City in Italy. It is the capital of the Marches region. Among the earliest musicians recorded as active in the cathedral of S Ciriaco are Nicolò Branchino (1559) of Pesaro and the Flemish composers Hector Vidue (c1562) and Giovanni Ferretti (?1573–9), all perhaps preceded by the Anconan Francesco Lupino. Among those in Ancona in the 17th century were Fabio Costantini, Nicolò Cherubini (1629–40), Biagio Gherardi (1645–50) and Giovanni (?1687) and Pietro Paolo (1691–1701) Moresi. Eliseo Ghibel (1581), Giacomo Finetti (1608–12) and Francesco Boccella worked at the church of SS Sacramento; a collection of Boccella's instrumental music (1653) was among the works printed by the publisher Ottavio Beltrano, who established himself in Ancona in 1651–4. The press of Claudio Percimeneo published works by the Augustinian monk Scipione Lazzarini (1674–5) and the 16-year-old Maria Francesca Nascimbeni, one of Lazzarini's pupils, whose Canzoni e madrigali morali e spirituali Percimeneo also published (1674). By the second half of the 17th century oratorios were being performed in various churches in the city; music was also performed in the convents.
Musical entertainments took place in the homes of patricians, in the Palazzo Municipale, in the Loggia dei Mercanti and notably at the Arsenale, a harbour building adapted in the late 16th century as a Carnival performance space; opere-torneo and intermedi were staged there on the initiative of the city's nobility, particularly Prospero Bonarelli della Rovere, founder of the Accademia dei Caliginosi (1624). He made a law requiring drammi per musica to be provided during Carnival; later cultivated by Bonarelli's son Pietro, the Accademia continued its activities intermittently until about 1775.
The Comune turned part of the Arsenale into a new Teatro Pubblico, inaugurated in 1665 with Cavalli's Giasone; works of local provenance and from Venice and Rome were staged there until a fire destroyed the theatre in 1709. A new theatre, La Fenice, opened in 1711–12. Operas were staged mainly during Carnival. La Fenice was closed in 1818 and for some time performances were staged at the Palazzo Acciaioli. A wooden open-air theatre erected in 1808 by Marco Organari was extended and covered, remaining in use until about 1845. Meanwhile, opera seasons transferred to the Teatro delle Muse. It opened in 1827, with a spring season of at least two opere serie and a lesser Carnival season (opere buffe or semiserie). It was active until 1943, giving about 50 performances a season for the first 50 years, notably (from 1830) under the direction of the Ancona composer Giuseppe Bornaccini (1805–81).
Concert performances also took place at the Società del Casino Dorico (founded in 1754 and known by that name from 1806), based at the Teatro delle Muse. Its members included Emanuele Nappi (1767–1836), who ran a violin school. The Nappi music library, which contains many Tartini manuscripts, is in the Biblioteca Comunale L. Benincasa. The workshop of the instrument maker Emiliano Gotti was succeeded by that of Giuseppe Baldantoni (1784–1873), which produced more than 200 bowed instruments.
From the mid-19th century, operas, ballets, operettas and concerts were also given in the Teatro Vittorio Emanuele (1860–c1927) and the Politeama Goldoni (1880–c1911); both were later turned into cinemas. The Arena Stamira was in use from 1934, and then replaced by the Teatro della Fiera (1949–59). These buildings have now disappeared; of the Teatro delle Muse, damaged by bombing in 1943 and demolished 30 years later, only the imposing neoclassical façade remains. Reconstruction work was in progress in the 1990s. The Società Corale V. Bellini was founded in 1888 and is still active. Since 1914 the Società Amici della Musica G. Michelli has organized the city's concert season, now based at the Teatro Sperimentale L. Arena. Ancona has no conservatory; a public music school, the Istituto Musicale G.B. Pergolesi, has existed since 1920.
ES (A.M. Bonisconti)
Grove0 (P. Fabbri)
RicordiE
G. Paleani: Il Casino Dorico anconitano (Ancona, 1921/R)
O. Morici: I cento anni del Teatro delle Muse di Ancona 1827–1927 (Ancona, 1927)
A. Vitali: La Società ‘Amici della musica’ di Ancona e i suoi primi cento concerti (Ancona, 1928/R)
F.M. Giochi and A. Mordenti: Annali della tipografia in Ancona 1512–1799 (Rome, 1980)
M. Salvarani: Catalogo delle opere musicali della Biblioteca Comunale ‘L. Benincasa’ di Ancona (Rome, 1988)
M. Salvarani: ‘Tornei ed intermedi all'Arsenale di Ancona (1608–1623)’, RIM, xxiv (1989), 306–29
ELVIDIO SURIAN/MARCO SALVARANI