Alessandro Scarlatti, the first of the moderns”: the review of the Nuova Orchestra Scarlatti begins in the name of the 300 years since the composer’s death
The project “Alessandro Scarlatti, the first of the moderns” by the Nuova Orchestra Scarlatti is underway, a review for the 300th anniversary of the death of A. Scarlatti, supported by the Ministry of Culture.
Friday 4 July at 7:30 pm, with free admission in the Basilica of Santa Restituta, inside the Cathedral of Naples in Via Duomo 147, the concert “Affetti sacri e profani” will be held: cantatas, arias and concertos by A. Scarlatti and GF Händel, performed by the Nuova Orchestra Scarlatti. At the harpsichord Marianna Meroni. First violin Giacomo Mirra. With the participation of the soprano Giuseppina Perna and the mezzo-soprano Tonia Langella, alternating with poems between Arcadia and contemporaneity interpreted by Enzo Salomone.
“Affetti sacri e profani” is the first event of the new NOS review dedicated to the great Sicilian composer, who moved to Naples, and whose death marks 300 years this year. Scarlatti was among the first, even before Bach and Handel, to ferry ancient counterpoint into a modern harmonic and tonal language, thus imprinting a fundamental turning point on all subsequent Western music.
The concert of July 4th offers a synthetic and varied choice of some of the main genres cultivated by Scarlatti in his vast production: concerto, cantata, oratorio, opera. The Concerto Grosso n. 1 and the Sinfonia di Concerto Grosso n. 10 represent a pinnacle of his stylistic research, in the vigorous architecture and in the precious details. The two arias, Se ritorno from the oratorio La Giuditta and Il mar delle mie pene from the opera Telemaco, are an example of the great Scarlattian theatre: maximum effect with the maximum economy of expressive means. An exemplary lesson that we find deeply absorbed by the young 'Italian' Handel in the famous Cara sposa from the opera Rinaldo.
Also on the program is a selection of the cantata Amore e Virtù, born from the partnership between Alessandro Scarlatti and Pietro Ottoboni, the powerful and refined cardinal-poet who admitted the musician to the prestigious Accademia dell'Arcadia, the center of Roman and Italian literary and artistic life in the early 18th century. And almost to reproduce the atmosphere of an Arcadian evening between music and poetry, Enzo Salomone, a famous Neapolitan actor of theater, cinema and television, who has specialized over the years in the relationship between music and orality, and who has also performed in numerous contemporary premieres, will give voice to interventions in verse alternating with music, ranging from poets and poetesses of Arcadia to the present day: love, nature, civil denunciation, but always along the red thread of the 'pleasure of the text'.
In the subsequent events of the festival, Alessandro Scarlatti's music will also be an opportunity to promote new creativity, with the proposal of unpublished pieces specifically commissioned from composers already established on the national and international scene and from young Campanian musicians under 40.
Saturday 12 July 2025, Church of SS. Marcellino and Festo in Naples, 7:30 pm, “Scarlatti 3000”: instrumental and vocal music by A. Scarlatti and JB Neruda and unpublished pieces by Giulio Gualtieri, Patrizio Marrone, Paolo Tortiglione; Nuova Orchestra Scarlatti, soprano Chiara Polese, trumpet Davide Battista, conductor Marco Attura. (6:45 pm The first of the moderns, conversation with the composers).
Friday 18 July 2025, Naples Cathedral, Basilica of Santa Restituta, 7:30 pm, “Scarlattiana 2025 (music and narration)”: Concerto grosso symphonies by A. Scarlatti and unpublished pieces by young composers Lidia De Migno, Giuseppe Franza, Giuseppe Galiano; NOS, Roberto Del Gaudio on stage. (6:45 pm Living Scarlatti in the 21st century, conversation with musicians under 40; participation by Dr. Maria Rossetti of the University of Naples Federico II).
Friday 25 July 2025, Church of SS. Marcellino and Festo in Naples, 7:30 pm, “In a Scarlatti Mood”: symphonic transitions from Baroque to Jazz, music by A. Scarlatti, Duke Ellington, B. Persico; NOS, pianist and conductor Bruno Persico. (6:45 pm Baroque Jazz Pop, conversation on form and improvisation with Bruno Persico).
All concerts are free to enter.
İl Denaro
