Antonio Salieri facts for kids

Portrait of Salieri by Joseph Willibrord Mähler, 1815

Antonio Salieri (born August 18, 1750 – died May 7, 1825) was a famous Italian composer, conductor, and teacher. He was born in Legnago, a town south of Verona, in what was then the Republic of Venice. He spent most of his adult life and career in Vienna, which was the capital of the Habsburg monarchy.

Salieri was a very important person in the world of opera in the late 1700s. He studied with Florian Leopold Gassmann and was helped by Christoph Willibald Gluck. Salieri wrote operas in three different languages. He helped create many parts of opera music, and his work greatly influenced other composers of his time.

He became the director of Italian opera for the Habsburg court, a job he held from 1774 to 1792. This made him very powerful in Italian opera in Vienna. He also wrote operas for theaters in Paris, Rome, and Venice. His plays were performed all over Europe during his lifetime. From 1788 to 1824, he was the Austrian imperial Kapellmeister, meaning he was in charge of music at the court chapel and its school.

Even when his operas were performed less often after 1804, he remained one of the most important music teachers. Many famous musicians, like Franz Liszt, Franz Schubert, and Ludwig van Beethoven, were his students. Salieri's music became less popular between 1800 and 1868. It was rarely heard until the late 1900s when he became famous again. This happened because of the play Amadeus (1979) by Peter Shaffer and its 1984 film version. These stories showed a made-up rivalry between Salieri and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Rumors spread that Salieri had poisoned Mozart, but this is not true. It is more likely that they respected each other as musicians.

Antonio Salieri: A Famous Composer

Early Life and Musical Start

Antonio Salieri was born on August 18, 1750. He began learning music in his hometown of Legnago. His older brother, Francesco Salieri, who was a student of the famous violinist Giuseppe Tartini, first taught him at home. He also had lessons from Giuseppe Simoni, the organist at Legnago Cathedral.

Salieri remembered little from his childhood, except his love for sweets, reading, and music. He once ran away from home to hear his brother play the violin. After his parents died around 1763-1764, he lived with a monk in Padua. Later, around 1765 or 1766, he became the ward of Giovanni Mocenigo, a nobleman in Venice.

While in Venice, Salieri continued his music studies with Giovanni Battista Pescetti, an organist and opera composer. After Pescetti's death, he studied with the opera singer Ferdinando Pacini. Pacini helped Salieri get the attention of the composer Florian Leopold Gassmann. Gassmann was impressed with Salieri's talent. He took the young orphan to Vienna and paid for the rest of his music education.

Learning in Vienna

Salieri and Gassmann arrived in Vienna on June 15, 1766. Gassmann took Salieri to the Italian Church to dedicate his teaching to God. This event made a lasting impression on Salieri. His education included learning Latin, Italian poetry, German, and European literature. His music studies focused on writing songs and understanding thoroughbass. He learned music theory, harmony, and counterpoint from a famous book called Gradus ad Parnassum. Salieri translated this book during his Latin lessons.

Salieri lived with Gassmann until 1774, the year Gassmann died and Salieri got married. Not many of Salieri's early works have survived. He later suggested that these pieces were either lost or destroyed on purpose. However, some church music from this time still exists, including a Mass in C major from 1767. A complete opera he wrote in 1769, La vestal, has been lost.

Starting in 1766, Gassmann introduced Salieri to the daily chamber music performances for Emperor Joseph II. Salieri quickly impressed the Emperor, and their relationship lasted until Joseph's death in 1790. During this time, Salieri also met Metastasio and Christoph Willibald Gluck. Metastasio taught Salieri about Italian poetry, and Gluck became his friend and advisor.

Salieri made his debut as an opera composer in 1770. His first full opera was Le Donne letterate, based on Molière's play Les Femmes Savantes. It had a libretto (story for an opera) by Giovanni Gastone Boccherini. This opera was a modest success and started Salieri's 34-year career. He wrote over 35 original operas.

Early Operas in Vienna

After the success of Le Donne letterate, Salieri received commissions for two more operas in 1770. Both had librettos by Giovanni Boccherini. The first, L'amore innocente (Innocent Love), was a light comedy. The second, Don Chisciotte alle Nozze di Gamace (Don Quixote at the marriage of Camacho), was based on Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quixote.

In these early works, Salieri liked to experiment and mix different opera styles. Don Chisciotte combined ballet and opera buffa (comic opera). L'amore innocente used different singing styles for sopranos, even borrowing from opera seria (serious opera). Mixing and pushing the boundaries of opera became a key part of Salieri's style. He also showed a lifelong interest in stories from classic plays and literature.

Salieri's first big success was with a serious opera called Armida, which premiered on June 2, 1771. It was based on Torquato Tasso's poem La Gerusalemme liberata. Armida is a story about love and duty, full of magic. It takes place during the First Crusade and includes a dramatic mix of ballet, arias (solo songs), and choruses. This opera followed Gluck's ideas for reforming serious opera. The libretto for Armida was by Marco Coltellini. Armida was translated into German and performed widely, making Salieri known as an important and modern composer.

His next popular success was a comedy called La Fiera di Venezia (The Fair of Venice). It was written for Carnival in 1772 and premiered on January 29. Salieri worked again with Giovanni Boccherini, who created an original story. La Fiera featured characters singing in three languages and showed a busy scene of the Venice Carnival. It also had an innovative scene that combined dancing on stage with singing from soloists and the chorus. This idea was later copied by other composers, including Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in Don Giovanni. Salieri also wrote impressive arias for a soprano that combined fancy singing (coloratura) with woodwind solos, which was new for comic opera.

Salieri's next two operas were not as successful. La Vecchia rapita (The Stolen Bucket) made fun of the emotional arias in opera seria. It also had new ways of using instruments, including the first known use of three tympani (kettledrums). This opera was followed by a popular comedy, La locandiera [it] (The Mistress of the Inn), based on a play by Carlo Goldoni.

Most of Salieri's instrumental works (music without singing) are from this period. Critics often say these works are not as creative as his operas. They are mostly in the Galant style, which was popular at the time. These pieces include two piano concertos (1773), an organ concerto (1773), and two concertos for multiple instruments: one for oboe, violin, and cello (1770), and another for flute and oboe (1774). These are some of Salieri's most recorded compositions.

When Gassmann died in 1774, Salieri took over as assistant director of the Italian opera. In 1775, Salieri married Therese Helferstorfer. During this time, he focused on rehearsing and conducting the Italian opera company in Vienna and teaching. He also composed an Alleluia for chorus and orchestra in 1774 and the oratorio La Passione di Gesù Cristo in 1776.

In 1777, the Italian opera company faced financial problems. Emperor Joseph II decided to stop Italian opera, French plays, and ballet. Instead, he wanted to promote German-language plays and music that reflected Austrian values. This meant Salieri's role as assistant court composer was reduced. Salieri had not fully learned German, and he felt he could no longer be an assistant opera director. With fewer opportunities in Vienna, Salieri started looking for new work.

Italian Tour and Parisian Success

In 1778, Gluck turned down an offer to compose the opening opera for La Scala in Milan. Joseph II suggested Salieri for the job, and Gluck agreed. Salieri was given a year-long leave to write for La Scala and tour Italy. His tour began with Europa riconosciuta (Europa Recognized) for La Scala. He also visited Venice and Rome. During this tour, he wrote three new comic operas and worked with Giacomo Rust on Il talismano [it]. One of his Italian works, La Scuola de' gelosi (The School for Jealousy), became very popular internationally.

When Salieri returned to Vienna in 1780, he wrote a German Singspiel (a type of opera with spoken dialogue) called Der Rauchfangkehrer (The Chimney Sweep). This opera and Mozart's Die Entführung aus dem Serail (The Abduction from the Seraglio) were the only two major successes from the German Singspiel experiment.

In 1783, the Italian opera company in Vienna was restarted. Salieri helped choose the singers during his Italian tour. The new season opened with a revised version of his successful opera La Scuola de' Pelosi. Salieri then went back to his usual work of rehearsing, composing, and teaching. However, he soon had an opportunity to write an opera for Paris, again thanks to Gluck's support.

Operas for Paris and Vienna

Salieri's opera Les Danaïdes (The Danaids) was a five-act French opera. The story was based on an ancient Greek legend. Gluck had originally been asked to finish this work for Paris, but he gave the entire project to Salieri. Gluck worried that critics would not like an opera by a young composer known for comedies. So, the opera was first announced as a new work by Gluck with Salieri's help. Later, the press said it was partly by Gluck and partly by Salieri. After its success, Gluck wrote a letter saying the opera was entirely by Salieri.

Les Danaïdes was very popular and led to more requests for Salieri to write for Parisian audiences. It followed the reform ideas that Gluck had started. Salieri's first French opera had serious and festive scenes, but it was mostly about darkness and revenge. It showed political murder, family duty, and eternal punishment. The opera, with its dark opening, grand choruses, many ballet scenes, and exciting ending showing hell, was performed in Paris for over forty years.

After his success in Paris, Salieri returned to Vienna and became friends with Lorenzo Da Ponte. He also met Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Da Ponte wrote his first opera libretto for Salieri, Il ricco d'un giorno (A rich man for a day) in 1784, but it was not successful. Salieri then worked with Giambattista Casti, and they had more success. Meanwhile, Da Ponte started working with Mozart on Le Nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro).

In 1785, Salieri created one of his greatest works with Casti's text, La Grotta di Trofonio (The cave of Trophonius). This was the first comic opera published in full score. Soon after, in 1786, Emperor Joseph II asked Mozart and Salieri to each create a one-act opera for a banquet. Salieri worked with Casti to create Prima la musica e poi le parole (First the music and then the words). This short work made fun of the relationship between a poet and a composer and showed the arguments between two famous sopranos.

Salieri then returned to Paris for his opera Les Horaces (The Horatii), which was not successful. However, his next Parisian opera, Tarare, with a libretto by Pierre Beaumarchais, was a great success. This opera was meant to be the ultimate reform opera, combining poetry and music in a new way. Salieri also composed a sacred cantata called Le Judgment dernier (The Last Judgement). The success of Tarare was so great that it was translated into Italian by Lorenzo Da Ponte as Axur, re d'Ormus (Axur, king of Hormuz) and performed at the royal wedding of Franz II in 1788.

Later Years and Retirement

In 1788, Salieri returned to Vienna and stayed there for the rest of his life. He became the Kapellmeister of the Imperial Chapel after Giuseppe Bonno died. He conducted music and managed the music school connected to the chapel until 1824, shortly before his death.

His Italian version of Tarare, called Axur, became his biggest international success. Axur was performed widely across Europe. Axur and his other new works completed by 1792 showed the peak of Salieri's popularity. However, his influence in Vienna began to lessen after the death of Joseph II in 1790. Joseph's death meant Salieri lost his most important supporter.

During this time of change in Vienna and revolution in France, Salieri composed two very new musical dramas with librettos by Giovanni Casti. But because these operas were seen as too political and liberal, they were not performed publicly. These two original operas, Cublai, gran kan de' Tartari (Kublai Grand Kahn of Tartary) and Catilina, remained unperformed. Cublai was a satire about the Russian Empress Catherine the Great, and Catilina was about a conspiracy to overthrow the Roman republic. These were composed in 1787 and 1792. Two other operas from 1789 were not very successful, but La cifra (The Cipher) was a great popular success.

The beginning of Salieri's opera Palmira, regina di Persia

Salieri retired as director of the Italian opera in 1792. He continued to write new operas until 1804, when he decided to stop writing for the stage. Of his later works, only two gained wide popularity during his life: Palmira, Regina di Persia (Palmira, queen of Persia) from 1795 and Cesare in Farmacusa [de] (Caesar on Pharmacusa). His late opera based on William Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor, Falstaff ossia Le tre burle (Falstaff, or the three tricks) (1799), is more popular today than it was back then. His last opera was a German Singspiel called Die Neger [de] (The negroes), which was a complete failure in 1804.

Life After Opera

When Salieri retired from the stage, he felt that musical styles had changed too much. He believed he no longer had the creative energy or desire to adapt. As he grew older, his political views also became less liberal. He saw the reforms of Joseph II's reign and the French Revolution replaced by more extreme ideas. The political changes and the invasion of Austria by French forces affected Salieri deeply. His first biographer, Ignaz von Mosel, noted that these changes, along with personal losses, led him to stop writing operas. Salieri himself said that musical taste was changing in a way that was "completely contrary to that of my own times."

Salieri continued his teaching and work with the imperial chapel. His duties required him to compose many sacred works. In his last years, he focused almost entirely on religious music and teaching. He wrote two sets of vespers, many graduals, offertories, and four orchestral masses for the chapel. During this time, he lost his only son in 1805 and his wife in 1807.

Salieri continued to conduct publicly. He conducted Haydn's The Creation in 1808, during which Haydn collapsed. He also conducted several premieres by Beethoven, including his first and second Piano Concertos. Salieri also helped manage several charities and organize their musical events.

His other works from this late period include large cantatas and one oratorio, Habsburg, written on patriotic themes. He also wrote educational works for his singing students and simple songs for home entertainment. In 1815, he composed a large instrumental work called Twenty-Six Variations for the Orchestra on a Theme called La Folia di Spagna. This piece showed his skill in using different orchestral sounds.

Salieri continued to teach young musicians. Among his students were Ludwig van Beethoven, Franz Liszt, and Franz Schubert. He also taught many famous singers. Most of his students, except the very wealthy ones, received lessons for free. This was his way of honoring the kindness Gassmann had shown him as a poor orphan.

In 1823, Salieri became ill and suffered from health problems for his last year and a half. He died in Vienna on May 7, 1825, at the age of 74. He was buried in the Matzleinsdorfer Friedhof. At his memorial service on June 22, 1825, his own Requiem in C minor, which he composed in 1804, was performed for the first time. His remains were later moved to the Zentralfriedhof. His monument has a poem written by one of his students, Joseph Weigl:

Salieri's Musical Works

Opera

During his time in Vienna, Salieri became very respected as a composer and conductor, especially for his operas. He also wrote chamber music and sacred music. Some of his most successful operas include Armida (1771), La fiera di Venezia (1772), La scuola de' gelosi (1778), Der Rauchfangkehrer (1781), Les Danaïdes (1784) (which was first presented as Gluck's work), La grotta di Trofonio (1785), Tarare (1787), Axur, re d'Ormus (1788), La cifra (1789), Palmira, regina di Persia (1795), Il mondo alla rovescia (1795), Falstaff (1799), and Cesare in Farmacusa (1800).

Sacred Works

Salieri's earliest surviving work is a Mass in C major. He wrote four major orchestral masses, a requiem, and many other religious pieces like offertories, graduals, vesper settings, and sacred cantatas and oratorios. Much of his sacred music was written after he became Hofkapellmeister in 1788.

Instrumental Works

His smaller collection of instrumental works includes two piano concertos, a concerto for organ (1773), a concerto for flute, oboe and orchestra (1774), a triple concerto for oboe, violin, and cello, and a set of twenty-six variations on "La folia di Spagna" (1815).

Salieri and Mozart: A Look at Their Relationship

In the 1780s, when Mozart lived in Vienna, he and his father Leopold wrote letters saying that some Italian musicians, led by Salieri, were trying to stop Mozart from getting certain jobs or staging his operas. For example, Mozart wrote in 1781 that "the only one who counts in [the Emperor's] eyes is Salieri." Their letters suggest that Mozart and his father, being Austrians, felt that Italian composers had a special place in the Austrian court. They blamed Salieri and other Italians for Mozart's difficulties in Vienna. In 1783, Mozart wrote about "a trick of Salieri's," accusing him of unfair actions.

Years after Mozart's death, a rumor started that Salieri had poisoned Mozart. Some people believe this rumor came from a rivalry between German and Italian music styles. Carl Maria von Weber, a relative of Mozart by marriage, is said to have avoided Salieri. These rumors then became part of popular culture, like in the 1984 film Amadeus, which shows a jealous Salieri trying to harm Mozart's career.

It's interesting to note that Salieri's music was more like that of Gluck and Gassmann, who were not strictly "Italian" in style, rather than other Italian composers like Giovanni Paisiello or Domenico Cimarosa. Empress Maria Theresa even preferred Italian composers over Germans like Gassmann, Salieri, or Gluck in 1772. Although Salieri was born in Italy, he lived in Vienna for almost 60 years and was seen by some, like music critic Johann Friedrich Rochlitz, as a German composer.

Historian Alexander Wheelock Thayer thinks the rivalry might have started in 1781. Mozart wanted to be the music teacher for Duchess Elisabeth of Württemberg, but Salieri was chosen instead because he was known as a good singing teacher. The next year, Mozart again failed to be chosen as the princess's piano teacher. Mozart's father wrote that "Salieri and his group will move heaven and earth to put it down." However, when Mozart's opera Figaro premiered, Salieri was busy with his new French opera Les Horaces. Also, when Lorenzo Da Ponte was in Prague preparing Mozart's Don Giovanni, he was called back to Vienna for a royal wedding where Salieri's Axur, re d'Ormus would be performed. Mozart was not happy about this.

The rivalry between Salieri and Mozart also became public during an opera competition held by Emperor Joseph II in 1786. Mozart was seen as the loser of this competition. Mozart's 1791 opera The Magic Flute has parts that sound similar to Salieri's music. For example, the Papageno–Papagena duet is like a song in Salieri's Prima la musica e poi le parole. Also, Papageno's whistle in The Magic Flute uses a tune from Salieri's Piano Concerto.

However, there is also evidence that Mozart and Salieri sometimes supported each other. For example, when Salieri became Kapellmeister in 1788, he chose to bring back Figaro instead of a new opera of his own. When he attended the coronation of Leopold II in 1790, Salieri brought three of Mozart's masses with him. Salieri and Mozart even wrote a cantata together, Per la recuperate salute di Ofelia, to celebrate the singer Nancy Storace returning to the stage. This work was lost until 2016 when a copy was found. Mozart's Davide penitente (1785), his Piano Concerto KV 482 (1785), the Clarinet Quintet (1789), and the 40th Symphony (1788) were all premiered because Salieri suggested it. Salieri supposedly conducted a performance of the 40th Symphony in 1791. In his last letter from October 14, 1791, Mozart told his wife that he had picked up Salieri and Caterina Cavalieri in his carriage and driven them to the opera. He spoke enthusiastically about Salieri attending his opera The Magic Flute, saying, "He heard and saw with all his attention, and from the overture, to the last choir there was not a piece that didn't elicit a 'Bravo!' or 'Bello!' out of him [...]."

Salieri, along with Mozart's student Johann Nepomuk Hummel, also taught Mozart's younger son, Franz Xaver Mozart, who was born about four months after his father's death.

Salieri's Legacy and Modern Interest

Salieri and his music were mostly forgotten from the 1800s until the late 1900s. His fame was revived because of the play Amadeus (1979) by Peter Shaffer and its 1984 film version, directed by Miloš Forman. These works showed a dramatic and very fictionalized version of Salieri. Today, his music has gained some popularity through recordings. It is also being studied more by experts, and a few of his operas are being performed again.

There is now a Salieri Opera Festival, supported by the Fondazione Culturale Antonio Salieri. This festival aims to rediscover his work and the works of other composers from his time. It is an annual event in his hometown of Legnago, where a theater has been named in his honor.

Modern Performances of Salieri's Work

In 2003, the singer Cecilia Bartoli released The Salieri Album, a CD with 13 songs from Salieri's operas. Most of these had never been recorded before. In 2008, another opera star, Diana Damrau, released a CD with seven Salieri songs. Since 2000, complete recordings of operas like Axur Re d'Ormus, Falstaff, Les Danaïdes, La Locandiera, La Grotta di Trofonio, Prima la musica e poi le parole, and Il mondo alla rovescia [de] have been released. While Salieri's works are not yet a regular part of opera performances, they are being performed more often.

His operas Falstaff (1995) and Tarare (1987) have been released on DVD. In 2004, the opera Europa riconosciuta was performed in Milan for the reopening of La Scala, with Diana Damrau in the main role. This performance was also shown on television.

In November 2009, Il mondo alla rovescia was performed for the first time in modern times at the Teatro Salieri in Legnago. This was part of the Salieri Opera Festival. From 2009 to 2011, Antonio Giarola directed the festival. He also directed Varietas Delectat, a dance show inspired by Salieri's music, from 2009 to 2012.

On November 14, 2011, in Graz, Austria, Salieri's Der Rauchfangkehrer had its first modern performance. In July 2014, the Pinchgut Opera of Sydney, Australia, performed it as The Chimneysweep. The Sydney Morning Herald called it the discovery of "a long-forgotten treasure."

Salieri's Music in Films

Salieri's music has even appeared in Hollywood films. In 2001, his triple concerto was used in the movie The Last Castle. The music was used as a theme for a character who seemed jealous of someone else. In 2006, the movie Copying Beethoven showed Salieri in a more positive way. In this film, a young music student says she came to Vienna to study opera singing with Salieri. The 2008 film Iron Man used a part of Salieri's Piano Concerto in C major.

Fictional Stories About Salieri

Salieri's life, especially his relationship with Mozart, has been the subject of many stories:

• Soon after Salieri's death in 1825, Alexander Pushkin wrote his play Mozart and Salieri (1831). This play explored the idea of envy.
• In 1898, Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov turned Pushkin's play into an opera of the same name.
• The very popular but highly fictionalized story came from Peter Shaffer's play Amadeus (1979) and its Oscar-winning 1984 film adaptation. In the film, F. Murray Abraham played Salieri as a clever character who tries to secretly harm Mozart's career.
• Salieri's supposed dislike for Mozart is also mentioned in a funny opera called A Little Nightmare Music (1982) by P. D. Q. Bach.
• Patrick Stewart played Salieri in the 1985 production The Mozart Inquest.
• Florent Mothe plays Salieri in the French musical Mozart, l'opéra rock (2009).
• C. Ian Kyer's historical novel Damaging Winds: Rumours that Salieri Murdered Mozart Swirl in the Vienna of Beethoven and Schubert (2013) also explores this topic.
• Antonio Salieri appears as a character in the mobile game Fate/Grand Order.

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See also

In Spanish: Antonio Salieri para niños