Nicola, Niccolò or Niccola
(Naples, April 4, 1752 - Torre del Greco, May 5, 1837)
A highly appreciated composer by his contemporaries, Nicola (Niccolò) Antonio Zingarelli closes with great merit the generous season of the 1700s of the Neapolitan; A prolific author, in addition to 38 works for theater and instrumental music, leaves a conspicuous production of sacred music, largely unpublished.
Born in Naples, Nicola Antonio Zingarelli, at the age of seven, was admitted to the Santa Maria di Loreto Conservatory; He studied under the guidance of Alessandro Speranza and Fedele Fenaroli, and he has for his partner Domenico Cimarosa. In July 1772, he obtained the position of organist at the Cathedral of Torre Annunziata.
Very young, he begins to devote himself to composition; We remember the interlude "The Four Pazzi" of 1768.
His first work, "Montezuma," presented on August 13, 1781, at the San Carlo Theater in Naples, had an excellent public success; Other works followed Alsinda, Ricimero, Armida, Ifigenia in Aulide, Artaserse, who placed him to the attention of the leading Italian theaters. In 1790, at the Académie Royale de Musique in Paris, Antigone was represented in serious work on a booklet by Jean-François Marmontel.
In 1793 Nicola Zingarelli took on the position of master of the chapel at the Cathedral of Milan, then the following year, he moved to the sanctuary of the Holy House of Loreto; His opera production began to diminish, and he mainly devoted himself to the composition of sacred music. Since 1804 he directed the choir of the Sistine Chapel.
In 1813 Zingarelli was appointed director of the Real College of Music of Naples (then Conservatory of San Pietro a Majella); Bellini, Mercadante, Petrella, and Piero Maroncelli, the patriot imprisoned with Silvio Pellico in the Fortress of Spielberg are among his students. In 1816 he succeeded Paisiello in the office of master of the Choir of the Cathedral of Naples, a position he holds for the rest of his life.
Nicola Zingarelli crosses the transition period in which the serious work of the metastasian and mythological theme leaves the field to the nineteenth-century melodrama but remains substantially linked to the eighteenth-century tradition; His works, characterized by cantability and a simple and straightforward melodic language, indicating it as the last exponent of the great Neapolitan school. His most successful work is "Giulietta and Romeo," represented for the first time in Milan in 1796 and with numerous reruns in Europe until 1830.
The symphony in three movements (Allegro-Adagio-Allegro) was well rooted in Milan but had less successful in Naples, suggesting that the composer used these symphonies to settle in Milan, the capital of the archduchy, and to date them no later than the first months of his stay in that city (1784-85).
"The Milanese symphonies are the only symphonies that Zingarelli wrote in three movements and a very" Central European "style. The symphony in three movements (Allegro-Adagio-Allegro) was well consolidated in Milan but had less successful in Naples, suggesting that the composer used these symphonies to settle in Milan, the capital of the archduchy, and to date them no later than the first months of his stay in that city (1784-85). When Zingarelli arrived in Milan in 1784, he only wanted to demonstrate his talent; He was not an aged prodigy child who required a short acute shock to get back on sixth. In Milan, music was better organized than elsewhere. The city has always had orchestras - not only the scale but also those of him the principal churches of the town (in particular the cathedral) and the smaller ones of essential families, academies, confraternities, and colleges - and often formed temporary orchestras that met on odd occasions for one event or the other. He rivaled Paris, London, and Vienna for his cosmopolitanism and his cultural mixture, boasting a theater of the work which, despite his recent construction, was already the most prestigious in the world. The dream of every composer was to write pieces, but while waiting for the opportunity, composing symphonies for the entertainment of Milan was the most obvious thing to do.
