(b Reggio nell’Emilia, 15 July 1579; d after 1623). Italian lutenist and composer, active in Austria. He was related to Domenico Maria Melli. Little is known of his early training; he remained in Reggio until his appointment as lutenist at the imperial court of the Emperor Matthias in December 1612. He returned briefly to Italy in 1614, probably to oversee the publication of his second book of lute intabulations. Melli was one of the small group of musicians who were retained when Ferdinand II succeeded Matthias as emperor; a list of the imperial chapel from the beginning of Ferdinand’s reign shows that he was among the highest paid of the imperial musicians. His favoured status at court is also confirmed by the title-page of his fifth book of intabulations (1620), which calls him not only lutenist and chamber musician but also ‘gentilhuomo di corte’. According to Vander Straeten, Melli was in Ferrara in 1620. He had left the imperial court for good by 1623, apparently to return to Reggio to assume the post of Captain of the Porta S Croce. He was married twice, in 1621 and again in 1623.
Melli’s four surviving publications consist primarily of brief binary dances for archlute (liuto attiorbato), nearly all of which bear programmatic titles. A number of his works use novel tuning schemes. His most ambitious compositions are the dances for a ballet performed for the Emperor Matthias on 2 March 1615, preserved in his fourth book. The score provides rare notated examples of the type of continuo practice described in Agazzari’s Del sonare sopra’l basso con tutti li stromenti (Siena, 1607), for, in addition to melodic lines for violin and ‘flauto’, the score includes parts for harpsichord, bass viol, double harp and no fewer than four different lutes.
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Intavolatura di liuto attiorbato, libro secondo, nel quale si contiene corrente, volte, gagliarde, preludi et 1 tastata, 1 capriccio, 1 corrente, et 1 volta cromatiche, 1 aria di Firenze passeggiata dall’autore (Venice, 1614/R) |
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Intavolatura di liuto attiorbato, libro terzo, nel quale si contiene varie sonate in una cordatura differente dall’ordinaria & differente ancora da quella che già 4 anni io mandai alle stampe nel fine del mio primo libro (Venice, 1616/R) |
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Intavolatura di liuto attiorbato, libro IV (Venice, 1616/R) |
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Intavolatura di liuto attiorbato e di tiorba, libro V (Venice, 1620/R) |
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1 galliard, lute, 161726 |
KöchelKHM
Vander StraetenMPB, vi
F. Torelli: ‘Una prima documentazione sui Melli, musicisti di Reggio Emilia’, Il flauto dolce: Rivista per lo studio e la pratica della musica antica, x–xi (1984), 35–9
F. Torelli: ‘Pietro Paolo Melli, Musician of Reggio Emilia’, JLSA, xvii–xviii (1984–5), 42–9
S. Saunders: Cross, Sword and Lyre: Sacred Music at the Court of Ferdinand II of Habsburg (1619–1637) (Oxford, 1995), 115, 228
THEOPHIL ANTONICEK/STEVEN SAUNDERS