Biagio Marini was an Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 virtuoso

Virtuoso

A virtuoso is an individual who possesses outstanding technical ability in the fine arts, at singing or playing a musical instrument. The plural form is either virtuosi or the Anglicisation, virtuosos, and the feminine form sometimes used is virtuosa...

 violin

Violin

The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....

ist and composer of the first half of the seventeenth century.

Marini was born in Brescia

Brescia

Brescia is a city and comune in the region of Lombardy in northern Italy. It is situated at the foot of the Alps, between the Mella and the Naviglio, with a population of around 197,000. It is the second largest city in Lombardy, after the capital, Milan...

. His works were printed and influential throughout the European musical world. He traveled throughout his life, and occupied posts in Brussels

Brussels

Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...

, over thirty years in Neuburg an der Donau

Neuburg an der Donau

Neuburg an der Donau, literally Neuburg on the Danube River, is a town which is the capital of the Neuburg-Schrobenhausen district in the state of Bavaria in Germany.-Divisions:The municipality has 16 divisions:-History:...

 and Düsseldorf

Düsseldorf

Düsseldorf is the capital city of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and centre of the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region.Düsseldorf is an important international business and financial centre and renowned for its fashion and trade fairs. Located centrally within the European Megalopolis, the...

, and Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

, Padua

Padua

Padua is a city and comune in the Veneto, northern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Padua and the economic and communications hub of the area. Padua's population is 212,500 . The city is sometimes included, with Venice and Treviso, in the Padua-Treviso-Venice Metropolitan Area, having...

, Parma

Parma

Parma is a city in the Italian region of Emilia-Romagna famous for its ham, its cheese, its architecture and the fine countryside around it. This is the home of the University of Parma, one of the oldest universities in the world....

, Ferrara

Ferrara

Ferrara is a city and comune in Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy, capital city of the Province of Ferrara. It is situated 50 km north-northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main stream of the Po River, located 5 km north...

, Milan

Milan

Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...

, Bergamo

Bergamo

Bergamo is a town and comune in Lombardy, Italy, about 40 km northeast of Milan. The comune is home to over 120,000 inhabitants. It is served by the Orio al Serio Airport, which also serves the Province of Bergamo, and to a lesser extent the metropolitan area of Milan...

, and Brescia

Brescia

Brescia is a city and comune in the region of Lombardy in northern Italy. It is situated at the foot of the Alps, between the Mella and the Naviglio, with a population of around 197,000. It is the second largest city in Lombardy, after the capital, Milan...

 in Italy. There is evidence that he married three times and had five children. He died in Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

.

Although he wrote both instrumental and vocal music, he is better known for his innovative instrumental compositions. He contributed to the early development of the string idiom by expanding the performance range of the solo and accompanied violin and incorporating slur

Slur (music)

A slur is a symbol in Western musical notation indicating that the notes it embraces are to be played without separation. This implies legato articulation, and in music for bowed string instruments, it also indicates the notes should be played in one bow; and in music for wind instruments, that the...

, double and even triple stopping

Double stop

A double stop, in music terminology, is the act of playing two notes simultaneously on a melodic percussion instrument or stringed instrument...

, and the first explicitly notated tremolo

Tremolo

Tremolo, or tremolando, is a musical term that describes various trembling effects, falling roughly into two types. The first is a rapid reiteration...

effects into his music. He was also among the first composers, after Marco Uccellini

Marco Uccellini

Marco Uccellini was an Italian Baroque violinist and composer.-Life:Uccellini's life is poorly known. Born at Forlimpopoli, Forlì, he studied in the Assisi seminary...

, to call for scordatura

Scordatura

A scordatura , also called cross-tuning, is an alternative tuning used for the open strings of a string instrument, in which the notes indicated in the score would represent the finger position as if played in regular tuning, while the actual pitch is altered...

tunings. He made contributions to most of the contemporary genres and investigated unusual compositional procedures, like constructing an entire sonata without a cadence

Cadence (music)

In Western musical theory, a cadence is, "a melodic or harmonic configuration that creates a sense of repose or resolution [finality or pause]." A harmonic cadence is a progression of two chords that concludes a phrase, section, or piece of music...

 (as in his Sonata senza cadenza). At least some, and perhaps a great deal, of his output is lost, but that which survives exhibits his inventiveness, lyrical skill, harmonic boldness, and growing tendency toward common practice tonality

Tonality

Tonality is a system of music in which specific hierarchical pitch relationships are based on a key "center", or tonic. The term tonalité originated with Alexandre-Étienne Choron and was borrowed by François-Joseph Fétis in 1840...

.

One latter-day champion of Marini's music is the British violinist Andrew Manze

Andrew Manze

Andrew Manze is an English violinist and conductor.As a guest conductor Manze has regular relationships with a number of leading international orchestras including the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Munich Philharmonic, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra,...

, who has released a disc on the Harmonia Mundi

Harmonia Mundi

Harmonia Mundi is an independent music record label founded in 1958 by Bernard Coutaz in Arles . The Latin phrase means "world harmony"....

 label entitled Curiose e moderne inventioni devoted to Marini's music for strings.

Surviving published works

• Op. 1 Affetti musicali (1617)
• Op. 2 Madrigali e symfonie
• Op. 3 Arie, madrigali et corenti
• Op. 5 Scherzi e canzonette
• Op. 6 Le lagrime d’Erminia in stile recitativo
• Op. 7 Per le musiche di camera concerti
• Op. 8 Sonate, symphonie…e retornelli (1626)
• Op. 9 Madrigaletti
• Op. 13 Compositioni varie per musica di camera
• Op. 15 Corona melodica
• Op. 16 Concerto terzo delle musiche da camera
• Op. 18 Salmi per tutte le solennità dell’anno concertati nel moderno stile
• Op. 20 Vesperi per tutte le festività dell’anno
• Op. 21 Lagrime di Davide sparse nel miserere
• Op. 22 Per ogni sorte di strumento musicale diversi generi di sonate, da chiesa, e da camera (1655)
• 2 motets

Sources

• Dunn, Thomas D. "Marini, Biagio", Grove Music Online
  Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
  The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, it is the largest single reference work on Western music. The dictionary has gone through several editions since the 19th century...
  
  , ed. L. Macy (accessed 22 March 2006), grovemusic.com (subscription access).

External links

• [ allmusic.com biography for Biagio Marini]