(It. Padova).
Italian city in the Veneto. An important centre of Roman civilization, the city had a theatre and an arena (of which ruins survive). A schola cantorum flourished at Padua Cathedral from the 13th century onwards through the activity of both the cantor, who was expected to teach and guide the performance of plainchant, and the magister scholarum, who taught grammar as well as music. Two books in the cathedral library (C55 and C56, compiled between 1407 and 1472 and containing a body of 13th-century rites and melodies), afford a complete documentation of the city's processions, as well as the richest Italian collection of ‘dramatic Offices’ (i.e. a dramatic organization of liturgical text and music), which were to be performed with theatrical apparatus during the Office of the major feasts of the year; this repertory included pieces for which the mid-13th century liber ordinarius of the cathedral prescribed a two-voice improvised performance, ornamented according to the solemnity of the occasion. These practices are connected with the notion of ‘cantus planus binatim’, for which the Paduan theorist Prosdocimus de Beldemandis, in his Expositiones, required ‘voces pares et dulces’; in the later sources such pieces are found both in non-mensural and mensural notation (according to Marchetto da Padova's system). At least one of these dramatic Offices, that of the Annunciation, was performed outside the cathedral on 25 March (or another date chosen by the Paduan bishop): the two main characters, the Angel and Mary, were carried in procession by the whole city from the chapel of the Palazzo della Ragione to the Roman arena. There, and after 1305 in the chapel built on that site for Enrico Scrovegni and frescoed by Giotto, the Office was performed (the ceremony, mentioned in the city statutes, had both civic and religious significance). It is likely that Marchetto composed the three-part motet Ave regina celorum/Mater innocentie for the opening of the chapel; he taught music at the cathedral up to 1308 and in 1312.
In the 13th century, troubadour song was cultivated in Padua as in the Veneto region, although very few melodies specifically related to this area have been identified. The importance of the French language and French literature in the Veneto encouraged the propagation of musica mensurabilis at the beginning of the 14th century. From 1328 to 1339 Alberto della Scala, a patron of the arts and music, was Lord of Padua. In 1332 the Paduan judge Antonio da Tempo dedicated to him his treatise on poetry and verse, containing the first description of the relationship between music and Italian secular poetry. Some compositions of the early Ars Nova repertory can be ascribed to this Paduan period on account of the allegorical references in poetic texts.
The few surviving polyphonic settings of Ordinary sections and ballatas dating from the mid- and late 14th century by local figures such as Graciosus de Padua, Zaninus de Peraga de Padua and Jacobus Corbus de Padua reveal an increasingly strong French influence. Such Franco-Veneto style, closely corresponding to contemporary epic poetry, is exemplified by the output of Bartolino da Padova, a Carmelite monk probably active in his native town during the last two decades of the century. Bartolino's 11 madrigals and 27 ballatas may be connected with the court of Francesco Novello, the last of the Carrara lords who ruled Padua for about a century. References in three of Bartolino's madrigals to Gian Galeazzo Visconti, who ruled Padua between 1388 and 1390, have been variously interpreted as a homage to the new ruler or as evidence of the composer's exile at Visconti's court.
In 1405 the city became part of the Venetian Republic; from 1403 until his death in 1411 Johannes Ciconia, whose madrigals are often connected with events of Paduan and Venetian public life, was cantor at the cathedral and the first Flemish musician active in northern Italy during the 15th century. Ciconia's link with Padua, and specifically with the university and the Benedictine abbey of S Giustina, dates back to the period of Francesco Carrara il vecchio (c1367). S Giustina, which became the most important centre of Benedictine reform, is also notable for the organs built there around the same period (a fragment of an organ tabulature, copied locally, survives). A reform of the monastery initiated in 1409 involved the official rejection of cantus figuratus during most of the 15th century, yet evidence indicates a continuing performance tradition of biscantus et contrapunctus and especially of polyphonic laude.
Music had been taught as one of the liberal arts at Padua University, founded in 1222: Prosdocimus de Beldemandis, a music theorist, astronomer and mathematician, taught music there until his death in 1428. During the 15th century the cathedral remained the centre of musical life; at the beginning and end of the century the names of Flemish and French composers, such as ‘Johannes de Francia tenorista’ (1419), ‘Richardus tenorista’ (1431), ‘Johannes contratenorista’ (1431) and ‘Presbyter Raynaldus francigena’ (1489), appear in the payrolls together with names of clearly Italian origin. Crispin van Stappen, who composed the strambotto Vale vale de Padoa santo choro, was magister cantus in 1492 and 1498. The organ builders and organists of the cathedral in this period were mainly of German origin, like Bernardus de Alemagna (1457–60) and his son Antonius (c1480). Pellegrino Cesena, a frottola composer from Verona, was maestro di cappella from 1494 to 1497 and several other names connected with the frottola repertory are associated with the city. Indeed the four-voice villotta (also termed ‘villotta alla padovana’ in later sources) originated in Padua, where it was used in performances of the plays of Angelo Beolco (called ‘Il Ruzante’; c1502–42) at the house of his patron, Alvise Cornaro. The architect G.B. Falconetto built in Cornaro's gardens a stage and an ‘odeon’ for plays and musical performances; both of these survive in the grounds of the Palazzo Giusti del Giardino.
A document of 1480 reports the decision to appoint a magister cantus for polyphonic music and an organist at S Antonio (usually called ‘Il Santo’). Polyphonic music, however, had certainly been used before, as exemplified by, among other things, Ciconia’s motet on J. von Speyer's text for St Anthony's Office, O proles Hispanie. It is also conceivable that the Proper of Du Fay's plenary mass for St Anthony of Padua was especially composed for the consecration of Donatello's altar in 1450 and that Du Fay himself came to Padua for the performance together with nine clerics from Burgundy. The activity of the cappella was rather irregular and based on a group of three to six singers until the mid-16th century, when new regulations brought stability to the institution. The first lay organist at Il Santo was Bartolomeo Novellino, engaged in 1498, probably in connection with the building of two great organs completed that year by Antonio Dilmani; a third was completed in 1544.
From 1575 the maestro di cappella at the cathedral was entrusted with the musical training of the clerics in the newly founded seminary (1571), a practice that lasted until the 19th century. From 1520 until his death in 1557 the Dominican Giordano Pasetto was maestro at the cathedral: he was instrumental in the local diffusion of the international polyphonic repertory (e.g. I-Pc A17, copied by Pasetto). Throughout the 16th century and later there was a continuous exchange of musicians between Il Santo and the cathedral: Ruffino d'Assisi was maestro di cappella at the cathedral between 1510 and 1520, and at Il Santo in the periods 1520–25 and 1531–2. Costanzo Porta was maestro at the cathedral from 1589 to 1595 and then returned to Il Santo (where he had also been in 1565–7) until his death in 1601.
A school ‘ad pulsandum lautos et citharas’ is documented as early as 1372 and may have flourished into the 16th century, as indicated by the career of the lute virtuoso and teacher Antonio Rotta (Rota), who taught students from the Faculty of Law, besides being organist in several churches and ecclesiastical institutions; Giovanni Maria Radino, organist at S Giovanni di Verdara, published an Intavolatura di balli per sonar al liuto in 1592. In the second half of the 16th century prominent German lute makers such as Wendelin Tieffenbrucker and Michael Hartung worked in Padua. Various professional associations of musicians, and more specifically instrumentalists, formed in 1531 and 1555 indicate that music had become a self-supporting profession in the city.
A number of academies were active in the 16th century; these learned gatherings of noblemen and rich bourgeoisie, at which humanistic and scientific subjects were discussed, were started early in the century by Alvise Cornaro and the linguist Pietro Bembo, but they flourished in the second half of the century: the Costanti was founded in 1556, and the Elevati lasted from 1557 until 1560. For both academies music was the main activity; Francesco Portinaro was engaged by both – with three other musicians – for the performance and teaching of vocal and instrumental music. Another academy, the Eterei, was active from 1564 to 1567. Portinaro was also employed (with the same duties) when the Rinascenti was established in 1573; he later became maestro di cappella at the cathedral (1576–8). Other Paduan academies were the Animosi, the Delia (mostly for fencing, and of which Galileo Galilei became a member) and the Ricovrati, later the Accademia Patavina di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti (still extant). Other composers at these academies included Giulio Renaldi and Gasparo Torelli (i), who was also active as a poet and promoter of the Accademia degli Avveduti.
A number of vocal polyphonic collections published in Venice in the late 16th and early 17th century originated at Padua, often with members of the well-established Natio germanica (e.g. the 1598 Laudi d'Amore: Madrigali a cinque voci de diversi eccellenti musici di Padova, containing pieces by Porta and Viadana). In 1596 the Venetian patron Marco Corner (Cornaro) was consecrated Bishop of Padua, and the following year at least three important publications of sacred music were dedicated to him by Giovanni Croce, Ludovico Grossi da Viadana and Girolamo Lambardi.
A series of intermedi was performed with the anonymous play Occulta fiamma amorosa in 1566 by the students of the university in the Sala dei Giganti in the Palazzo del Capitanio (see EinsteinIM, pp.474–5). Opera in Padua began in 1636 with the production under the aegis of Pio Enea degli Obizzi of Ermiona, a tourney with a ‘dramatic introduction’ with music by G.F. Sances and stage machinery by Alfonso Rivarola; the performers, who had come from Rome and Venice, later took part in the first public opera performance in Venice, Francesco Manelli's Andromeda (1637). A similar tourney, L'amor pudico, with music by Antonio Dalle Tavole (Tavola), was performed in the piazza dei Signori in 1643. Apart from a favola boscareccia, La Cidippe, performed in 1670, no other works appear to have been staged in Padua until 1691, when Domenico Gabrielli's Maurizio was given in the renovated Teatro dello Stallone. The Teatro degli Obizzi, inaugurated in 1652 and used primarily for spoken theatre, hosted opera only from Carnival 1693 (Isifile); the theatre archives, which survive, are for the most part inaccessible. In nearby Piazzola sul Brenta, lavishly staged operas (mostly by Carlo Pallavicino and Domenico Freschi) were performed in the sumptuous villa of Alvise Contarini from 1679 to 1685.
The earliest oratorio performance recorded in Padua was in 1675, when Santa Catterina da Siena was given within the context of a private celebration. Other oratorios were produced in various palaces and churches. Music at Il Santo during the 17th century flourished under the long tenure of Antonio Dalle Tavole (1635–74) as maestro di cappella; his music library, of which an inventory survives, reveals a broad interest in Italian sacred music for voices and instruments. The young Agostino Steffani sang in the cappella as a soprano between 1664 and 1667.
During the 18th century Padua became one of the most distinguished Italian musical centres. F.A. Calegari, maestro di cappella at Il Santo from 1703 to 1727, was an important theoretician who inspired a distinctive Paduan school of composition. This reached its zenith during the tenure of his pupil F.A. Vallotti, maestro di cappella at Il Santo from 1730 to 1780. Vallotti's music was performed in Padua until the last decade of the 19th century. The most famous composer of 18th-century Padua, however, was Giuseppe Tartini, first violin at Il Santo from 1721 until his death in 1770. In 1728 he began his celebrated school of violin playing which brought to the city students from Italy and abroad; his theoretical works also attracted interest throughout Europe. Other prominent musicians connected with Il Santo were the cellist Antonio Vandini and the oboist Matteo Bissoli. The castrato Gaetano Guadagni, one of the most influential singers of the century, joined the cappella of Il Santo in 1746 and returned to Padua in the last years of his life. From 1726 until the early 19th century a guild of musicians under the protection of St Cecilia was active in the city.
In the 18th century musical standards at Il Santo were considerably higher than those at the cathedral, where the cappella suffered from protracted disputes between bishop and chapter over musical matters. Giacomo Rampin, maestro di cappella at the cathedral for more than half a century (1704–60), was followed by Aurelio Episcopi (1760–80) who produced a new repertory of introits, hymns and vespers preserved in the cathedral's archive. A more distinguished figure was the keyboard player and composer Gaetano Valeri, organist from December 1785 and maestro di cappella from 1805 until his death in 1822.
Operatic activity in the earlier part of the 18th century was sporadic and largely undocumented. For several years from 1743 the soprano castrato Mariano Nicolini was impresario at the Teatro degli Obizzi; opera centred on the summer season and the Fiera del Santo, which attracted many visitors. The Teatro Nuovo, a larger theatre controlled not by a single owner but by an association of the nobility, was inaugurated in 1751 with Galuppi's Artaserse. This began the most splendid period of operatic activity in Padua, often in direct competition with Venice and nearby Vicenza. Between 1779 and 1791 the Teatrino del Prato della Valle staged opera buffa, as did the Teatro degli Obizzi in the autumn season which included the Fiera di S Giustina. Towards the end of the 1780s there was fierce rivalry between the two larger theatres; from 1792 they divided the seasons between them, the Nuovo being allotted the Santo and S Giustina fairs and the Obizzi the carnival and spring seasons. From 1768 to 1784 musical life in Padua was enriched by the private academy patronized by Don Giuseppe Ximenes d'Aragona, the former Habsburg ambassador in St Petersburg and London. Among the works commissioned by Ximenes d'Aragona was Mozart's La Betulia liberata (1771).
The years after the fall of the Venetian Republic in 1797 were characterized by stagnation and growing dependence on works originating in the principal Italian theatres; the last important premières in Padua were Meyerbeer's Romilda e Costanza (1817, Nuovo) and Temistocle Solera's Genio e sventura (1843, Nuovo). In 1884 the Teatro Nuovo was renovated and given the name Teatro Verdi, which it still bears.
During the 19th century the cappella musicale at Il Santo was beset by economic and organizational problems. The Austrian and French military occupations between 1797 and 1814 caused progressive impoverishment, exacerbated by over-ambitious attempts to maintain the cappella’s former standards. Performance of Vallotti's music was frustrated by the shortage of castrato voices, while the authorities refused to accept female singers. After a suspension of its activities between 1848 and 1851, the cappella was reinstated by Melchiorre Balbi, maestro di cappella from 1854 to 1879, who also stressed the need for a renewal of the repertory. A new reform, begun in 1893, resulted in the abolition of the orchestra and the institution of a new schola cantorum, in keeping with the ideals of the Cecilianist Giovanni Tebaldini; as the new maestro di cappella (1895–7) Tebaldini initiated historical research on the cappella and rejected the Vallotti tradition. He was followed by Oreste Ravanello (until 1938), the last maestro to produce a substantial body of compositions for the cappella. The cappella was officially disbanded in 1967; Il Santo, however, remains one of the main venues for important musical events in Padua.
In 1878 an Istituto Musicale was founded, serving both as a school and a centre for the organization of concerts. In 1882–4 and from 1890 to 1912 it was directed by Cesare Pollini, a pianist and pupil of Brahms. Under his aegis, a taste for instrumental music, both chamber and orchestral, was slowly developed in Padua through the organization of forward-looking concerts, despite the opposition of the local opera-orientated public; after Pollini's premature death in 1912 the institute was named after him. In the 1920s a concert society named after the Paduan inventor of the piano, Bartolomeo Cristofori, was integrated with the Pollini institute and developed a programme of concerts, including music by the most advanced European composers. After 1953 the legacy of the Cristofori was taken over by the Amici della Musica and the Centro d'Arte of the university, which by the 1970s had raised concert life in Padua to a high level, despite the inadequacy of local performing venues.
The Orchestra da Camera di Padova e del Veneto, founded in October 1966, was directed and conducted by Claudio Scimone until 1983. Virtually the same group of musicians performed as the Solisti Veneti until the two orchestras became distinct in 1983. In that year Peter Maag became resident conductor of the Orchestra da Camera, one of the few Italian chamber orchestras of international standard. The Solisti Veneti remain active under Scimone, who in 1971 launched the annual Tartini Festival, focussing on revivals of 18th-century music. It was subsequently renamed the Veneto Festival and expanded its scope.
When, after World War II, a bill was passed regulating operatic activity in Italy, Padua failed to achieve the status of ‘teatro di tradizione’ which would have guaranteed the survival of an opera theatre in the city; today productions are occasional, and the local opera public goes to the nearby theatres of Venice, Verona, Treviso and Rovigo. There is, however, a Centro Lirico in Padua which organizes concerts of operatic repertory. Following the fire which destroyed the Teatro La Fenice in 1996, the Teatro Verdi has hosted productions from Venice.
Since 1973 a laboratory for electronic music, the Centro di Sonologia Computazionale has been active within the university. In 1983 a group specifically devoted to contemporary music, Interensemble, was founded in Padua and has contributed substantially to the diffusion of new music.
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