(b ‘Roma de Monteclaro’, 1489–90; d Brescia, 26 April 1560–12 Aug 1561). Italian viol and violin maker. His instruments are the earliest extant examples of the Brescian school. G.M. Lanfranco (Scintille di musica, Brescia, 1533) praised the work of ‘Zanetto Montechiaro’. He is variously recorded in Brescian city records from 1527 as ‘Joannettus de li violettis’, ‘magister a liriibus’, ‘magister a violonis et violis’ and ‘di liuti’. He was excused from duty in the register of night guards of 1549–50 because he had reached the age of 60. An almost perfectly preserved six-string viol with its original label ‘Zanetto in Bressa’ is in the Musée Royal of the Brussels Conservatory, and shows this maker to have been an excellent designer and craftsman. A smaller viol, from Bisiach, also has its label and is in the Shrine to Music Museum, Vermillion, South Dakota. Several other instruments are attributed to him. Zanetto is a very important figure in the early history of the violin. He is the earliest violin maker about whom sufficient documentation exists to draw a picture of his life and work.
His son, Peregrino [Pellegrino] Micheli (b Brescia, c1520; d Brescia, 1606–20 July 1609), was also a fine maker. He is recorded as a maker of ‘viole, lire, cittare, lauti et altri instrumenti’. A tenor viola with the label ‘Peregrino f[ilius]. q[uondam]. m[agistro]. Zanetto’ in Brescia is in the Shrine to Music Museum, and a bass viol with a carved scroll and an unusual body shape in the Musée de la Musique, Paris, is attributed to him. His three sons, Giovanni (b c1562; d after 1619), Battista (b c1568; d before 1615) and Francesco (1579–1615), worked with him.
G. Livi: I liutai bresciani (Milan, 1896)
F. Dassenno and U.Ravasio: Gasparo da Salò e la liuteria bresciana tra Rinascimento e Barocco (Brescia, 1990)
U. Ravasio: ‘Vecchio e nuovo nella ricerca documentaria su Gasparo da Salò e la liuteria bresciana’, Liuteria e musica strumentale a Brescia tra Cinque e Seicento: Salò 1990, i, 25–43
CHARLES BEARE/UGO RAVASIO