«La nostra musica di chiesa è assai differente...».
Mozart e la musica sacra italiana
edited by Rosa Cafiero, Raffaele Mellace, Claudio Toscani

(Essays, 8)

XII, 266 pp.; 21 x 15 cm

The dozen of essays collected here deal with three topics, seen from several viewpoints: (1) the huge, complex world of late 18th-century Italian church music soon after the encyclical, Annus qui hunc («the excellent musical performances people can daily hear in churches», in Charles Burney’s words); (2) Wolfgang Amadé Mozart, who did not write much liturgical music in Italy but heard a lot of it and long cherished its memory and lessons; and (3) their intricate getting now close, now far, as per Mozart’s own words picked up as a title. Authors tackle multiple problems of productive, aesthetic, and executive context, as well as problems of style, form, and fortune—period, later, and modern, all of them of vital importance to compose such a complex picture. Diverse approaches are adopted, running the whole gamut from encompassing huge geographical areas to geeting deeper on a single work. And yet the reader cannot escape a common impression linking all essays as well as the composite panorama they depict—namely, the richness of the Kulturtransfer process that had been making the Alps such a porous barrier for centuries. Mozart’s dialogue with Italian church music and oratorio of his times was yet another effective example.

Rosa Cafiero is Researcher in Musicology and Music History, Lecturer in Music History, Milan Catholic University (1993-present). She studied Composition and Piano at Naples “San Pietro a Majella” Conservatory (Degree 1989), Humanities at the Naples “Federico II” University (Degree 1986). From 1988 to 1993 Lecturer in Music History (Reggio Calabria, Vibo Valentia, Bari, Salerno, and Potenza Conservatories). From 1997 to 2004 Lecturer in History of Music Theories at Rome "Tor Vergata" University. Co-Advisor for the Web-Based Series Monuments of Partimenti and Monuments of Solfeggi hosted by Northwestern University and produced by the Northwestern School of Music, (edited by Robert Gjerdingen). Her Publications have dealt with 18th- and 19th-Century Italian Music Theory, 18th- and 19th-Century Ballet Music, 19th-Century Music Publishing, 19th-Century Music Collecting (http://docenti.unicatt.it/ita/rosa_cafiero/).

Raffaele Mellace is graduated in Humanities in Milan, in Oboe in Bologna and received a PhD in Musicology in Bologna. He is currently Associate Professor for Musicology and History of Music at University of Genoa, and co-editor of "Il Saggiatore Musicale". His main research focuses are 18th-century opera and church music. To these topics he has devoted several articles in volumes and journals (among them "Mozart-Studien"), in dictionaries such as MGG-online and Dizionario dell’opera (ed. P. Gelli, Baldini & Castoldi, 1996), booklet and program notes, and three books: Johann Adolf Hasse (L’Epos, 2004, German revised edition, Ortus-Verlag, 2016), Johann Sebastian Bach. Le cantate, preface by Chr. Wolff (L’Epos, 2012; “C.M. Martini International Award” 2013), and Il racconto della musica europea. Da Bach a Debussy (Carocci, 2017). He edited together with C. Fertonani and C. Toscani, La musica sacra nella Milano del Settecento (LED, 2014), and with C. Bacciagaluppi and G. Giovani, Apoteosi della musica del Regno di Napoli by G. Sigismondo (SEdM, 2016).

Claudio Toscani is associate professor in History of opera and Music philology at the University of Milan. He studied music and musicology at the Parma and Milan conservatories and at the Hochschule für Musik und darstellende Kunst, Vienna. After graduating at the Parma University, he obtained a PhD in Musicology at the Bologna University and spent study and research stints at the University of Chicago and at the Sorbonne, Paris. He has taken part in many international meetings and published essays, mostly on 18th- and 19 th-century Italian opera. His are the scholarly editions of Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi, Donizetti’s La fille du régiment, Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater and Il prigionier superbo, among others. A member of the committees for the publication of Rossini’s, Bellini’s, Cimarosa’s, and Puccini’s works, he is editor-in-chief of the National Edition of Giovanni Battista Pergolesi’s Works and (from 2012 to 2018) of the “Rivista Italiana di Musicologia”. From 2018 he is president of the Italian Musicological Society.