BERNABEI, ERCOLE. — Musician, b. at Caprarola between 1620 and 1622, d. at Munich in 1687. A pupil of Orazio Benevoli, in 1663 he was organist at S. Luigi de’ Francesi in Rome; thence he passed as maestro di cappella to S. Giovanni in Laterano, then to the Giulia in the Vatican, until in 1674 he left for Munich as court maestro di cappella. He wrote much theatrical and sacred music: masses, psalms, hymns, Te Deums in 4 and 8 voices, as well as works in the madrigal style. He masterfully moulds sound to the demands of ideas and words, and infuses into monody and declamation a colour and warmth that foreshadow the imminent greatness of dramatic discourse and theatrical melody.
His son and pupil, and his successor in the court chapel, was GIUSEPPE ANTONIO, b. at Rome in 1649, d. at Munich on 9 March 1732. He too wrote psalms, motets, hymns, Magnificats, offertories and masses, of which he published a collection (Sex Missarum brevium, cum una pro defunctis, for 4 voices with instruments) printed at Augsburg in 1710. His works lie in manuscript at the Liceo musicale in Bologna, and many were published by Proske in his Musica Divina, II and III, Regensburg 1854–59.