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Scan 838
A dictionary of music and musicians, 1926
13 lines. Read by computer on 11 September 2026, twice; the two readings disagreed in places. Printed page 772. See the scan on archive.org.
1between the years 1693 and 1717, at the theatres of S. Angelo, S. Cassiano, S. Giovanni Crisostomo, and SS. Giovanni e Paolo. Some of these having attracted the attention of the Crown Prince of Saxony during his stay in Venice (1712), he engaged Lotti to visit Dresden, with a company of singers, including Boschi and Personelli, both members of the chapel, and his own wife, a Bolognese singer named Santa Stella. The joint salary of husband and wife was fixed at 2100 'doppii' (about £1600). The party set out on September 5, 1717, having obtained special leave of absence from the Procuratori of St. Mark's—'per farvi un opera.' In Dresden Lotti composed 'Giove in Argo' (1717), 'Ascanio, ovvero gl' odi delusi del Sangue' (1718), and 'Teofane' with Pallavicini (1719); intermezzi, and various other pieces, including church works, among which may be specified the eight-part 'Crucifixus' occurring in a 'Credo' for five voices and instruments. The Procuratori gave him one extension of leave, but in 1719 he was compelled to return or vacate his post; and accordingly left Dresden in October in a travelling-carriage, which he ever after retained as a memorial of his visit, and finally bequeathed to his wife. After his return to Venice he composed entirely for the church and chamber. Lotti died of a long and painful illness (dropsy) on Jan. 5, 1740, and was buried in the church of S. Geminiano, where his widow (who died 1759 and was buried with him) erected a monument to his memory. It was destroyed with the church in 1815.
3Besides the compositions already mentioned he wrote for Vienna an opera, 'Constantino,' overture by Fux (1716), and two oratorios, 'Il Voto crudele' (1712), and 'L' Umiltà coronata' (1714); for Venice, the oratorios 'Gioa Rè di Giuda,' 'Giuditta' (printed by Poletti), and the celebrated madrigal 'Spirto di Dio' for the Doge's espousal of the Adriatic, performed on the Bucentoro in 1736—a very effective composition. His book of madrigals (1705), dedicated to the Emperor Joseph I., contains the one in five parts, 'In una siepe ombrosa,' which Bononcini claimed in London as his own composition, and which led to his disgrace (see vol. i. pp. 360-361). Another is given as a model by Padre Martini in his Esempio di contrappunto. Nevertheless they were severely handled at the time in a Lettera famigliare d'un accademico filarmonico, circulated in MS. anonymously, but attributed on Fontana's authority to Marcello, who had been a pupil of Lotti's. [See Chrysander's Händel, ii. 294 and 303.] Many of his compositions are still in the King of Saxony's musical library, and Breitkopf & Härtel once possessed several of his MSS., as did also Dr. Burney. one of two readings
4Besides the compositions already mentioned he wrote for Vienna an opera, 'Constantino,' overture by Fux (1716), and two oratorios, 'Il Voto crudele' (1712), and 'L' Umiltà coronata' (1714); for Venice, the oratorios 'Gioa Rè di Giuda,' 'Giuditta' (printed by Poletti), and the celebrated madrigal 'Spirto di Dio' for the Doge's espousal of the Adriatic, performed on the Bucentoro in 1736—a very effective composition. His book of madrigals (1705), dedicated to the Emperor Joseph I., contains the one in five parts, 'In una siepe ombrosa,' which Bononcini claimed in London as his own composition, and which led to his disgrace (see vol. i. pp. 360-361). Another is given as a model by Padre Martini in his Esemplare di contrappunto. Nevertheless they were severely handled at the time in a Lettera famigliare d'un accademico filarmonico, circulated in MS. anonymously, but attributed on Fontana's authority to Marcello, who had been a pupil of Lotti's. [See Chrysander's Händel, ii. 294 and 303.] Many of his compositions are still in the King of Saxony's musical library, and Breitkopf & Härtel once possessed several of his MSS., as did also Dr. Burney. one of two readings
6Lotti's rank among musicians is a high one, from the fact that though the last representative of the old severe school, he used modern harmonies with freedom and grace. The expression and variety of his music struck even his contemporaries, especially Hasse, when he was at Venice in 1727. Burney, who heard his church music sung in Venice in 1770 (Present State, France and Italy, p. 145), credits him with 'grace and pathos,' and characterises his choral music as both solemn and touching, and so capable of expression, though written in the old contrapuntal style, as to have affected him even to tears. Of his cantatas he says that they contain recitatives full of feeling (Hist. iv. 534). As a specimen of his writing for a single voice we may cite the favourite song 'Pur d'esti.' He was so afraid of overloading the voices that he never used orchestral accompaniments in church music. There are wind instruments as well as the four strings in his Dresden operas, but not in those produced in Venice. [The Quellen-Lexikon enumerates twelve operas as still extant, and gives the names of fifteen more, and a list of masses, church music of different kinds, and arias and madrigals.]
8Besides Saratelli and Marcello, Alberti, Bassani, Gasparini, and Galuppi were among his pupils. A motet of Lotti's, 'Blessed be thou,' and a madrigal, 'All hail, Britannia,' both for four voices, are given in Hullah's Part Music (1st ed.), and a fine Credo in C, also for four voices, in his Vocal Scores and Part Music (2nd ed.). Proske has a mass of his (a 4) in Musica Divina, vol. i., and Rochlitz a Crucifixus, a 6, and another a 8, and a Qui tollis, a 4, in his Sammlung. There is also a Kyrie in the Auswahl vorz. Musikwerke (Trautwein). Four masses and a requiem are in Lück's Sammlung, and various other pieces in the collections of Schlesinger, Moskowa, etc.
10LOTTINI, ANTONIO, the principal Italian basso in London in 1737 and 1738. He sustained that part in Handel's 'Faramondo' in 1737, in his 'Serse,' and in the 'Conquista del Vello d'oro' in 1738.
12LOUIS FERDINAND, PRINCE,—accurately Friedrich Christian Ludwig,—born Nov. 18, 1772, killed at the battle of Saalfeld, Oct. 13, 1806, was the son of Prince August Ferdinand of Prussia, and therefore nephew of Frederick the Great and of Prince Henry (the patron of J. P. Salomon and cousin of Frederick William II.) the violoncello-player, for whom Beethoven wrote his op. 5. His sister Louise married Prince Radziwill, who composed the Faust music, and to whom Beethoven dedicated the Overture, op. 115. Louis Ferdinand thus belonged to a musical as well as a royal family, and he appears to have been its brightest ornament on the score of natural gifts—his uncle the Great Frederick excepted—even down to our own time; in music undoubtedly so. He was kindly and generous in the highest degree, and free from all pride of
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