Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Musical Examples
- Editor's Note
- Acknowledgments
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Chapter One The Scene and the Players
- Chapter Two The Young Musician
- Chapter Three Early Works
- Chapter Four The Musical Dramatist
- Chapter Five Italian Psalms
- Chapter Six Padre Martini and the Dixit Dominus
- Chapter Seven Family Honors and Private Music Making
- Chapter Eight Isacco Figura del Redentore and the Death of Metastasio
- Chapter Nine “Countless Artistic Pleasures” Martines as Musical Hostess and Teacher
- Appendix One The Martines Family
- Appendix Two Letters to and from Marianna Martines
- Appendix Three Metastasio's Will and Codicil
- Appendix Four List of Works
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Chapter Two - The Young Musician
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 March 2023
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Musical Examples
- Editor's Note
- Acknowledgments
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Chapter One The Scene and the Players
- Chapter Two The Young Musician
- Chapter Three Early Works
- Chapter Four The Musical Dramatist
- Chapter Five Italian Psalms
- Chapter Six Padre Martini and the Dixit Dominus
- Chapter Seven Family Honors and Private Music Making
- Chapter Eight Isacco Figura del Redentore and the Death of Metastasio
- Chapter Nine “Countless Artistic Pleasures” Martines as Musical Hostess and Teacher
- Appendix One The Martines Family
- Appendix Two Letters to and from Marianna Martines
- Appendix Three Metastasio's Will and Codicil
- Appendix Four List of Works
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Marianna Martines was baptized on May 4, 1744, in the Michaelerkirche, probably on the day she was born into her well-connected, bilingual, and talented family. She came into the world during the reign of the Empress Maria Theresa, when Joseph Haydn was still a twelve-year-old soprano in the imperial chapel. She was, to the best of our knowledge, the first girl born to the family. Most of what little we know of Marianna's childhood and musical training comes from the autobiographical letter that she wrote to Padre Martini in December 1773:
I was born in the year 1744 on the 4th day of May. In my seventh year they began to introduce me to the study of music, for which they believed me inclined by nature. Its rudiments were taught me by Signor Giuseppe Haydn, currently Maestro di Cappella to Prince Esterhazy, and a man of much reputation in Vienna, particularly with regard to instrumental music. In counterpoint, to which they assigned me quite early, I have had no other master than Signor Giuseppe Bonno, a most elegant composer of the imperial court, who, sent by Emperor Charles VI to Naples, stayed there many years and acquired excellence in music under the celebrated masters Durante and Leo. My exercise has been, and still is, to combine the continual daily practice of composing with the study and scrutiny of that which has been written by the most celebrated masters such as Hasse, Jommelli, Galluppi and the others who are famous today and who are praised for their musical labors—and without neglecting the older [masters] such as Hendel, Lotti, Caldara, and others … But in all my studies, the chief planner and director was always, and still is, Signor Abbate Metastasio who, with the paternal care he takes of me and of all my numerous family, renders an exemplary return for the incorruptible friendship and tireless support which my good father lent him up until the very last days of his life.
This lovely passage—a little gem of eighteenth-century musical autobiography— is worth examining in some detail. In claiming Haydn as her first teacher, Marianna ran the risk of misleading Padre Martini, who might not have realized that Haydn had been only a teenager with no steady employment when he gave her lessons.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Marianna MartinesA Woman Composer in the Vienna of Mozart and Haydn, pp. 22 - 34Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2010
- 1
- Cited by