We take it for granted that we can learn more about performers, composers and instrument makers today - almost anything we could wish to know can be found via the internet. Go back 150 years and even then the most famous performers often became well known beyond their home countries, thanks to newspapers and the advent of recording techniques. But once you look back further things become hazier. International travel was less common and musicians’ fame tended to be more localised, with a few notable exceptions.
In the early 16th century an Italian family of musicians made their mark in England and much of what we know about them is because they were employed by one of our most notorious monarchs - King Henry VIII. It’s difficult to imagine the impact the Bassano family must have had on musical life in the English court, but their influence continued for nearly two centuries. No fewer than seventeen members of the Bassano family worked in the English court as musicians during the 16th and 17th centuries and even today their descendants continue working in the performing arts.
Let’s start by looking back to where it all began, in Italy….
In 1502 Jeronimo Piva and his son Jacob were employed by the council of Bassano, a town around forty miles from Venice, to maintain the town’s organs, with the perk that they didn’t have to pay tax on this income. Jeronimo was already making instruments and has been credited with the invention of the pifaro, probably a type of curtal - the bassoon’s ancestor. His instruments were highly thought of and the Bassano maker’s mark was one which indicated an instrument of high quality. It’s believed that Jeronimo was the first in his family to follow this route, but it remains a mystery as to where he learnt his skills.
The Bassano family, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Building the family name and the move to England
Jeronimo had six sons who were musicians and instrument makers. Four of the brothers visited England in 1531 and an entry in Henry VIII’s Privy Purse Expenses records a payment to the Bassano brothers who had played in his sackbut consort.
After a return to Italy five of the brothers finally emigrated to England and in 1540 Henry VIII granted places to “Alvixus, John, Anthony, Jasper and Baptista de Basani, brothers in the science or art of music”. It wasn’t unusual for musicians to incorporate the place they lived into their name and the Bassano name certainly became a useful trademark for them over the centuries.
It’s possible that Henry VIII’s sixth and final wife, Catherine Parr, may have had an indirect influence in bringing the family to the court. Her brother William, Lord Parr, was passionate about music and had enough influence in court to bring the Bassanos to England. When his sister married the King in 1543 she became their patron. Following the King’s death Catherine subsequently lived with her second husband near the Bassanos in Charterhouse Square.
One of the ways Henry tempted the Bassanos to return to a England was by offering appealing accommodation. They lived in the former monks’ quarters in the now dissolved Charterhouse monastery, rent free. This would have been an attractive place to live, with its own clean water supply, sewage system, laundry and brewery. Charterhouse was located just to the north west of the City so the brothers wouldn’t have had to endure the cramped and unsanitary conditions which existed within the City walls. Each brother was allocated a cell as their personal living space and Alvise converted another of the buildings for his working space to make instruments.
The location of Charterhouse in relation to the City.
The Bassanos remained at Charterhouse until 1552, when Sir Edward North took ownership of the old priory and wished to convert it to a suitably imposing mansion. After harassment from North they finally moved to new living quarters in Mark Lane, near the Tower of London. amid London’s Italian community.
Instrument makers to the King
One of the Bassanos’ main roles in England was as instrument makers. Their creations were much prized and they sold widely beyond England.
‘Instruments so beautiful and good that they are suited for dignitaries and other potentates.’ - Johann Jakob Fugger, artistic advisor and superintendent of music at the Bavarian Court.
An inventory of music at the Bavarian court from 1571 lists no fewer than 45 wind instruments with the Bassano mark, including 10 cornetti, 12 crumhorns and 9 recorders. Their instruments are also documented elsewhere in Europe, including Brussels, Paris, Leipzig, Nuremberg, Rome, Vienna and Salamanca. One of their instruments was even recovered from the wreck of the Mary Rose, which sank in 1545. Charterhouse Square was home to the French and Spanish ambassadors and other members of the Tudor elite at this time so they no doubt had a ready market for instruments of such quality beyond the royal court.
Examples of the marks which appear on the Bassano’s instruments
Research by recorder maker Friedrich von Huene in 1974 revealed that the Bassanos’ mark, similar to the shape of a rabbit’s foot, survives today on a huge number of instruments - specifically, 48 cornetti, 6 crumhorns, 8 curtals, 7 flutes, 45 recorders and 7 shawms
When Henry VIII died in 1547 an inventory was made of his musical instruments, which included cornetti, crumhorns, dulceuses, fifes, flutes, recorders, shawms and a tabor pipe, at least some of which would have been made by the Bassanos. The inventory mentions a collection of some 76 recorders. The only ones to be specifically named are four basses and a great bass, but it would be logical to assume they were made in consorts. Pitch wasn’t standardised at the time so having matched consorts would allow Henry to invite others to join him to play. Perhaps he kept a consort of instruments at each of his Royal palaces to avoid the need to transport them around?
Ultimately the Bassanos became some of the most important European instrument makers in the 16th and 17th centuries - quite an achievement from Jeronimo’s early steps in Venice. In England the golden era for the family’s instrument making appears to rest with the first generation, as only Arthur and Anthony II from the 2nd and 3rd generations respectively are known to have made instruments.
The court recorder consort
One of the jobs Henry VIII granted the Bassano brothers in 1540 was the foundation of a court recorder consort. This was an ensemble of six players, five of whom were members of the Bassano family. It existed continuously from then until around 1630, after which the players were absorbed into the general group of wind players.
Although the recorder consort would have formed much of their work, the Bassanos almost certainly played all of the instruments they made too - cornett, crumnhorn, flute, lute, recorders, shawm, viol and sackbut. They may have been primarily employed as recorder players but they were likely to have been called upon to deputise for others from time to time as well.
During his reign, Henry VIII greatly expanded the range of court music, with consorts of cornetti, sackbuts, viols and violins, as well as the recorders. He was a keen recorder player himself and it’s known that between 1542 and 1545 a case of walnut recorders was signed out for the King’s personal use.
No doubt Henry already had people at court who could play the recorder, but he leapt at the chance to form a consort who specialised on the instrument and the Bassanos were unique in being described as ‘musicians’, as opposed to other less senior employees who were classed as minstrels, flutes or viols.
The consort continued to flourish beyond the reign of Henry VIII. No fewer than seven recorder players received liveries for the funeral of Queen Elizabeth I in 1603, five of them from later generations of the Bassano family. There’s little written evidence of exactly what the consort’s duties were, but no doubt there were many calls upon them. They may have been required to provide music for the monarch’s entertainment, as well as a presence at major events such as royal weddings or the arrival of foreign dignitaries.
Life as a court musician
Pay for musicians in the Royal court was very varied. The London Waits were paid just £11 a year, but in comparison the Bassanos were handsomely rewarded because of their special skills as both players and instrument makers. Alvise is recorded as having been paid £50 a year, although wages were often paid late. By 1635 King Charles I was six months in arrears paying his musicians!
During Henry VIII’s reign musicians also received clothes or material (known as a livery) from the Great Wardrobe. The King’s Great Wardrobe, near Blackfriars in the City of London, housed the royal stores and ceremonial robes. The building was destroyed in the great fire of 1666, but a nearby church, St Andrew’s by the Wardrobe, is a reminder to this day of its existence.
By the reign of Elizebeth I practices had changed and musicians instead received money in lieu of livery, with an allowance of sixteen pounds, two shillings and sixpence paid per annum. Extra allowances were offered to cover the cost of the clothes needed for monarchs’ coronations and funerals. In 1547, for the funeral of Henry VIII, Alvise, John, Anthony, Jasper and Baptista received a suitable regal combination of seven yards of damask crimson, two yards of velvet crimson and five years of satin crimson cloth. One can only imagine how splendid they must have looked in such riches!
One final task for some members of the Bassano family was that of composing. No doubt many of them wrote music but today fewer than twenty pieces survive from the 16th century, composed by Augustine and Jeronimo.
Later generations of the Bassanos
The Bassano family continued along dual paths, with some family members continuing to work in Venice. The English branch of the family certainly flourished and seven members of the first generation also served in the court recorder consort. Other descendants continued to serve in the sackbut, flute and viol consorts until 1665.
Beyond 1665 the Bassanos may no longer have worked as court musicians, but their musical activities and interests continued to the present day. Christopher and Richard Bassano (great gandsons of Anthony II) both sang as Vicars Choral at Lichfield Cathedral in the 18th century and Christopher’s Six Select Anthems were published in 1770. Louisa Bassano sang in the first performance of Mendelssohn’s oratorio Elijah in 1846. Then early in the 20th century George Henry Bassano, great-great nephew of Richard owned a factory in Derby manufacturing wind up gramophones which he called Bassanophones.
Moving on to the modern day, the artistic connections continue. One branch of the family by marriage (the Laniers) emigrated to Virginia in the 1650s and their family tree includes both Tennessee Williams and Quincy Jones! Here in England, Peter Bassano, a descendant of Anthony (one of the first generation of brothers who moved here in 1540) is a musician too. He was a trombonist with the Philharmonia Orchestra for 27 years and more recently has worked as a conductor with both modern and historical performance groups.
The musical genes in this notable family are evidently strong and let’s hope they continue to be part of British musical life for many years a to come!