Bontempi (real name, Angelini), Giovanni Andrea

Bontempi (real name, Angelini), Giovanni Andrea, Italian singer and composer; b. Perugia, c. 1624; d. Torgiano, July 1, 1705. He was a castrato, and sang in the choir of S. Marco in Venice (1643–50). After studies with Mazzocchi, he was appointed joint Kapellmeister in Dresden, with Schiitz and Vincenzo Albrici, in 1656. He assumed the name Bontempi after his patron, Cesare Bontempi. In 1680 he returned to Italy; sang at the Collegiata di S. Maria at Sapello, near Foligno, in 1682; was maestro di cappella there during the first half of 1686. He was one of the earliest composers of Italian operas and oratorios. His first opera, II Paride in musica, to his own libretto, was produced in Dresden, on Nov. 3, 1662; it was the first Italian opera ever produced there. Two later operas, both produced in Dresden, were Apollo e Dafne, written in collaboration with Peranda and produced in Dresden on Sept. 3, 1671, and Giove e Io (also with Peranda), produced in Dresden on Jan. 16, 1673. He also composed an oratorio, Martirio di San Emiliano. Bontempi publ, the treatises Nova quatuor vocibus componendi methodus (Dresden, 1660), Tractus in quo demonstrantur occultae convenientiae sonorum systematis participan (Bologna, 1690), and Historia musica, nella quale si ha piena cognitione della teorica e della pratica antica della musica harmonica secondo la dottrina de’ Greci (Perugia, 1695).

Bibliography

G.B. Rossi Scotti, Di G.A. B. di Perugia (1878); F Briganti, G.A. Angelini-B. (1624–1705), Musicista, letterato, ar-chitto: Perugia-Dresda (Florence, 1956).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire