Girolamo Frescobaldi

Girolamo Frescobaldi (born September 1583, Ferrara, Papal States—died March 1, 1643, Rome) was an Italian organist and one of the first great masters of organ composition. He strongly influenced the German Baroque school through the work of his pupil J.J. Froberger. Frescobaldi began his public career as organist at the church of Sta. Maria in Trastevere in Rome, in 1607. He travelled to the Netherlands the same year and published his first work, a book of madrigals, in Antwerp. In 1608 he became organist at St. Peter’s in Rome, and, except for the period when he was court organist at Florence (1628–34), he remained at St. Peter’s until his death.

Frescobaldi’s fame rests on his instrumental works. Among these, keyboard compositions predominate, but the canzone for unspecified instruments with basso continuo are of outstanding historical significance in the development of pieces for small instrumental ensembles. They are of a transitional type that led to the fully developed trio sonata, which was the principal chamber music medium until it was displaced by the string quartet.

In 1608 Frescobaldi published 12 fantasias in open score that are notable for their variety and for contrapuntal mastery of the highest order. The textures are idiomatic in a way rarely found in earlier examples of the form. In 1626 he published, again in open score, a collection of 10 ricercari, 5 canzoni, and 11 capriccios. The composer’s preface contains valuable information about performance: “Should the player find it tedious to play a piece right through he may choose such sections as he pleases, provided only that he ends in the main key.… The opening passages should be played slowly so that what follows may appear more animated. The player should broaden the tempo at cadences.…”

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Much of Frescobaldi’s keyboard music was intended for the harpsichord, as is made clear in the title of his Toccate d’intavolature di cimbalo e organo (1637). The volume includes also partitas on various melodies and pieces on ground basses. These show Frescobaldi’s free inventiveness in genuine keyboard textures and figuration. The preface of another collection, first published in 1627, again gives information of great value to the interpretation of Baroque instrumental music: “Play the opening of a toccata slowly and arpeggiando.… If one hand has a trill, while the other plays a passage, do not play note against note, but play the trill rapidly and the other expressively.” Such directions indicate the extent to which keyboard style had moved away from its origin in transcriptions of vocal or instrumental compositions. One of Frescobaldi’s remaining publications, the Fiori musicali of 1635, consists of organ music intended for liturgical use.

Frescobaldi’s style is characterized by a dramatic inventiveness and a bold use of chromaticism, but these qualities were carefully subordinated to a logical, effective construction within the piece. He was one of the first to develop the modern principle of monothematic writing, which replaced the rapid presentation of a number of themes typical of the early ricercar and canzone.