Antonio Lotti: Messa a tre cori e orchestra in mi minore 

"Unique surprises, all precious gems" may be the perfect summation of so much of Lotti's compositions. I repeatedly find myself catching my breath at an unexpected chord or rhythm. Are you in a position to point me to a listing of his compositions, ideally broken down by movements? I've gathered a number of his pieces here and there, many labeled simply "Kyrie" or "Gloria" with no indication of WHICH work it is from. Thank you in advance.

@@stanleyslawski1339 [I do not systematically replies so some I may find and some not, this one I did.] Thanks for your inquiry. I am not really a musicologist but I was a musician and played in a symphony orchestra when I was young and I listened to all of Mozart and to all of Bach more than once. I think I know a good deal about music history as an amateur. But I did not know about Lotti until six weeks ago! I can read the German, Latin, Italian, French fluently to the research in the sources. I bought some eighteenth century first edition Italian and French treatises on music. I do research as a profession and it looks me we are not getting anywhere unless more of the Italian libraries are catalogued and the catalogues are made available. What exactly has survived. Right now the only bibliography I know is that of the Wikipedia entry. The Grove Online Encyclopedia must have a list of Lotti's works. Albinoni, for example, was known mainly for his operas. He wrote so many and they seem to be all gone. Where are they? In other news, I go around RU-vid stating that Leonardo Leo is the greatest composer of music of all time and people are evidently skeptical. One guy called me an idiot in caps with quite a lot of exclamation marks. Now, I just discovered that Johann Friedrich Reichardt, the eminent German music critic and musician who was friends with Schiller and Goethe, wrote that Leo was the most important musician of the eighteenth century. I already knew that, with one exception though. There is a biography of Leo (1957), none of Lotti that I have been able to discover. Nothing wrong with Mozart and Bach. But the history of Western music cut off one of its two legs when it deified them and the Italian connection was mostly forgotten. There is a lot of work to be done.

@@leodepuydt308 Thanks for replying to my specific question about the list of compositions. I'm not a professional researcher, but am a professional musician, and certainly have gone deeper than Wiki. Grove's a great suggestion, I'll give it another shot. As to your passion about certain composers, I'm sure you understand that art is subjective. If you think Leo was the greatest composer of all time, then he is..... for you. What anyone else thinks is irrelevant, in my opinion. I daily am moved to tears or to laughing out loud (at a musical surprise or joke) when listening to my vast collection of Baroque music. Not Baroque, of course, but with Beethoven I almost have an out of body experience from the emotions stirred in me. Yet, many of the Romantic period composers generally bore me. Yet my friend, a Juillard trained composer, yawns when I point him to Lotti or Albinoni, saying "Yeah, that's nice, I guess"........ while living and breathing the Romantics. It's subjective.

@@stanleyslawski1339 Thanks. Stand your ground! You are going up against the stream, I realize that. The Neapolitan settecento has been completely wiped off the face of the earth. I am not a professional musician but I played the trumpet well enough to become professional but I went in a different direction. I have listened to All of Mozart and to All of Bach several times. You cannot forget the historical dimension. Leonardo Vinci and Leonardo Leo first made music sound as it still sounds today. Alessandro Scarlatti was really good, but he could not quite yet really do it. You cannot fault Sir Isaac Newton for knowing about the formulas of eletromagnetism and quantum mechanics. A couple of weeks ago, I discovered Johann Friedrich Reichardt, composer and musician and friend of Goethe and Schiller. He believed that Leo was the most important composer of the eighteenth century. Say what? A German? I have been called an idiot with many exclamation marks on RU-vid by defending how unique Leo was. I found Reichardt's work on the internet. Reichardt tried to explain to Prussian monarchs that Vinci and Leo were the origin. I have a biography of Reichardt by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (whom some consider the second greatest singer of the 20th century) signed by the author! Reichardt was presumably not very successful in his endeavor. By the late 1700s, the orchestras got bigger (Mahler's 1000 man orchestra), the instrumentation more sophisticated, the instrumentalists more virtuosic. The settecento composers had access to none of that. And then it became all about overwhelming by romantic pathos, blowing the audience away with a musical bazooka. Operatic heroins started taking so long to die that you just want to jump on the stage to kill the bitch. Where was the simplicity, the naturalness, the unforced beauty, the humor of the settecento. The really good Baroque composers never try to overwhelm, knock you off your socks. It is true that the Italian settecento was obliterated from the history of music as we listen to Beethoven's music swelling like . . . a musical orgasm? Where is the line of melody? I was myself indoctrinated to admire the romantics. But pure pathos is not the same as music. Music should be about simplicity, beauty, and naturalness and not an alternative to sex. That is what sex is for. Leave it out of music. Keep it in the bedroom. Leo Depuydt

@@leodepuydt308 Fun conversation. I respect and admire your passion and clarity that about what moves you, and what you think is good music/bad music. I have to say, though, that you write as if you are decreeing universal truth rather than stating and opinion/preference. "Music should be about simplicity... and not an alternative to sex". For you, maybe. Ha! I've often stated that one could use the 1st movement of Beethoven's Fifth as an accompaniment for making love. I hear melody profoundly in Beethoven. You don't? OK. I'm curious about an apparent contradiction in your final comments about "music should be simple and natural" when you point to the period and composers that you admire. The very word "Baroque" likely finds its roots in "baraco" which meant "elaborate and unnecessarily complicated", which was, indeed, an early criticism of Baroque music. Regardless, I've enjoyed the conversation, and am glad to continue it if occasion occurs. But if you will excuse me now, I need an infusion of Stabat Mater. (wink)

Nicely said!

False

+Adenosin I We know the Lotti Missa Sapeientia was in Bach's library, and many musicologist think it may very well have inspired the B Minor mass.

Definitely! But listening to this work of Lotti's, we can hear how strongly Zelenka was influenced by the man.RobinInnle

The first part I ever heard from this mass was Gratias agimus tibi. I would have almost swore it was Zelenka! Great to hear where also he took his inspiration.

This is warmer than Bach and Mozart.

When Mozart was born in 1756, Lotti was already dead for 16 years. He's a contemporary of Bach

@@pjkhunold Thank you. What does that have to do with what I said? If I thought it was worthy of Bach, I'd have said so.

Es la asunción de María?

@@supernivemdealbabor non penso. L' iconografia è diversa: sia la dormitio che l' assunzione vedono la presenza dei dodici apostoli. La tela può essere la glorificazione di Maria (vedi la corona), oppure la sintesi devozionale di una comunità che onora particolarmente i "suoi" santi (San Pietro, San Polo, San Giovanni Battista, San Lorenzo ...) e la Vergine naturalmente,