Stabat Mater. By Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710 - 1736) & Antonio Vivaldi (1678 - 1741).

Text and Illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopaedia,

unless otherwise stated.

Purported portrait of Pergolesi.

Presented by his biographer, Florimo,

to the Naples Conservatory.

(Wikimedia Commons)

Stabat Mater.

Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710 - 1736).

Antonio Vivaldi (1678 - 1741).

Available on YouTube at

http://youtu.be/T5TnMOIPRVs.

Besides secular music, Pergolesi also wrote sacred music, including a Mass in F and his Magnificat in C Major. It is his Stabat Mater (1736), however, for soprano, alto, string orchestra and basso continuo, which is his best known sacred work.

It was commissioned by the Confraternità dei Cavalieri di San Luigi di Palazzo, who presented an annual Good Friday Meditation in honour of The Virgin Mary. Pergolesi's work replaced one composed by Alessandro Scarlatti, only nine years before, but which was already perceived as "old-fashioned," so rapidly had public tastes changed.

Artist: François Morellon la Cave.

Engraved portrait of Antonio Vivaldi.

Italiano: François Morellon la Cave: Antonio Vivaldi – 

Effigies Antonii Vivaldi per l’edizione Le Cène dell’op. 8 del 1725.

Deutsch: Antonio Vivaldi (Kupferstich von François Morellon la Cave; 1725).

English: Antonio Vivaldi by François Morellon la Cave; 1725.

Source/Photographer: http://portrait.kaar.at/Musikgeschichte%2018.Jhd/image13.html.

(Wikimedia Commons)

Antonio Lucio Vivaldi (4 March 1678 – 28 July 1741), nicknamed il Prete Rosso ("The Red Priest") because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, Catholic Priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice.

Recognised as one of the greatest Baroque composers, his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe. Vivaldi is known mainly for composing instrumental concertos, especially for the violin, as well as sacred choral works and over forty operas. His best known work is a series of violin concertos known as The Four Seasons.

Many of his compositions were written for the female music ensemble of the Ospedale della Pietà, a home for abandoned children, where Vivaldi had been employed from 1703 to 1715 and from 1723 to 1740. Vivaldi also had some success with stagings of his operas in Venice, Mantua and Vienna. After meeting the Emperor Charles VI, Vivaldi moved to Vienna, hoping for preferment. However, the Emperor died soon after Vivaldi's arrival and Vivaldi died less than a year later.

Though Vivaldi's music was well received during his lifetime, it later declined in popularity until its vigorous revival in the first half of the 20th-Century. Today, Vivaldi ranks among the most popular and widely recorded of Baroque composers.