ABSTRACT

The apparently incongruous pairing of Claudio Monteverdi’s light canzonette with Giulio Cesare’s “Dichiaratione” in the Scherzi musicali (1607) suggests a purely casual relationship between music and essay. Key passages in the essay indicate however a closer connection between the two, and date the pieces to 1599-1602, earlier than has generally been assumed. Composed at a time when Monteverdi was still producing the classical madrigals of the Fourth and Fifth books (1603 and 1605), the Scherzi employ a number of elements characteristic of his later concertato style: in addition to setting the poetry of Gabriello Chiabrera, they are cast in schematic forms alternating tuttis, solos with instrumental accompaniment, and instrumental ritornellos, and they include short obbligato instrumental passages. Rather than being by-products of larger compositions, the Scherzi bear witness to a complex line of development at a crucial point in the composer’s career, and they provide a background against which to reevaluate Monteverdi’s use of the canzonetta form for dramatic purposes in such widely divergent works as Orfeo (1607) and the “Lamento della ninfa” (1638).