Bernardo Pisano

Full biography Bernardo Pisano

Bernardo Pisano was an Italian composer, singer, priest, and scholar of the Renaissance period. He was born in Florence, Italy on October 12, 1490, and died on January 23, 1548, at the age of 57. Pisano's music was known for its harmonies and use of complex counterpoint.

Pisano's life and works are not very well-known, and much of his music has been lost. However, it is known that he sang in the Papal choir in Rome in the early 16th century, and later he became a priest in Florence. He also worked as a composer for the Strozzi family, a wealthy and influential Florentine family who supported the arts.

Pisano's surviving works include some sacred music and secular vocal works, such as madrigals (a type of Italian secular vocal music) and frottolas (similar to madrigals but with a simpler structure). Pisano's madrigals show the influence of the work of the famous composer Josquin des Prez.

Despite his relative obscurity, Pisano's music played an important role in the development of the madrigal and other vocal forms in 16th-century Italy. His collection of madrigals, Musica di messer Bernardo Pisano , was widely known and highly regarded in its time. Overall, Bernardo Pisano's music is an important part of the Renaissance period and has contributed to the evolution of vocal music in Italy.