A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Sala, Nicola

SALA, Nicola, born at a little village near Benevento, Naples, in 1701, and brought up in the Conservatorio della Pietà de' Turchini under Fago, Abos, and Leo. He died in 1800, and devoted the whole of a long life to his Conservatorio, in which he succeeded Fago as second master, and Cafaro, in 1787, as first master. The great work to which all his energies were devoted was his 'Regole del contrappunto prattico,' in 3 large volumes, containing methodical instruction in the composition of fugues, canons, etc., which was published in 1794. During the disturbances in Italy the engraved plates vanished for a time and were supposed to be lost. Choron then reprinted the work (Paris 1808), but the plates were afterwards discovered. Both editions are in the Library of the Sacred Harmonic Society. Sala wrote little besides this work. Three operas, 'Vologero,' 1737; 'Zenobia,' 1761; and 'Merope,' 1769; an oratorio, 'Giuditta,' 1780; 3 'Prologues' on the births of kings of Naples; a Mass, a Litany, and a few smaller pieces, are mentioned by Florimo (Cenno storico, 562).

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