Credits:

Bariolla, Ottavio (c.1573-c.1619)

Description:

We find the music of Ottavio Barriola to be very accomplished and remarkable. He is a composer who, in the heyday of ricercare, broke away from monophonic composition and preferred to use multiple themes, thus anticipating the style taken by later composers such as Trabati and Frescobaldi, who were representative composers of the Neapolitan school. Each piece shows clear originality in its thematic construction and sense of music, and the simultaneous use of various themes and their variations gives a sense of marvelous perfection. Filippo Piccinelli, abbot of the church of Santa Maria Preso San Celso, who is related to Barriola, praised it highly in his book L'Ateneo dei Letterati Milanesi (Milan, 1670), and Walter, a leading German late-baroque composer famous for his organ music, wrote Musikalisches Lexikon (Leipzig, 1732), which states that "Variola's fame was not only alive and well more than a hundred years after his death, but also spread outside Italy.The "Ricercare for Organ" is now in the National Library of Turin and is only available in German organ tablature (the original is lost). The largest manuscript source of keyboard music in the world, containing 1,770 pieces of music.