Francesco Durante—Paisiello’s Teacher

Rousseau’s effulgent praise for Francesco Durante is just one of numerous contemporary proofs of Durante’s reputation as a pedagogue, composer, and all-round musician. He is praised not only in the testimony of his own students but also in the dictionaries of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In many respects, his partimenti may be considered a key to understanding and performing Paisiello’s essays in the genre.

Numerous manuscripts with partimenti by Francesco Durante are held by libraries across Europe today, though not a single autograph is known to have survived. Until recently, a manuscript dated 1762 containing partimenti by Durante was regarded as the earliest such in existence. However, another partimento manuscript was recently discovered in private hands that was in fact copied during Durante’s lifetime: “Regole per imparar di sonare il Cembalo del Sig.r D. Francesco Durante, … Napoli … 13 Aprile 1754.” The scribe in question was a priest, D. Giustino de’ Santi (1711–73), who made this copy for his religious community in Naples, basing it on a source that is no longer extant. Two dates are mentioned in the manuscript: April 13, 1754, on the first page, and April 14, 1754, on the third. The manuscript was written out neatly and carefully. It contains a section with basic rules (scale, cadenze, movimenti di basso), brief partimenti numerate, applying these rules in a practical example immediately after they are stated, followed by thirteen partimenti diminuiti, a partimento fugue, and three intavolature.

A personal note by the copyist at the beginning of the introductory section is intended to encourage the student not to give up too early just because the initial “principles” demand the most time and effort: