Gaspare Spontini

Gaspare Luigi Pacifico Spontini , count de San Andrea (1844), is an Italian type-setter born with Maiolati close to Ancône the November 14th 1774 and died in the same city the January 14th 1851.

Biography

Gaspare Spontini resulted from a very modest family, which wished that he embrace the ecclesiastical state. But the young man wanted to become musician and went to perfect his formation with Naples, in Conservatorio della Pietà dei Turchini. The irregularity of its results and its difficult nature and disturber were worth humiliating failures to him which forced it to flee without to have been able to finish its education. Its beginnings, in the comic opera or seriated , felt some, but they testify to a clean personality and a will to take its distances compared to the tradition of the old Neapolitan school.

In 1803, Spontini decided to settle in Paris, attracted by the glory of Napoleon Bonaparte and new esthetics that the mode sought to promote. One was then in the search of type-setters able to carry out a synthesis between revolutionary and republican esthetics, with in particular his ancient references and his great orchestral masses, and the traditional French style. Moreover, this synthesis was to be not only national but European, on the scale of the French empire.

Spontini understood that a place was to be taken and, as of its arrival in Paris, it endeavoured to assimilate the French style. After some shy persons tests to alter its Italian works, it quickly gave three light operas to the Feydeau Theater: the Small house (1804), Milton (1804) and Julie or the Pot of flowers (1805). In parallel, it was made relations: the president of the Senate, Lacépède, the piano maker Érard, critic musical François-Joseph Fétis, Madam de Staël, Juliette Récamier, but especially the empress Joséphine.

Thanks to these protections, it could make give in 1806 a cantata to the glory of Napoleon i, the eccelsa parked wrongly as well as the light comedy Everyone , composed for the festival of the Emperor and who was played by his sisters and his courtiers. Previously, in 1805, Spontini had been named particular Compositeur of the room of S.M. the Empress.

For some time, Spontini worked with a booklet which had proposed to him Victor-Joseph-Etienne de Jouy on a Roman subject, which had been pushed back before by Méhul and Boieldieu. When the Vestal was given to the Opera on December 15th 1807 the work appeared to incarnate in an almost miraculous way the spirit of the Empire and created sensation at once. The Institute of France declared it better lyric work of the decade. Success was renewed with Fernando Cortez on November 28th 1809.

Spontini was named leader for the Italian opera in Odéon in 1810 and directed several important executions of works of type-setters varied. August 3rd 1811, it married Marie-Catherine Céleste Érard, girl of the famous piano maker Jean-Baptiste Érard. The couple could settle with the castle of the Dumb woman, property of this one. They did not have a child, but the marriage was perfectly happy.

Spontini was made knight of the Légion of honor on May 29th, 1818. December 15th 1819, it made give its opera Olympie , often regarded as its best work, which did not meet initially success. After re-examinehaving re-examined it considerably, it made it play once again on February 28th 1826 and, this time, the public was conquered.

After this first failure, Spontini left Paris for Berlin in 1820 where it was named Kapellmeister as a chief, with an annual salary of 4.000 thalers and the possibility of giving a concert per annum to its profit. It put in music Lalla Rookh of Thomas Moore, given to the Royal palace on January 27th 1821. Then it gave its opera Agnes von Hohenstaufen (1829). In 1829, it was made doctor honoris causa university of Halle and, in 1834, it directed the representations of the Vestal to Hamburg. It turned over in its birthplace in 1835, travelled in England in 1838 and went back to Paris where it was elected with the Académie of the Art schools the same year. In 1837, it made there give a revised version of Agnes von Hohenstaufen .

In 1842, it left Germany definitively and went to be established in Rome, where the Pope did it count de San Andrea in 1844. This year, he travelled to Paris and Dresden, then withdrew in his birthplace in 1850. With its death, it bequeathed its fortune at charitable institutions. If it were of a difficult nature, it had always been generous, of alive sound, for the musicians needy.

Works

Li puntigli delle gives , opera-puffs out, Rome, 1796
It finto pittore , opera-puffs out, Rome, 1797
Teseo riconosciuto , opera, Florence, 1798
the eroismo ridicolo , opera-puffs out, Naples, 1798
the finta filosofa , opera-puffs out, Naples, Teatro Nuovo, be 1799
I quadri parlanti , opera-puffs out, Palermo, 1800
Gli Elisi delusi , opera-puffs out, Palermo, 1800
the fuga in Maschera , opera-puffs out, 1800
Gli amanti in cimento , opera-puffs out, Rome, Teatro Valle, November 3rd 1801
the metamorfosi di Pasquale , opera-puffs out, Venice, 1802
the Small house , Op3era Comique, Paris, Théâtre Feydeau, 1804
Milton , Op3era Comique, Paris, Théâtre Feydeau, November 27th 1804
Julie or the Pot of flowers , Op3era Comique, Paris, Théâtre Feydeau, March 12th 1805
the Vestal , tragedy lyric in 3 acts, booklet of Victor-Joseph-Etienne de Jouy, Opera of Paris, December 15th 1807
Fernando Cortez or the conquest of Mexico , opera in 3 acts, booklet of Victor-Joseph-Etienne de Jouy and Joseph-Alphonse Esménard, Opera of Paris, November 28th 1809
Peeling or the King of Peace , opera, Opera of Paris, August 23rd 1814
the Two rivals , opera, 1816
Olympie , opera, Opera of Paris, December 22nd 1819
Lalla Rookh , January 27th 1821
Nurmahl oder Das Rosenfest von Kaschmir , opera, Opera of Berlin, May 27th 1822
Alcidor , opera in 3 acts, booklet of Guillaume Mr. Théaulon de Lambert, translated into German by A.C. Herklots, Berlin, royal Opera, May 23rd 1825
Agnes von Hohenstaufen , opera in 3 acts, booklet of Ernst Raupach, Berlin, royal Opera, May 28th 1829

External bonds

Center of studies Gaspare Spontini: site entirely dedicated to the type-setter
Article of the catholic Encyclopedia
Bruno Peeters, the Vestal, Cortez, Olympie, Agnes and the others , Forum Operated
Fondazione Pergolesi Spontini, Jesi
Jean-Paul Penin, Fernand Cortez *. Fernand Cortez.

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