident in Venice; all were well-known musicians
who had long been in friendly relations with the
composer; and all must have benefited from his
connections and influence in the city. Three were
singers and clerics in St Mark’s: Antonio Vicentini,
Vincenzo Rimedio and Giacomo Rapallino. The
fourth was one of the great violin virtuosos of the
time: Carlo Farina. Vicentini, who stood with Farina
as witness for Massimiliano, joined the cappella
on 26 January 1620 at an annual salary of 50 duc-
ats. Given that this sum was well below what was
normally offered foreign singers, one suspects that
this was a supernumerary appointment, and that
Monteverdi had a special hand in it, as in the case of
other Mantuans in the cappella.21
Vicentini’s witness statement is the most extensive
of the four: it suggests a very close relationship to a
 composer with whom he says he has been familiar
‘for more than eighteen years ... both in Mantua and
in Venice’ (‘da più di disdotto anni in qua ... tanto
a Mantua, quanto a Venetia’), adding that he has
also known Massimiliano ‘since he was a little baby’
(‘sin da fantolino’) given that ‘as a friend of Signor
Claudio I was often in his house’ (‘come amico del
signor Claudio praticavo in casa sua’).
Farina’s statement is similar: he confirms that he
has known Monteverdi for a long time (in his case,
‘twenty years’), and Massimiliano ever since he was a
baby (‘da fantolino in su’), noting the month and year
of his birth (May 1604), and his baptism in Mantua
in the parish of S. Piero in the Via Nuova. But this
statement is all the more noteworthy because of
what it reveals about Farina himself, including hith-
erto unknown information to add to our knowledge
of his biography. He says that he is in fact a native
of Mantua; that he is the son of Alvise (i.e. Luigi
Farina, a member of the violin ensemble active at
the Mantuan court during Monteverdi’s time there);
that he is 27 years old ‘in circa’ (which puts his date
of birth at around 1595 and not somewhere between
1600 and 1605 as is commonly suggested); and that
he is a ‘musician’ (‘musico’) resident in Venice at the
monastery of S. Stefano.22 No less important for our
understanding of Farina’s career is the mere fact—
again hitherto unknown—that he was present in
Venice in 1622 (the year of his witness statement)
and probably until 1625 (when he left for Germany).
His connection with the important Augustinian
monastery of S. Stefano is also important—a num-
ber of significant Venetian composers also had links
with it (including Carlo Milanuzzi and Guglielmo
Miniscalchi)—and it is possible that his relations
with Monteverdi had some impact here as well. Thus
Farina, too, could have benefited from the compos-
er’s support.
Vincenzo Rimedio (or ‘Remedio’)—one of the
witnesses that Monteverdi enlisted for his other son,
Francesco, in 1624—was the first of the Mantuan
musicians to move to Venice. He, too, was a cleric
and a tenor, and he was appointed to the cappella
of St Mark’s on 19 February 1619 with a higher sal-
ary than Vicentini’s (60 ducats per year, increased
to 80 in 1623). Unlike Vicentini, Rimedio underwent
a regular audition in competition with five other
candidates for the position.23 Like the two witnesses
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for Massimiliano, he describes his relationship with
Monteverdi in familiar terms, saying that he had
known Francesco for about 15 years ‘on the occasion
of my having been, and being, a friend of his father,
Signor Claudio’ (‘con occasione che son stato et sono
amico del signor Claudio suo padre’).
The second witness for Francesco was Giacomo
Rapallino, the last of the three Mantuan cler-
ics to enter the cappella of St Mark’s but the one
who gained the greatest success and reputation.
He was a baritone in the cathedral in Mantua
around 1620, but he was appointed as a ‘basso’ in
St Mark’s in December 1622 with a salary of 80
ducats per year (which by way of two separate
increases reached 100 ducats in 1629). To judge by
Monteverdi’s letters, Rapallino received a further
40 ducats per year as chaplain to another impor-
tant Venetian patron, the procurator Giovanni
Battista Foscarini, and he was also associated
with Girolamo Mocenigo (who of course figures
in Monteverdi’s biography by way of his support
of Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda and
Proserpina rapita). Despite attempts to recruit
him back to Mantua in 1627 (in which Monteverdi
was involved), Rapallino preferred to stay in
Venice for similar reasons to Monteverdi: more
favourable working conditions and greater oppor-
tunities to earn additional income. He seems to
have been a versatile singer of some standing, to
judge also by his involvement in the performance
of the tournament, Ermiona, in Padua in 1636.
His witness statement for Francesco is more suc-
cinct than the others, and, oddly enough, he is the
only one not to state explicitly his friendship with
Monteverdi—though that is clear enough any-
way from the composer’s letters—saying that he
knows him ‘for having been his neighbour for a
long time’ (‘per esser stato suo vicino per molto
tempo’).24
There is one more thread to follow in the story of
Monteverdi’s son, Massimiliano. He reappears in a
pair of documents from the later 1620s. In the mean-
time, he had completed his doctorate in medicine,
but in August 1628, shortly after his release from
imprisonment in Mantua by the Inquisition, he left
the priesthood as quickly as he entered it, marrying
the Venetian Anna Valli. Exactly nine months later,
their son Baldassare Felice was born.25
Early Music  AUGUST 2017  37 1
 Ca’ Foscari
The three other documents presented here concern
the last years of Monteverdi’s life. In 1640 and 1643,
Monteverdi twice stood as godfather at the baptisms
of two children of Opilio Morlacchini, an instru-
mentalist at St Mark’s.26 But he had already acted in
a still more official capacity in 1639 by virtue of his
now being in holy orders himself (since 1632). On
25 August, in the church of S. Samuele, Monteverdi
was the priest who baptized Giovan Battista Manelli,
son of the singer-composer Francesco and his wife,
Maddalena Lolli. In this case, it was the patrician
Giacomo Foscari who stood as godparent (see
illus.4):
25 August 1639
By the Reverend Signor Priest Claudio Monteverde with
permission of the Very Reverend Signor Parish Priest
was baptized a son born of Signor Francesco Manelli and
Signora Madalena, his wife, to whom was given the name
Giovan Battista. The godfather was the Most Illustrious
Signor Giacomo Foscari ‘dalla Ca’ Grande’; the godmother
was Bianca.
This is a particularly intriguing entry because
it brings together three important individuals in
a ceremony that cemented—not just symboli-
cally—a state of reciprocal friendship and a shar-
ing of mutual interests. It is well known that barely
two years before, in Carnival 1637, Manelli had
joined with Benedetto Ferrari and a small com-
pany of singers to inaugurate at the Teatro Tron di
S.  Cassiano the successful first season of ‘public’
opera in Venice with a production of Andromeda,
with music by Manelli to a libretto by Ferrari. They
repeated the same formula, and success, in the next
year with La maga fulminata. We likewise know
that in 1640, a few months after the baptism of

4  Record of the baptism of Giovan Battista Manelli, performed by Claudio Monteverdi (Venice, Biblioteca dell’Archivio
Storico del Patriarcato, Parrocchia di S. Samuele, Battesimi, reg.3, letter ‘G’, unnumbered folio).

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 Manelli’s son, Monteverdi entered the field with the
revival of his Arianna at the Teatro S. Moisè, and
then his Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria at the newly
renovated Teatro SS. Giovanni e Paolo (owned by
the Grimani family);27 Manelli and Ferrari had
already transferred their operation to both these
theatres in 1639 (marked with letters ‘F’ and ‘G’ on
illus.1).
Scholars have long worried about why Monteverdi
was slow to make his way into the Venetian opera
houses, and what might have encouraged him to do
so.28 This new baptismal document reveals that a few
months before the staging of Arianna and Il ritorno,
he had established something more than just a cor-
dial relationship with Manelli (who had entered
the cappella of St Mark’s with other members of his
company in 1638).29 Monteverdi had no obligations
to officiate as a priest either in St Mark’s or elsewhere,
so for him to do so for the baptism of Manelli’s son
is wholly unusual: it therefore seems significant
precisely because it represents an exception. This is
therefore one more piece of evidence to add to what
other scholars have already begun to document:
that the composer’s involvement in early Venetian
opera was due, precisely, to some connection with
Manelli and Ferrari.30 For example, the perfor-
mance in Padua in 1636 of Ermiona—the opera-
tournament by Pio Enea II degli Obizzi and viewed
in certain respects as an important predecessor of
Venetian ‘public’ opera—involved Monteverdi’s son,
Francesco, and others close to the composer such as
Giacomo Rapallino, as well as Maddalena Manelli,
Girolamo Medici and Anselmo Marconi, who were
all members of the small company that mounted
Andromeda in Venice the following year.31
The third important individual in this baptis-
mal record is Giacomo Foscari ‘dalla Ca’ Grande’,
whom Manelli chose as godfather to his son. Foscari
was no average patrician: born in 1580 to Alvise di
Federico Foscari and Betta Loredan, Giacomo was
a descendant of the ‘due Foscari’ memorialized by
Verdi: the doge Francesco Foscari and his ill-for-
tuned son, Giacomo. The ‘Ca’ Grande’ with which
our Giacomo Foscari is clearly identified in the bap-
tismal record is the splendid palace built by Doge
Francesco in 1453 ‘in Volta di Canal’, today the seat
of the University of Venice and commonly known
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as Ca’ Foscari (marked by letter ‘B’ in illus.1). The
building was famous for its magnificence—with
its bold echoes of the Palazzo Ducale—which led
to the name ‘Ca’ Grande’, and in 1574 it was chosen
to be the lodging for Henri III, King of France and
Poland, on his visit to the city. Thereafter it was kept
among a select list of palaces deemed by the senate
as suitable for hosting foreign princes and dignitar-
ies on official visits. Though we cannot interpret his
role as godfather to Manelli’s son as proof that he
was among the patrician patrons of the new pub-
lic opera in Venice, Foscari was certainly a sup-
porter of Manelli, and it is possible that he helped
sustain the activities of his company.32 Moreover,
Giacomo Foscari must have been well known also
to Monteverdi. Giacomo’s brother, Pietro Foscari,
was the official Venetian escort and advisor to Duke
Ferdinando Gonzaga as he prepared for his state
visit to the city from 21 to 30 May 1623. Although
the duke and duchess and their entourage—includ-
ing the famous singer Adriana Basile—were lodged
in Ca’ Barbaro on the Giudecca, they attended two
separate events in Ca’ Foscari. The first was on 28
May to view the ceremonial regatta on the Grand
Canal; and on the following day, they returned for
the grand festa da ballo and refreshments offered by
the Venetian government in Ferdinando’s honour.
On either or both occasions, Monteverdi could well
have been in attendance to meet and perhaps serve
the duke.33
Conclusion
The new documents presented in this essay may
seem relatively insignificant in terms of scale, but
they each in their own ways offer intriguing glimpses
of how Monteverdi inserted himself into various
professional and social networks in the city in which
he spent the last 30 years of his life. They also invite
us to consider how the stylistic innovations achieved
by Monteverdi in his Venetian music might relate
specifically to these emerging contexts. We already
knew from his letters that Monteverdi preferred
the conditions which governed his employment
in Venice over those in Mantua, but now we can
develop a clearer sense of the personal relations that
also made it, for the most part, a congenial place in
which to live and work.
Early Music  AUGUST 2017  373
 Rodolfo Baroncini is a professor of music history at the Conservatorio di Musica ‘Antonio Buzzolla’ di
Adria. His research has focused on violin music of the late 16th and 17th centuries, and, more recently,
on the social and other contexts for music in Venice during that time. His publications include a
major biography of Giovanni Gabrieli (Palermo: L’Epos, 2012). rodolfo.baroncini@alice.it
1  For example, Jeffrey Kurtzman
somewhat typically considers
Monteverdi’s Venetian secular
works as ‘adjunct to his principal
duties as maestro di cappella’ in his
‘Monteverdi’s sacred music: the state
of research’, in Claudio Monteverdi:
studi e prospettive; atti del convegno,
Mantova 21–24 ottobre 1993, ed.
P. Besutti, M. T. Gialdroni and R.
Baroncini (Florence, 1998), pp.3–29,
at p.4.
2  For Monteverdi’s correspondence,
see Claudio Monteverdi: lettere, ed.
É. Lax (Florence, 1994) and The letters
of Claudio Monteverdi, ed. D. Stevens
(Oxford, 2/1995); subsequent reference
to these letters in this essay is made
by date.
3  The most serious lacuna regards
the absence of studies on the contexts
surrounding Venetian secular
repertories, and on the complex
phenomenon of private patronage:
see R. Baroncini, ‘Giovanni Gabrieli
e la committenza privata veneziana:
i ridotti Helman e Oth’, in Spazi
veneziani: topografie culturali di
una città, ed. S. Meine, Veneziana
15 (Rome, 2014), pp.23–58; and
Baroncini, ‘La vita musicale a Venezia
tra Cinquecento e Seicento: musici,
committenti e repertori’, in Italian
music in Central-Eastern Europe:
around Mikołaj Zieleński’s Offertoria
and ‘Communiones’ (1611), ed. T. Jeż,
B. Przybyszewska-Jarmińska and M.
Toffetti (Venice, 2015), pp.131–50. This
was also the subject of an international
conference, Orfeo in laguna: le ‘Nuove
musiche’ a Venezia nel Seicento,
c.1610–c.1650 (University of Bologna,
15 October 2015; the proceedings are
forthcoming in the journal Musicalia);
in addition, Massimo Ossi covered
some of the ground, focusing largely
on private lives, in his ‘Musicians
among Venetians: social relations
374  Early Music  AUGUST 2017
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and patronage in Venice in the late
Renaissance’, paper presented at the
annual meeting of the Renaissance
Society of America (Berlin, 26–28
March 2015).
The undue emphasis on Monteverdi
is clear in the title of Denis Arnold’s
well-known article, ‘Alessandro
Grandi, a disciple of Monteverdi’,
The Musical Quarterly, xliii (1957),
pp.171–86. Grandi was neither a
student nor a follower of Monteverdi:
see the new biographical information
and critical assessment in R. Baroncini
and S. Saunders, ‘The composer’, in
Alessandro Grandi, Il quarto libro
de motetti a due, tre, quattro, et
sette voci (1616), ed. D. Collins and
R. Kendrick, Corpus Mensurabilis
Musicae, cxii/5 (Münster and
Middleton, WI, 2015), pp.xi–xxxiv.
Compare also R. Baroncini, ‘“Et per
tale confirmato dall’auttorità del signor
Giovanni Gabrieli”: the reception of
Gabrieli as a model by Venetian and
non-Venetian composers of the new
generation (1600–1620)’, in Giovanni
Gabrieli: transmission and reception
of a Venetian musical tradition, ed.
R. Baroncini, D. Bryant and L. Collarile
(Turnhout, 2016), pp.5–31.
4 On comparaggio, see G. Alfani,
Fathers and godfathers: spiritual
kinship in early modern Italy
(Farnham, 2009); and for its impact
on musical and other networks, see
T. Carter and R. A. Goldthwaite,
Orpheus in the marketplace:
Jacopo Peri and the economy of late
Renaissance Florence (Cambridge,
MA, 2013), pp.97–102. An analysis of
Venetian baptismal records reveals
that in a high percentage of cases,
comparaggio involved godparents
in the same or related professions
as the parents, and that it tended
to seal professional or commercial
relationships. For broader issues of
patron–client networks and what
they implied, see the important
theoretical foundations established
in C. Annibaldi (ed.), La musica e il
mondo: mecenatismo e committenza
musicale in Italia tra Quattro e
Settecento (Bologna, 1993), pp.9–42.
R. Baroncini, ‘Ridotti and salons:
private patronage’, in A companion
to music in 16th-century Venice, ed.
K. Schiltz (Leiden, forthcoming),
covers the Venetian context. Some
examples for Venetian musicians
are also provided in R. Miller, ‘The
composers of San Marco and Santo
Stefano and the development of
Venetian monody to 1630’ (PhD diss.,
University of Michigan, 1993), p.338.
As for Monteverdi’s own children,
see P. Fabbri, Monteverdi (Turin,
1985), pp.66, 69–70; trans. T. Carter
(Cambridge, 1994), pp.52, 56.
5  For Barbarino, see Miller, ‘The
composers of San Marco and Santo
Stefano and the development of
Venetian monody to 1630’, pp.110–51;
R. Baroncini, Giovanni Gabrieli
(Palermo, 2012), pp.511–13; and
Baroncini, ‘Nuove musiche e nuova
storia: attori e contesti delle pratiche
per voce sola e concertato ristretto
a Venezia fino al 1620’, Musicalia
(forthcoming).
6  This entry is missing from the
baptismal records of Barbarino’s
other children transcribed in Miller,
‘The composers of San Marco and
Santo Stefano and the development of
Venetian monody to 1630’, pp.344–9.
7 Baroncini, Giovanni Gabrieli,
pp.508–14; L’altro Orfeo (1613) e le
‘nuove musiche’ a Venezia: studio e
edizione critica, ed. R. Baroncini and
L. Collarile (Rome, 2017).
8  Nicolò Passaggi was the son of
Francesco Passaggi and Arcangela
Milani (our Antonio’s aunt); Venice,
 Biblioteca dell’Archivio Storico del
Patriarcato (henceforth I-Vasp),
Parrocchia di S. Cassiano, Matrimoni,
reg.1, unnumbered folio (14 June 1571).
The appointments to the position of
Guardiano Grande are documented in
Venice, Archivio della Scuola Grande
di S. Rocco, Parti, reg.4, fol.256v
(Milani; 7 March 1618), and reg.5,
fol.6r (Passaggi; 30 July 1623). For
Monteverdi at the Scuola di S. Rocco,
see J. Glixon, Honoring God and the
city (Oxford, 2003), p.286.
9  For the baptismal record, see I-Vasp,
Parrocchia di S. Moisè, Battesimi, reg.2,
fol.354r (11 May 1615); here Zanetti is
styled ‘scrittor’ (although the reference
is cancelled out), as he is in I-Vasp,
Parrocchia di S. Moisè, Battesimi, reg.2,
fol.248r (24 October 1611). He appears
occasionally in the St Mark’s accounts;
see, for example, Venice, Archivio di
Stato (henceforth I-Vas), Procuratoria
de Supra, Cassier Chiesa, reg.8, entry
for 13 May 1614.
10  I-Vasp, Parrocchia di S. Moisè,
Battesimi, reg.3, fol.161r (30 November
1626).
11  Vandali came to Venice from
Rome where he was a singer at S.
Luigi dei Francesi; I-Vasp, Curia
antica, Legitimitatum, reg.5, fol.170r
(9 December 1609). He was appointed
at St Mark’s in November 1590 as
a ‘soprano a voce mutata’, i.e. a
falsettist; I-Vas, Procuratoria de Supra,
Terminazioni, reg.138, fols.21v–22r (14
November 1590).
12  The Cistercians from the Abbazia
di San Tommaso dei Borgonini in
Torcello were associated with the
church of S. Margherita (Dorsoduro).
13  For Grandi’s relations with
Monteverdi, see Baroncini and
Saunders, ‘The composer’, pp.xxvi,
xxxii.
14  I-Vas, Procuratoria de Supra,
Cassier Chiesa (1614–22), reg.8,
unnumbered folio (29 December 1617).
15  Giovanni Matteo Bembo’s
grandfather (also called Giovanni
Matteo)—well known in Venetian
history as a lover of culture and for his
distinguished role in the battle against
Barbarossa at Cattaro in 1539—married
Marcella Marcello, niece of Cardinal
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Pietro Bembo; see E. A. Cicogna, Delle
inscrizioni veneziane (Venice, 1830),
iii, pp.318ff. The other branch of the
Bembo family (‘di Riva di Biagio’)
had very close ties with Marc’Antonio
Negri (vice-maestro at St Mark’s from
1612 to 1619), who also wrote the music
for the investiture of Laura Bembo, the
niece of the doge.
16  A. Grillo, Delle lettere, iii (Venice,
1616), p.289.
17  T. Carter, Monteverdi’s musical
theatre (New Haven and London,
2002), pp.170–95 (the Combattimento),
pp.211–16 (Apollo).
18  Details of the certificate of
legitimacy are in I-Vasp, Curia antica,
Legitimitatum, reg.9, fols.230v–231r
(2 April 1622); for Massimiliano’s
ordination, see I-Vasp, Archivio
segreto, Ordinationum (1619–23),
fol.105r (8 May 1622). Monteverdi
himself took Minor Orders on 9
March 1631 and was ordained on 16
April 1632; see Paolo Fabbri’s entry on
Claudio Monteverdi in the Dizionario
biografico degli italiani, lxxvi (Rome,
2012).
19  I-Vasp, Curia antica, Examina
matrimoniorum, reg.20 (1623–31),
fols.45–46r (legitimacy; 22 March
1624); I-Vasp, Archivio segreto,
Ordinationum (1624–7), fol.24r
(tonsure and Minor Orders; 23 March
1624).
20  For Francesco in St Mark’s, see
P. Fabbri, Monteverdi (Turin, 1985),
p.190 (in 1615), p.247 (1623); trans.
Carter (Cambridge, 1994), pp.137–8,
186–7. His association with Giovanni
Francesco Morosini, Abbot of Leno
and a canon of Padua Cathedral,
is noted in Monteverdi’s letter to
Alessandro Striggio, Venice, 9
February 1619; Morosini was active
as a patron, the principal protector
of the composer Felice Sances, and
the dedicatee of various musical
editions. For Francesco Monteverdi
‘unexpectedly’ joining the Discalced
Carmelites, see Monteverdi to Striggo,
Venice, 11 July 1620.
21  Vicentini’s appointment is noted
in I-Vas, Procuratoria de Supra,
Terminazioni, reg.141, fol.124r (26
January 1619 m.v., i.e. 1620). In contrast
Early Music  AUGUST 2017  375
to other such entries, there is no
reference to him having undergone
an audition; it notes only that his
appointment was approved by the
procurators ‘having received a report
from Don Claudio Monteverdi,
maestro di cappella’ (‘havutta relatione
dal don Claudio Monteverdi maestro
di capella’).
22  For Farina’s date of birth, compare
W. Apel, Italian violin music of the 17th
century, ed. T. Binkley (Bloomington,
1990), p.71 (Farina born around 1600);
N. Pyron and A. Bianco, ‘Farina, Carlo’,
in Grove Music Online (around 1604).
For what we have known to date about
him, see A. Bianco, ‘Nach englischer
und frantzösischer Art’: vie et oeuvre
de Carlo Farina avec l’édition des cinq
recueils de Dresde (Turnhout, 2010).
Luigi Farina and the violin ensemble
at the Mantuan court is discussed in
R. Baroncini, ‘“Sinfonie et balli allegri”:
functions, genres and patronage of
instrumental music at the court of
Mantua in the early 17th century’,
Italian history and culture, v (1999),
pp.29–70, at pp.47–51.
23  I-Vas, Procuratoria de Supra,
Terminazioni, reg.141, fols.106v–107r
(19 February 1618 m.v., i.e. 1619).
24  For Rapallino in Mantua, see S.
Parisi, ‘Ducal patronage of music
in Mantua, 1587–1627: an archival
study’ (PhD diss., University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1989),
p.527. His appointment to St Mark’s
and subsequent salary increases
are noted I-Vas, Procuratoria de
Supra, Terminazioni, reg.142, fol.64v
(10 December 1622), fol.136r (31
March 1626), fol.179r (7 January
1629). Monteverdi notes Rapallino’s
association with Foscarini, and
his other sources of income, in his
letter to Alessandro Striggio, Venice,
22 May 1627; this is one of a series
of letters concerning attempts to
recruit Rapallino to Mantua. The
latter’s connection with Mocenigo is
noted by Monteverdi in his letter to
Striggio, Parma, 4 February 1628; here
Monteverdi also calls Rapallino ‘my
very dear friend’.
25  I-Vasp, Parrocchia di S. Pantalon,
Matrimoni, reg.3, letter ‘A’,
 unnumbered folio (28 August 1628);
Battesimi, reg.5, letter ‘B’, unnumbered
folio (28 May 1629).
26  I-Vasp, Parrocchia di S. Maria
Formosa, Battesimi, reg.5, letter ‘G’,
unnumbered folio (12 December 1640);
Parrocchia di S. Maurizio, Battesimi,
reg.1, fol.43r (5 February 1642 m.v., i.e.
1643).
27  For the location of the production
of Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria (not
the Teatro S. Cassiano), see E. Rosand,
Monteverdi’s last operas: a Venetian
trilogy (Berkeley, 2007), p.57.
28  See, for example, N. Pirrotta, ‘Early
Venetian libretti at Los Angeles’, in
Pirrotta, Music and culture in Italy
from the Middle Ages to the Baroque
(Cambridge, MA, 1984), pp.317–24,
at pp.321–2; E. Rosand, Opera in
17th-century Venice: the creation of a
genre (Berkeley, 1991), pp.15–19.
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29 Rosand, Opera in 17th-century
Venice, pp.71–2 n.15.
30  For Monteverdi’s other connections
with the activities of the Ferrari–
Manelli troupe at the S. Moisè and SS.
Giovanni e Paolo theatres, see G. Vio,
‘Musici veneziani dei primi decenni
del Seicento: discordie e bustarelle’,
Rassegna veneta di studi musicali, v–vi
(1989–90), pp.375–85, at pp.382–5;
B. Glixon, ‘Scenes from the life of
Silvia Gailarti Manni, a 17th-century
“virtuosa”’, Early Music History, xv
(1996), pp.97–146, at pp.112–16.
31  L’Ermiona del Sr. Marchese Pio
Enea Obizzi, per introduzione d’un
torneo à piedi, et à cavallo, e d’un
balletto rappresentato in musica
nella città di Padova l’anno 1636 ...
descritta dal S. Nicolò Enea Bartolini
gentilhuomo, et academico senese
(Padua, 1638), p.6, ‘Attori’.
32  Compare Cristoforo Ivanovich’s
note of the patronage of Andromeda by
several noblemen (‘con la protezione
di più Nobili’), above and beyond the
financial resources of the musicians
involved, in his ‘Memorie teatrali di
Venezia’, in Minerva al tavolino (Venice,
1681), pp.390–91; see also Rosand,
Opera in 17th-century Venice, p.70.
33  For Foscari, see M. Barbaro,
Genealogie e origini di famiglie venete
patrizie, in Venice, Biblioteca del
Museo Correr, Ms. Cicogna 2500, iii,
fols.272v–273v. On the use of Ca’ Foscari
to host visitors, see La casa grande dei
Foscari in Volta de Canal: documenti,
ed. F. Sartori (Venice, 2001), p.4 and
docs.24–6, 29, 33–7, 40–42. The Gonzaga
visit is discussed in Fabbri, Monteverdi,
pp.246–7, trans. Carter, pp.186–7; and
J. Whenham, ‘The Gonzagas visit Venice’,
Early Music, xxi/4 (1993), pp.525–42.