LICHTENTHAL, Peter 1780-1853

Album Musicale Sacro ... Fr. 24. [Piano-vocal score]

Milano: Giovanni Ricordi [PNs 20351-20362], [1848].

Folio. Dark red leather-backed marbled paper boards, titling and decorative devices gilt to spine, original publisher's printed wrappers with small illustration to head bound in. 1f. (recto title with contents printed within decorative border, verso blank), 3-117 pp. Each piece with separate caption title and pagination. Engraved.

For SATB choir and organ or piano, unless otherwise specified.

Contains 12 works:

1. Pater Noster. 5 pp.
2. Ave verum corpus. 5 pp.
3. Veni Sancte Spiritus. 7 pp.
4. Ave Maria [2 settings "una in istile moderno, l'altra in istile antico"].12 pp.
5. Salve Regina. 7 pp.
6. Ave Maris Stella. 9 pp.
7. Ave Maria. 7 pp. [double SATB choir]
8. Salve Regina. 4 pp. [soprano, piano or organ]
9. Salve Regina. 4 pp. [soprano, piano or organ]
10. Stabat Mater. 44 pp.
11. O salutaris Hostia. 5 pp. [SSAA, piano or organ]
12. O salutaris Hostia. 6 pp. [TTBB, piano or organ]

Provenance
The collection of Italian conductor, vocal coach, and close associate of Puccini and Mascagni, Luigi Ricci (1893-1981), previously from the collection of Italian composer Francesco Maria Albini (1829-1917), with his signature and "263" to upper wrapper and title.

Binding slightly worn, rubbed, and bumped; head and tail of spine frayed; upper wrapper creased and slightly soiled; lower wrapper lacking. Slightly worn; scattered light foxing throughout. A clean, wide-margined copy overall.

First Editions. Rare (no copies located in the U.S.; two copies located outside Italy, at the British Library and ÖNB).

Peter (Pietro) Lichtenthal was an Austrian doctor, writer on music, and composer. He was friends with Mozart's son Karl Thomas while living in Vienna, then moved to Milan in 1810 where he spent the rest of his life.

"Lichtenthal's importance lies in his writings, in particular his four-volume Dizionario e bibliografia della musica (1826), which although full of factual errors, and being in significant measure a translation of the dictionaries of Gerber (1790–92), Koch (1802) and Castil-Blaze (1821) and the bibliography of Forkel (1792), is nevertheless a landmark in the development from dilettantism to modern, systematic bibliographic method." Alfred Loewenberg and Bruce Carr in Grove Music Online

Fétis writes: "I found him in Milan in 1841, and found him to be a very amiable man, very obliging, loving art with passion, little favored by fortune, but not desiring its advantages." Vol. 5, pp. 297-298.

As a composer, Lichtenthal wrote a number of works that achieved a degree of success during his lifetime, including seven ballets for La Scala. However, it is his arrangements of Mozart that have lived on, including the Requiem and several symphonies and piano concertos.

The present collection of sacred vocal music consists primarily of shorter works for chorus with piano or organ accompaniment. Of the twelve works, the most substantial is the Stabat Mater, a ten-movement setting dedicated to Rossini.

Item #31309

Price: $300.00  other currencies