Cesare Bendinelli (1542-1617)

Biography

Cesare Bendinelli was from Verona.¹ If we assume him to be identical to the Cäsar Bendinello who was a trombonist at the court of Schwerin from 1562 to 1565², and if we postulate a two-year period of apprenticeship and another four years as a journeyman, further assuming that this was his first full-time position, we arrive at a date of birth around 1542. During the late 16th century it was not at all unusual for trumpeters to play other instruments, cornetto being the most frequent second instrument. (Two centuries later, trumpeters were often expected to play the violin.) The combination of trumpet and trombone was certainly possible as well, especially in the case of trumpeters specializing in the low register of their instrument. However, we must confess a certain uneasiness at seeing Bendinelli, who soon after was known as a high trumpet player, listed as a trombonist.

Between 1567 and 1577, probably into 1580, Bendinelli served as a court trumpeter at the Imperial court of Vienna. He was taken into service there on August 1, 1567, at a salary of 15 guilders monthly and a new uniform each year.⁹ Before 1571 he married, for in that year he received a gratification of 20 guilders for his wife, who had been seriously ill.⁴ In 1573 his salary was raised to 17 guilders a month.⁶ The last we learn of him in Vienna is that his salary was paid through the end of 1576; unfortunately the archival volumes for 1577–1580 are missing.⁶

In 1580 Bendinelli was taken on as the chief trumpeter at the court of Munich.⁸ He retained this position until his death.⁷ The music at this court was of the highest order, under Orlando di Lasso (1532–1594), who had served as music director there from 1568. At the time of Bendinelli’s arrival, the number of trumpeters in the courtly trumpet ensemble had dwindled from the 15 who had been employed at the beginning of Lasso's tenure to six (plus a kettledrummer).⁸ The duties of the court trumpeters — who, in the archival documents, are always listed separately from the other instrumentalists and singers — were to give solemnity to the acts of the Duke and his family by playing at table, in church (on high feast days such as Christmas), at courtly weddings, and at the Duke's comings and goings.

During Bendinelli’s tenure, the strength and quality of the courtly trumpet ensemble was improved, in particular by the acquisition of large numbers of new trumpets, generally in Nuremberg. The first such purchase was made in 1586, when the cornettist Vileno Cornazzano was sent there to bring back two new trumpets.⁹ One of these was probably the trumpet in pretzel shape made by Anton Schnitzer in 1585, an instrument donated by Bendinelli in 1614 to the Accademia Filarmonica in Verona. (See Illustration 1.)