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Difference between revisions of "Nicolò Minato"
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'''Nicolò Minato''' (1627 Beramo ‐ {{date|1698-01-28|mdy}}, Vienna) was a libretist, writer, poet and impresario. He wrote over a hundred libretto, the most famous of which is probably ''[[Xerse]]'', set to music by Francesco Cavalli, but also [[Georg Friedrich Händel]], among others. | |||
==Life and career== | |||
Nicolò Minato was born in Bergamo around 1627. He studied law in Venice and began practising as a lawyer there. He also published his first literary works in Venice and participated as librettist and impresario in the theatrical activities of the city. He began his career as an opera librettist in 1650 with the libretto for the opera ''Orimonte'', which he wrote for [[Francesco Cavalli]]. His first great success was [[Xerse]] (1654), also set to music by Cavalli. Gradually, he left the legal profession altogether and devoted himself entirely to writing libretti and theatre management. He became a member of several literary academies, including the ''Accademia degli Imperfetti'', whose members devoted themselves to the study of the classics and the law. He wrote 11 libretti for Venice, mainly for the ''Teatro San Salvatore''. His texts were mostly set to music by [[Francesco Cavalli]]. Antonio Sartorio also wrote several operas to his libretto.<ref name="Wiki"/> | |||
In 1669, he left Venice and became court poet to Emperor Leopold I. During his time in Vienna, he produced some 210 works, of which 170 were operas and serenatas (dramatic non-scenic cantatas) and the remaining 40 were oratorios and sepolkras (funeral music). In addition, he wrote texts for ceremonial events of the imperial family. His libretti remained very popular even after his death, and they were frequently set to music by leading composers such as [[Johann Adolf Hasse]], [[Georg Friedrich Händel]], [[Giovanni Bononcini]], Giovanni Legrenzi, Marc'Antonio Ziani, Tomaso Albinoni and [[Georg Philipp Telemann]].<ref name="Wiki"/> | |||
==Minato in Bohemia== | |||
In 1679-1680, the entire Leopold court took refuge in Prague for fear of a plague epidemic. Nicolò Minato stayed with the Leopold court in Prague. During his eight-month stay, at least nine of Minato's works (serenatas, operas, oratorios) were performed at Prague Castle, seven of them completely new. Of these, the three-act opera ''La patienza di Socrate con due mogli'' (Socrates' Patience with Two Women), which was probably the first comic opera ever performed in Prague, is particularly significant. He also made his mark in the history of Czech music with two sacred compositions, the oratorio ''Abelle di Boemia overo S. Wenceslao'' (The Czech Abel or St. Wenceslaus) and the sepolkra ''La Sacra Lancia'' (The Holy Lance). The St Wenceslas oratorio is probably the only Italian Baroque oratorio on this theme. In ''La Sacra Lancia'', an allegorical play with a Passion theme, he used the actual motif of the plague threat and some contemporary Prague realities. ''Antonio Draghi'' composed the music to these texts. The work was performed during Lent in 1680 in the Church of All Saints at Prague Castle. (''Translated and abridged from Wikipedia''<ref name="Wiki"/> | |||