Monteverdi and his constellation

The year 1600 was the start of a century of unprecedented change, of extraordinary invention and of tumultuous advances in all the sciences and the art forms. For some it was a time of optimism and expanding horizons, while for others it was deeply unsettling. This introductory podcast lays the foundation for viewing the period through the lens of seven prominent thinkers, mathematicians and artists. John Eliot Gardiner makes a strong case for Monteverdi to be seen as a significant ‘star’ in a constellation of innovative talent that also included Galileo, Rubens, Caravaggio, Kepler, Shakespeare and Francis Bacon.

Monteverdi’s swan-song, L’incoronazione di Poppea (1643),is a high-water mark of the new genre of public opera, Shakespearean in its contrasts of high and low-life characters, political chicanery and outrageous theatricality. It coincides with the death of the last two in this constellation of genius - Galileo in 1642 and Monteverdi a year later - and marks the end of this extraordinary period of innovation that shaped the modern world. Their demise coincides with incipient European economic upheavals and warfare and, meteorologically, the start of a mini ice age. Pressures to re-establish moral order took hold, and the old hierarchy governed by reason was regaining ground in reaction to the cultivation of the individual artistic pursuit of creativity and originality.

The focus here is on the growing awareness of the physical, mental and psychological attributes of the individual, and the development of a new philosophy which leads ultimately to Descartes’ formulation: cogito ergo sum . A growing awareness of the physical, mental and psychological attributes of the individual leads to a fresh focus on the ‘common man’ - notably by Shakespeare, but also in their own ways by Caravaggio and by Monteverdi. Spoken theatre and opera are parallel vehicles for expressing and dramatising the human condition and the fluctuations and depths of the human heart. The first public opera house opens in Venice in 1637. Monteverdi, now maestro di cappella at the Basilica of St Mark, is perfectly placed for one final, extraordinary push into this brand-new dramatic world.

Visual art – and especially the work of Caravaggio and Rubens (in different but complementary ways) now aimed to intensify sensory experience and drama. What Monteverdi called the “natural path to imitation” was a radical bid to represent, magnify and even ‘improve’ upon nature through song and music theatre. The Church was not alone in finding this secularisation of knowledge alarming. Even the contemporary French philosopher Montaigne noted “Our mind is an erratic, dangerous and heedless tool. It is hard to impose order and moderation upon it”.

The young star chosen and coached by Monteverdi to sing the title role in his second opera, Arianna, died of smallpox just days before the scheduled première in 1608. Her replacement, an experienced singing actress, held strong views on the character of the abandoned heroine, Ariadne. This podcast explores how women suddenly step forward as creative participants and instigators in this brave new world of the senses. Monteverdi showed a particular empathy with his female protagonists and performers. Actress Dame Janet Suzman finds a resonant truthfulness in Shakespeare’s Cleopatra, and we hear how the painter Artemisia Gentileschi dealt with her real-life experience of rape and processed it in her creative work. A window of opportunity opened for women artists and musicians in this period, allowing a temporary escape from paternalistic dominance, before closing again by mid-century.