of Cologne was almost wholly composed of Italians, under the direction of the Kapellmeister Lucchesi, a composer well known in Tuscany.
At Coblentz, where Italian operas were often performed, the Kapellmeister was Sales of Brescia.
Darmstadt had formerly been distinguished by the presence of Vivaldi, the Court violinist.
Mannheim and Schwetzingen, the summer residence of the Elector Palatine, had Italian opera-houses. That of Mannheim was able to contain five thousand persons; the staging was sumptuous, and the company more numerous than at the Paris or London opera-houses. Almost all the performers were Italian. Of the two Kapellmeisters one, Toeschi, was Italian, and the other, Christian Cannabich, had been sent to Italy at the Elector's expense to study under Jommelli.
At Stuttgart and at Ludwigsburg, where the Duke of Würtemberg was in conflict with his subjects, on account of his extravagant passion for music,[1] Jommelli was fifteen years Kapellmeister and director of the Italian opera.[2] The theatre was enormous; it could be opened at the back, thus forming, when required, an open-air amphitheatre, "which was sometimes filled by the populace, expressly for the purpose of obtaining effects of perspective." All the opera buffa singers were Italian. The orchestra included numerous Italians, and in particular some famous
- ↑ The Würtembergers had protested in the Diet of the Empire against their sovereign's prodigality; they accused him of ruining the country by his music. His melomania was compared with Nero's; in his craze for things Italian the Duke had boys castrated at Stuttgart by two surgeons from Bologna. Burney speaks with contemptuous pity of this prince, "half of whose subjects are theatrical musicians, violinists and soldiers, and the other half beggars and outcasts."
- ↑ Another Italian, Boroni, succeeded him.
