Xpose
da Palestrina
Frescobaldi
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Rome,
the capital of Italy,
with its long history, has a great cultural heritage. Ever since the Roman
Empire
through the Renaissance
and Baroque
to Modern age,
Rome
has been a fascinating city with great music and the most important Italian
artists, mainly serving the Pope and Vatican.
The Vatican, which occupies only
108 acres in the heart of Rome, has been an independent state since 1929,
when the Lateran Treaty was signed. The Pope exercises the legislative,
judicial and executive powers of this theocracy. In the Sistine
Chapel
Mozart,
the "wonder child", wrote out the whole score of a nine voice
Allegri's
"Miserere"
after hearing it only once.
The
musical life of Italy was concentrated in Rome in certain times and composers
such as Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina
and Girolamo Frescobaldi
came here to work in the service of the Pope, writing religious music for
the Christian church. Other Italian cities such as Milan
and Venice
became important much later in the history of music, in someway taking
the lead from Rome.
It was in Rome that Domenico
Scarlatti
met Handel
when they were both 23, and lost in an organ
competition against him, while they were both equal on the harpsichord.
Since the 19th century and the beginning
of the 20th Century, French
winners of the prix de Rome,
such as Berlioz,
Gounod
and Debussy,
have been sent to the Villa Medici
in Rome, as guests
of the Academie of France. They earned their keep by sending at least one
musical composition per year, back to Paris.
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