Vincenzo Bellavere (also Bell'haver, Bell'aver, Belaver) (c.1540-1541 – 29 August 1587) was an Italian composer of the Venetian School. While a fairly minor figure in the Venetian School, he was a competent composer of

madrigals A madrigal is a form of secular vocal music most typical of the Renaissance (15th–16th c.) and early Baroque (1600–1750) periods, although revisited by some later European composers. The polyphonic madrigal is unaccompanied, and the number ...

and wrote a few works in the grand

Venetian polychoral style The Venetian polychoral style was a type of music of the late Renaissance and early Baroque eras which involved spatially separate choirs singing in alternation. It represented a major stylistic shift from the prevailing polyphonic writing of the ...

Biography

Nothing is known about him prior to his appearance in

Padua Padua ( ; it, Padova ; vec, Pàdova) is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the ...

in 1567 as an organist at Crosieri Cathedral. That same year he tried to gain the prestigious job as first organist of the cathedral there. In 1568 he acquired the position of primary organist at the

Scuola Grande di San Rocco The Scuola Grande di San Rocco is a building in Venice, northern Italy. It is noted for its collection of paintings by Tintoretto and generally agreed to include some of his finest work. History The building is the seat of a confraternity estab ...

, a Venetian establishment almost as prestigious as St. Mark's; he held this post until 1584 at which time he returned to Padua to take the post at the cathedral that he at first failed to win. In December 1585 he was fired from his job in Padua, probably because of an unexcused absence, but he returned to Venice to become organist of yet another Venetian church, Santo Stefano. In 1586 he became first organist at St. Mark's, the position just vacated by

Andrea Gabrieli Andrea Gabrieli (1532/1533Bryant, Grove online – August 30, 1585) was an Italian composer and organist of the late Renaissance. The uncle of the somewhat more famous Giovanni Gabrieli, he was the first internationally renowned member of the V ...

; thus he was first organist alongside

Giovanni Gabrieli Giovanni Gabrieli (c. 1554/1557 – 12 August 1612) was an Italian composer and organist. He was one of the most influential musicians of his time, and represents the culmination of the style of the Venetian School, at the time of the shift f ...

, who was second organist. Unfortunately Bellavere died after only holding this post for nine months. Bellavere was a talented composer and could have become a major member of the Venetian school, had his career not been cut short; possibly he died fairly young, though reliable information on his age is missing.

Works

Bellavere wrote, besides keyboard works (being an organist), choral works, notably madrigals in a light style reminiscent of Andrea Gabrieli, as well as four

motet In Western classical music, a motet is mainly a vocal musical composition, of highly diverse form and style, from high medieval music to the present. The motet was one of the pre-eminent polyphonic forms of Renaissance music. According to Ma ...

s and two settings of the

Magnificat The Magnificat (Latin for " y soulmagnifies he Lord) is a canticle, also known as the Song of Mary, the Canticle of Mary and, in the Byzantine tradition, the Ode of the Theotokos (). It is traditionally incorporated into the liturgical servic ...

. His last music shows a progressive use of the multiple choir and instrument group style that was to make Giovanni Gabrieli famous, and which is the hallmark of the Venetian School.

References and further reading

* "Vincenzo Bellavere," in ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'', ed. Stanley Sadie. 20 vol. London, Macmillan Publishers Ltd., 1980. *

Eleanor Selfridge-Field Eleanor () is a feminine given name, originally from an Old French adaptation of the Old Provençal name ''Aliénor''. It is the name of a number of women of royalty and nobility in western Europe during the High Middle Ages. The name was introd ...

, ''Venetian Instrumental Music, from Gabrieli to Vivaldi.'' New York, Dover Publications, 1994. * Denis Arnold/Serena Dal Belin Peruffo: "Vincenzo Bellavere", Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed November 13, 2005)
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External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Bellavere, Vincenzo 1540s births 1587 deaths Cathedral organists Italian classical composers Italian male classical composers Italian classical organists Male classical organists Renaissance composers Venetian School (music) composers