April’s composer of the month is Antonio Vivaldi
Antonio Vivaldi was born in Venice, Italy in 1678, which is where he spent most of his life. He composed music in the Baroque period.
Vivaldi’s father taught him to play the violin, and the two would often perform together. He was a very good violinist.
As his parents did not earn much and the family was big (8 children), Antonio chose to become a priest as it would enable him to get a good education free of cost.
Antonio continued to study and practice the violin, even after he became a priest (ordained in 1703) . He was called the “Red Priest” because of his flaming red hair. However, after a while, his bad asthma kept Antonio from saying Mass.
After that, Vivaldi spent all his time writing music and teaching. He taught at an orphanage for girls, and wrote a lot of music for the girls to play. He worked there for about 40 years. People came from miles around to hear Vivaldi’s talented students perform the beautiful music he had written.
In 1740, he sold all his manuscripts and moved to Vienna in the hope of finding steady employment under the patronage of Emperor Charles VI, who greatly admired the composer’s work and had invited him to his court. But Charles VI died soon after Antonio Vivaldi arrived in Vienna. Vivaldi was left destitute without having any job or income. This caused him to fall ill and he died soon afterwards.
Vivaldi’s music died with him but was revived when a large number of his manuscripts were found in Turin in 1926. His music started to become popular again after 1950. Many people think Vivaldi was the best Italian composer of his time. He wrote concertos, operas, church music and many other compositions. In all, Antonio wrote over 500 concertos.
His most famous set of concertos is The Four Seasons. Each of the four concertos (Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter) gives the violin a chance to conjure up sounds and pictures from each period of the year, from barking dogs and mosquitos, to summer storms and birds happily singing the arrival of spring.
Some of his music is lost, but new pieces keep being discovered all the time!
Here are some snippets that we’ll be sharing in class:
Autumn – from the 4 seasons Played by the Orchestra of st Lukes with animations by children from schools in New York. https://www.youtube.com/
L’estro armonico – Concerto No 10 in B Minor for 4 violins https://www.youtube.
Storm – from the Four Seasons played by 2 Cellos (the children have loved this!) https://www.youtube.
Mandolin Concerto https://www.youtube.
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