Lorenzo Da Ponte

Lorenzo da Ponte

Lorenzo Da Ponte, born Emanuele Conegliano (March 10 1749 – August 17 1838) was an Italian librettist and poet born in Ceneda (now Vittorio Veneto). Appointed a professor at what is now Columbia Univeristy in 1825, he was the first faculty member to have been born Jewish and ordained as a Roman Catholic priest. He is most famous for having written the librettos to three Mozart operas, Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte. Many of his works belonged to the Opera buffa genre.

Life

Conegliano was a Jew by birth. When he, his father, and siblings converted to Roman Catholicism in 1763, he took the name Lorenzo Da Ponte, the name of the bishop of Ceneda who administered the baptism. Still later, he studied to be a teacher and was ordained a Catholic priest in 1773. However, unable to conduct himself in a manner befitting either profession, he was banned from both fields, and in 1799 was exiled from Venice. In addition to having an adulterous relationship, he expressed doubts about Catholic dogma. He was also renowned for drinking and gambling. Da Ponte worked in Dresden, and later Vienna, where he collaborated with Mozart and Antonio Salieri. In 1780, he was appointed court librettist to Joseph II, for whom he composed libretti in many different languages, including French, German, and Italian. While in Vienna he also worked with composers Vicente Martín y Soler and Antonio Salieri. It was in Vienna that he met Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and began the collaboration for which he famous. His libretti Le nozze di Figaro , Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte appearded in 1786, 1787 and 1790. During 1788, financial problems at the Viennese court due to the cost of the war with the Ottoman Empire resulted in the closure of several theaters. By 1790, when Joseph II died, Da Ponte's own position was threatened and in 1792, he was dismissed. Once again, scandal appears to have led to his loss of favor. That year, he married Celestina Ernestina Grahl (known as Nancy), who died on December 12th, 1831. Their daughter,

Migration to the United States

Moving to Paris in 1791, he went to London the following tear where he worked at the King's Theatre, taught Italian and was employed as a bookseller. During 1800, he was imprisoned for his debts. In 1805, fleeing creditors, he migrated with Nancy and their daughter, Luisa (born 1794) to the United States. He briefly ran a grocery store in Philadelphia and gave private Italian lessons before returning to New York to open a bookstore. At one point, he may have played organ at St. Patrick's Old Cathedral. He became friends with Clement Clarke Moore, the supposed author of "Twas the Night Before Christmas," and through him gained an appointment as the first Professor of Italian Literature at Columbia College (now known as Columbia University). He was the first faculty member to have been born a Jew, and also the first to have been ordained as a Roman Catholic priest. This was, however, an unsalaried position although he could chargge fees for teaching. In 1828, at the age of 79, da Ponte became a naturalized citizen of the United States. He was not very successful at Columbia, failing to interest his students in his native language. His attemot to establish an Opera company in New York also floundered.

Death

Da Ponte died in 1838. Another distinction shared by him with Mozart is the fact his place of burial is unmarked. Da Ponte was originally buried in a Catholic cemetery in Manhattan near Old Saint Patrick's Cathedral. These interments were later removed to Calvary Cemetery in Queens with little attention paid to who was who. A cenotaph to Da Ponte's memory is found at Calvary.

Legacy

All but two of Da Ponte's works are adaptations of pre-existing plots, as was common among librettists of the time. Le nozze di Figaro, for example, is based on a play by Pierre Beaumarchais, as is Axur re d’Ormus, which Da Ponte wrote for Salieri. The minor exception is L'arbore di Diana; the great exception Così fan tutte, an original work which he began with Salieri but completed with Mozart. Da Ponte's considerable musical legacy is less well known today than in his lifetime. This may be because his work is viewed as derivative. Certainly, he did not create his plots. However, he was brilliant at creating poetry and at giving new life to old material into which he skillfully wove comedy alongside tragedy. His Memoirs suggest that he saw his somewhat erratic career as the result of victimization by people he regarded as his enemies. However, it has also been described as "valuable" for "its portrait of early 19th-century America" . During the Third Reich, when Mozart was "re-invented as a German artist", the "Jeiwsh origins of his librettist were deliberately obscured

Works

• Opera Librettos
  • Ifigenia in Tauride (1783, ital. translation of the French opera Iphigénie en Tauride - composer Christoph Willibald Gluck)
  • La Scuola de' gelosi (1783, New version of the 1778 Libretto by Caterino Mazzolà) - composer Antonio Salieri
  • Il Ricco d'un giorno (1784) - composer Antonio Salieri
  • Il Burbero di buon cuore (1786, from the play by Carlo Goldoni) - composer Vicente Martín y Soler
  • Il Demogorgone ovvero Il filosofo confuso (1786) - composer Vincenzo Righini
  • Il finto cieco (1786) - composer Giuseppe Gazzaniga
  • Le nozze di Figaro (1786, from the play Le Mariage de Figaro by Beaumarchais) - composer Mozart
  • Una cosa rara ossia Bellezza ed onestà (1786, from the comedy La Luna della Sierra by Luis Vélez de Guevara) - composer Vicente Martín y Soler
  • Gli equivoci (1786) - composer Stephen Storace
  • L'arbore di Diana (1787) - composer Vicente Martín y Soler
  • Il dissoluto punito o sia Il Don Giovanni (1787, from the opera Don Giovanni Tenorio by Giuseppe Gazzaniga) - composer Mozart
  • Axur, re d'Ormus (1787/88, ital. translation of the libretto Tarare by Beaumarchais) - composer Antonio Salieri
  • Il Talismano (1788, from Carlo Goldoni) - composer Antonio Salieri
  • Il Bertoldo (1788) - composer Antonio Brunetti
  • L'Ape musicale (1789) - Pasticcio of works by various composers
  • Il Pastor fido (1789, from the pastoral by Giovanni Battista Guarini) - composer Antonio Salieri
  • La Cifra (1789) - composer Antonio Salieri
  • Così fan tutte (1789/90) - composer Mozart
  • La Caffettiera bizzarra (1790) - composer Joseph Weigl
  • La Capricciosa corretta (1795) - composer Vicente Martín y Soler
  • Antigona (1796) - composer Giuseppe Francesco Bianchi
  • Il consiglio imprudente (1796) - composer Giuseppe Francesco Bianchi
  • Merope (1797) - composer Giuseppe Francesco Bianchi
  • Cinna (1798) - composer Giuseppe Francesco Bianchi
  • Armida (1802) - composer Giuseppe Francesco Bianchi
  • La Grotta di Calipso (1803) - composer Peter von Winter
  • Il Trionfo dell'amor fraterno (1804) - composer Peter von Winter
  • Il Ratto di Proserpina (1804) - composer Peter von Winter

• Texts for Cantatas, Oratorios, etc.
  • Per la ricuperata salute di Ofelia (1785) - composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Antonio Salieri and Cornetti - lost
  • Davidde penitente (1785) - composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
  • Il Davidde (1791) - Pasticcio from works by various composers
  • Hymn to America - composer Antonio Bagioli

• Poetry: Da Ponte wrote poetry throughout his life, including:
  • Various laudatory poetry for royalty (and some disparaging ones)
  • A long letter of complaint in blank verse to Emperor Leopold II
  • 18 sonnets in commemoration of his wife (1832)

Notes

Bibliography

• Bolt, Rodney, The Librettist of Venice: The Remarkable Life of Lorenzo Da Ponte - Mozart's Poet, Casanova's Friend, and Italian Opera's Impresario in America, New York: Bloomsbury, 2006 ISBN 1596911182
• Da Ponte, Lorenzo, Memorie, New York: 1823-27; English edition: Memoirs of Lorenzo Da Ponte, translated by Elizabeth Abbott, annotated by Arthur Livingstone. New York: The Orion Press, 1959. ISBN 0306762900
• Hodges, Sheila, Lorenzo Da Ponte: The Life and Times of Mozart's Librettist, Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2002 ISBN 0299178749
• Holden, Anthony, The Man Who Wrote Mozart: The Extraordinary Life of Lorenzo Da Ponte , London: Orion Publishing Company, 2007 ISBN 075382180X
• Jewish Museum, Vienna (pub.), Lorenzo Da Ponte - Challenging the New World, exhibition catalogue from the Jewish Museum ISBN 978-3-7757-1748-9, ISBN 3-7757-1748-X
• Russo, Joseph Louis, Lorenzo Da Ponte: Poet and Adventurer, New York: Columbia University Press, 1922 ISBN 0404506321
• Steptoe, Anthony, Mozart-Da Ponte Operas: The Cultural and Musical Background to "Le nozze di Figaro," "Don Giovanni," and "Cosi fan tutte", New York: Clarendon Press/Oxford University Press, 1988 ISBN 019313215X

• Da Ponte, Lorenzo, "Libretti viennesi," a cura di Lorenzo della Chà, Milano-Parma: Fondazione Bembo-Ugo Guanda Editore, 1999, due volumi. ISBN 88-8246-060-6
• Da Ponte, Lorenzo, "Estratto delle Memorie," a cura di Lorenzo della Chà, Milano: Edizioni Il Polifilo, 1999. ISBN 88-7050-438-7
• Da Ponte, Lorenzo, "Il Mezenzio," a cura di Lorenzo della Chà, Milano: Edizioni Il Polifilo, 2000. ISBN 88-7050-310-0
• Da Ponte, Lorenzo, "Saggio di traduzione libera di Gil Blas," a cura di Lorenzo della Chà, Milano: Edizioni Il Polifilo, 2002. ISBN 88-7050-461-1
• Da Ponte, Lorenzo, "Dante Alighieri," a cura di Lorenzo della Chà, Milano: Edizioni Il Polifilo, 2004. ISBN 88-7050-462-X
• Da Ponte, Lorenzo, "Saggi poetici," a cura di Lorenzo della Chà, Milano: Edizioni Il Polifilo, 2005. ISBN 88-7050-463-8
• Da Ponte, Lorenzo, "Libretti londinesi" a cura di Lorenzo della Chà, Milano: Edizioni Il Polifilo, 2007. ISBN 88-7050-464-

External links

• Columbia Encyclopedia Lorenzo Da Ponte entry. Retrieved September 14, 2007.
• Encyclopaedia Britannica Lorenzo Da Ponte entry. Retrieved September 14, 2007.
• Holden, Anthony, “The phoenix,” ‘’The Guardian’’ (London), 7 January 2007 Retrieved September 14, 2007.
• Keats, Jonathan, "Lorenzo's Toil: How the Son of an Impoverished Leatherworker Came to Write Mozart's Libretti," Washington Post, 16 July 2006 - book review. Retrieved September 14, 2007.
• "Lorenzo Da Ponte, Challenging the New World: An exhibition about Mozart's Librettist as Part of the Vienna Mozart Year 2006" Jewish Museum, Vienna. Retrieved September 14, 2007.
• Catholic Encyclopedia Lorenzo Da Ponte entry. Retrieved September 14, 2007.

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