View source for Nicola Porpora

{{Short description|Italian composer (1686–1768)}}
{{Redirect|Porpora|the surname|Porpora (surname)}}
{{Infobox person
| name          = Nicola Antonio Porpora
| image         = Nicola Antonio Porpora.jpg
| caption       = Unknown Neapolitan, ''Ritratto di Nicola Antonio Porpora'', [[Museo internazionale e biblioteca della musica|International Museum and Library of Bologna]]
| birth_date    = {{birth date|1686|08|17|df=y}}
| birth_place   = [[Naples]], [[Kingdom of Naples]]
| death_date    = {{death date and age|1768|03|03|1686|08|17|df=y}}
| death_place   = Naples, Kingdom of Naples
| education     = Poveri di Gesù Cristo
| works         = [[List of operas by Nicola Porpora|List of operas]]
| occupation    = {{flatlist|
*Composer
*voice teacher
}}
| organizations = {{flatlist|
*Conservatorio di Sant'Onofrio
*Poveri di Gesù Cristo
}}
}}

'''Nicola''' (or '''Niccolò''') '''Antonio Giacinto Porpora''' (17 August 1686{{spaced ndash}}3 March 1768) was an Italian composer and teacher of singing of the [[Baroque music|Baroque]] era, whose most famous singing students were the [[Castrato|castrati]] [[Farinelli]] and [[Caffarelli (castrato)|Caffarelli]]. Other students included composers [[Johann Adolph Hasse]], [[Matteo Capranica]] and [[Joseph Haydn]].

==Biography==
Porpora was born in [[Naples]], Italy. He graduated from the music conservatory [[Music conservatories of Naples|Poveri di Gesù Cristo]] of his native city, where the civic opera scene was dominated by [[Alessandro Scarlatti]]. Porpora's first opera, ''Agrippina'', was successfully performed at the Neapolitan court in 1708. His second, ''Berenice'', was performed at Rome. In a long career, he followed these up by many further operas, supported as ''maestro di cappella'' in the households of aristocratic patrons, such as the commander of military forces at Naples, prince [[Philip of Hesse-Darmstadt]], or of the Portuguese ambassador at Rome, for composing operas alone did not yet make a viable career. However, his enduring fame rests chiefly upon his unequalled power of teaching singing. At the Neapolitan [[Music conservatories of Naples|Conservatorio di Sant'Onofrio]] and with the Poveri di Gesù Cristo he trained [[Farinelli]], [[Caffarelli (castrato)|Caffarelli]], [[Felice Salimbeni|Salimbeni]], and other celebrated vocalists, during the period 1715 to 1721. In 1720 and 1721 he wrote two serenades to libretti by a gifted young poet, [[Pietro Metastasio|Metastasio]], the beginning of a long, though interrupted, collaboration. In 1722 his operatic successes encouraged him to lay down his conservatory commitments.

After a rebuff from the court of [[Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor|Charles VI]] at [[Vienna]] in 1725, Porpora settled mostly in [[Venice]], composing and teaching regularly in the schools of La Pietà and the Incurabili. In 1729 the anti-[[George Frideric Handel|Handel]] clique invited him to London to set up an opera company as a rival to Handel's, without success, and in the 1733–1734 season, even the presence of his pupil, the great Farinelli, failed to save the dramatic company in [[Lincoln's Inn Fields]] (the "[[Opera of the Nobility]]") from bankruptcy.

An interval as ''[[Kapellmeister]]'' at the [[Dresden]] court of the [[Electorate of Saxony|Elector of Saxony]] and Polish King Augustus from 1748 ended in strained relations with his rival in Venice and Rome, the hugely successful opera composer [[Johann Adolph Hasse]] and his wife, the prima donna [[Faustina Bordoni|Faustina]], and resulted in Porpora's departure in 1752.

As his accompanist and valet he hired the youthful [[Joseph Haydn]], who was making his way in Vienna as a struggling freelancer.<ref name="Griesinger12">Griesinger, p. 12</ref> Haydn later remembered Porpora thus: "There was no lack of ''Asino'', ''Coglione'', ''Birbante'' [ass, cullion, rascal], and pokes in the ribs, but I put up with it all, for I profited greatly from Porpora in singing, in composition, and in the Italian language."<ref name="Griesinger12"/> He also said that he had learned from the maestro "the true fundamentals of composition".

In 1753 Porpora spent three summer months, with Haydn in tow, at the spa town [[Mannersdorf am Leithagebirge]]. His function there was to continue the singing lessons of the mistress of the ambassador of Venice to the Austrian Empire, [[Pietro Correr (politician)|Pietro Correr]].<ref name="Griesinger12"/>

Porpora returned in 1759 to Naples.

From this time Porpora's career was a series of misfortunes: his florid style was becoming old-fashioned, his last opera, ''Camilla'', failed, his pension from Dresden stopped, and he became so poor that the expenses of his funeral were paid by a subscription concert. Yet at the moment of his death, Farinelli and Caffarelli were living in splendid retirement on fortunes largely based on the excellence of the old maestro's teaching.

A good linguist, who was admired for the idiomatic fluency of his recitatives, and a man of considerable literary culture, Porpora was also celebrated for his conversational wit. He was well-read in [[Latin]] and [[Italian language|Italian]] literature, wrote [[poetry]] and spoke [[French language|French]], [[German language|German]], and [[English language|English]].{{citation needed|date=October 2020}}

Besides some four dozen operas, there are oratorios, solo cantatas with keyboard accompaniment, motets and vocal serenades. Among his larger works, his 1720 opera ''Orlando'',<ref>{{cite web|title=Announcement of Availability of Recording of Porpora's Orlando|publisher=Records International|url=http://www.recordsinternational.com/archive/RICatalogApr06.html|date=April 2006|access-date=2008-01-06}}</ref> oratorio ''Gedeone'' (1737), one [[mass (music)|mass]],<ref>{{cite web|title=Announcement of Release of Recording of Porpora Mass in D|publisher=Records International|url=http://www.recordsinternational.com/archive/RICatalogNov02.html|date=November 2002|access-date=2008-01-06}}</ref> his Venetian Vespers,<ref>{{cite news|last=Ballifh|first=Benjamin|url=http://www.classiquenews.com/ecouter/lire_chronique_cd.aspx?id=567|language=fr|title=Le Mag CD: Nicola Porpora: Vêpres Vénitiennes (Andrieu, 2007)|date=2007-11-19|publisher=Classiquenews.com|access-date=2008-01-06|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071126063724/http://www.classiquenews.com/ecouter/lire_chronique_cd.aspx?id=567|archive-date=2007-11-26}}</ref> and the operas ''Germanico in Germania'' (1732) and ''Arianna in Nasso'' (1733 according to HOASM)<ref>{{cite web|title=Persistent Link to Catalogue Entry for a Recording of Arianna in Nasso|publisher=New York Public Library|url=http://catnyp.nypl.org/record=b7217085|access-date=2008-01-06}}</ref> have been recorded. <!-- and are as of 1-2008 still available, searching jpc.de, in Europe anyway -->

==Works==

===Vocal music===

====Operas====
:See '''[[List of operas by Nicola Porpora]]'''.

====Oratorios====
*''Davide e Bersabea'' (P. Rolli; London 1734)
*''Il Gedeone'' (text by A. Perrucci; Vienna March 28, 1737) recorded in 1999 on CPO 999 615-2
*''Il Verbo in carne'' (anon.; Dresden 1748)

====Cantatas====
[[File:Frederick, Prince of Wales, and his sisters by Philip Mercier.jpg|thumb|250px|[[Philippe Mercier|Philip Mercier]], 1733: [[Frederick, Prince of Wales]] with his younger sisters Anne, Caroline and Amelia]]
* 12 cantatas for solo voice and continuo dedicated to [[Frederick, Prince of Wales]] (London, 1735)<ref>[http://www.porporaproject.com/works.htm Complete works of Nicola Antonio Porpora] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101209015741/http://www.porporaproject.com/works.htm |date=2010-12-09 }}</ref><ref>{{citation|title=Archive of the Berlin Sing-Akademie|pages=268–269|first1=Matthias |last1=Kornemann|first2= Axel |last2=Fischer|publisher=Walter de Gruyter|year= 2009|isbn=978-3598117985}}</ref>
:I. ''D'amore il primo dardo''
:II. ''Nel mio sonno almen (Il sogno)''
:III. ''Tirsi chiamare a nome''
:IV. ''Queste che miri o Nice''
:V. ''Scrivo in te l'amato nome (Il nome)''
:VI. ''Già la notte s'avvicina (La pesca)''
:VII. ''Veggo la selva e il monte''
:VIII. ''Or che una nube ingrata''
:IX. ''Destatevi destatevi o pastori''
:X. ''Oh se fosse il mio core''
:XI. ''Oh Dio che non è vero''
:XII. ''Dal pover mio core''

===Instrumental music===
*6 Sinfonie da camera op. 2 (London 1736)
*12 Sonatas for violin and bass op. 12
*12 Triosonatas for 2 violins and bass (Vienna 1754)
*Sonatas for cello, violins, and Bass
*Concerto for cello, strings and bass
*Concerto for cello, 3 violins and bass

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Bibliography==
*Griesinger, Georg August (1810). ''Biographical Notes Concerning Joseph Haydn''. Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel. English translation by Vernon Gotwals, in ''Haydn: Two Contemporary Portraits'', Milwaukee: University of Wisconsin Press.

==External links==
{{commons category}}
*[http://www.hoasm.org/VIIIB/Porpora.html Porpora biography and discography]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20040214232817/http://www.porporaproject.com/content/nicola_porpora.htm The Porpora Project: a fuller biography]
*{{IMSLP|id=Porpora%2C_Nicola_Antonio|cname=Porpora}}
*{{MutopiaComposer|PorporaN}}
*{{OL author|4694567A}}

{{Nicola Porpora}}
{{Neapolitan School}}
{{Baroque music}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Porpora, Nicola}}
[[Category:1686 births]]
[[Category:1768 deaths]]
[[Category:18th-century Italian male musicians]]
[[Category:Neapolitan School composers]]
[[Category:18th-century Italian composers]]
[[Category:Italian classical composers of church music]]
[[Category:Italian Baroque composers]]
[[Category:Italian opera composers]]
[[Category:Italian male opera composers]]
[[Category:Italian voice teachers]]
[[Category:Composers from Naples]]
[[Category:Joseph Haydn]]