Adriano Banchieri (1568-1634) · Giulio Cesare Croce (1550-1605)

Adriano Banchieri (Bologna, 1568-ivi, 1634)
Festino del Giovedì Grasso avanti cena (Venezia 1608)

Giulio Cesare Croce (San Giovanni in Persiceto, 1550-Bologna, 1605)
La solenne e trionfale entrata dello sloffeggiatissimo e squaquaratissimo signor Carnevale in questa città. Opera piacevolissima,&bella del Croce da recitarsi una sera s’un festino (Bologna 1618)
Mascherate piacevolissime di Giulio Cesare dalla Croce, dalle quali pigliando l’invenzioni si possono fare concerti dilettevoli e gratiosi per passa tempo il Carnevale (Bologna 1604)

An interesting and goliardic representation of Bologna at the beginning of the seventeenth century is proposed to us by the Dramatodia theaterical company directed by Alberto Allegrezza and with the participation of Enrico Bonavera. The theme is the Carnival, the texts are by the storyteller, writer and poet Giulio Cesare Croce and the music by the brilliant and non-conformist Olivetan friar Adriano Banchieri. The irresistible combination formed by these two authors stages an irreverent and paradoxical triumph of hyperbole, satire, jokes and double meanings, which find their expression – at the same time popular and artistic – in the dramaturgic representations linked to the commedia dell\\”arte and in the musical forms of the time such as the villanella, the canzonetta and the ballet.