Gabrieli gets the gig

Synopsis

On today’s date in 1585, Giovanni Gabrieli got the job.

He had been acting as the temporary organist at St. Mark’s in Venice, but his appointment was made permanent when he proved successful in a competition against the other candidates for the post. It was a unanimous vote, in fact.

Gabrieli would hold the post until his death in 1612, and would supply for the Doges of Venice a body of ceremonial music still admired for its exceptional power and beauty.

Even before Gabrieli’s tenure, musicians at St. Mark’s had made use of the church’s multiple choir lofts for special effects involving antiphonal groups of performers. Gabrieli wrote music involving two, three, and even four groups of musicians, a kind of early surround-sound experience when one musical theme was answered, or echoed, by another in space and time.

Gabrieli’s intricate music required a high degree of co-ordination among the performers scattered around the big church, and occasionally things didn’t come off as planned, which could prove embarrassing. In a resolution drawn up by the governing body of St. Mark’s in April of 1607, some five years before Gabrieli’s death, the church officials, anxious to avoid embarrasing musical train wrecks, passed a resolution stressing the necessity of placing one of the best musicians in each loft to “beat the time as it is regulated by maestro Gabrieli.”

Music Played in Today's Program

Giovanni Gabrieli (c. 1556 – 1612) Deus, in nomine tuo Gregg Smith Singers; Texas Boys Choir;Vittorio Negri, cond. CBS 62426

Giovanni Gabrieli (c. 1556 – 1612) Canzona No. 27 Hesperion XX EMI 63141

On This Day

Births

• 1866 - Russian composer Vassili Sergeievitch Kalinnikov (Gregorian date: Jan. 13);

• 1923 - Jazz vibraphone virtuoso, Milt Jackson, in Detroit; He was a member of the famous Modern Jazz Quartet;

Deaths

• 1782 - German composer Johann Christian Bach, in London, age 47; He was the youngest surviving son of J.S. Bach;

Premieres

• 1724 - Bach: Sacred Cantata No. 190 ("Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied") performed (incomplete) on New Year's Day as part of Bach's first annual Sacred Cantata cycle in Leipzig (1723/24);

• 1725 - Bach: Sacred Cantata No. 41 ("Jesu, nun sei grepreiset") performed on New Year's Day as part of Bach's second annual Sacred Cantata cycle (1724/25);

• 1726 - Bach: Sacred Cantata No. 16 ("Herr Gott, dich loben wir") performed on New Year's Day as part of Bach's third annual Sacred Cantata cycle in Leipzig (1725/27);

• 1729 - Bach: Sacred Cantata No. 171 ("Gott, wie dein Name, so ist auch dein Ruhm") probably performed in Leipzig on News Year's Day as part of Bach's fourth annual Sacred Cantata cycle (to texts by Christian Friedrich Henrici, a.k.a. "Picander") during 1728/29;

• 1735 - Bach: Part 4 ("Fallt mit Danken, fallt mit Loben") of the 6-part "Christmas Oratorio," S. 248, in Leipzig;

• 1848 - Moniuszko: opera “Halka” (1st version in 2 acts in a concert version), in Vilnius;

• 1858 - Moniuszko: opera “Halka” (2nd version in 4 acts), in Warsaw at the Weilki Theater;

• 1873 - Rimsky-Korsakov: opera "The Maid of Pskov," in St. Petersburg (Gregorian date: Jan. 13);

• 1879 - Brahms: Violin Concerto in D, Op. 77, by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, with soloist Joseph Joachim and the composer conducting;

• 1894 - Dvorák: String Quartet No. 12 in F, Op. 96 and String Quintet in Eb, Op. 97 (both nicknamed the "American"), in Boston, by the Kneisel Quartet (and violist M Zach in the Quintet);

• 1942 - Chavez: Piano Concerto, in New York City, by the New York Philharmonic conducted by Dimtri Mitropoulos, with soloist Eugene List;

• 1953 - Bloch: "Suite Herbaïque" in Chicago;

• 1954 - Walter Piston: “Fantasy” for English horn and orchestra, by the Boston Symphony, Charles Munch conducting;

Others

• 1585 - Composer Giovanni Gabrieli becomes the second organist at St. Mark's Cathedral in Venice; His uncle, the composer Andrea Gabrieli, is the first organist;

• 1791 - Haydn arrives in England for a series of concerts at the invitation of orchestral conductor and impresario Johann Salomon;

• 1801 - Eight members of the U.S. Marine band perform the first official music at the unfinished Executive Mansion (the "White House") at a New Year's Day reception hosted by President and Mrs. John Adams;

• 1908 - Gustav Mahler makes his conducting debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, leading a performance of Wagner's "Tristan und Isolde."