Giacomo Durazzo

Count Durazzo by Martin van Meytens, around 1770

Count Giacomo Durazzo (born April 27, 1717 in Genoa , † October 15, 1794 in Venice ) was an Italian diplomat, theater manager and patron of the arts.

Life

Durazzo came from one of the most important noble houses of Genoa, the Durazzo , his brother was the Doge in Genoa Marcellino Durazzo, owner of the manor house that is now the Museo di Palazzo Reale.

In 1749 he became Ambassador of Genoa in Vienna, but in 1752 he left the diplomatic service and became assistant to the director of the Vienna Court Theater and in 1754 became director of all imperial theaters ( Burgtheater , Theater am Kärntnertor ), with the support of Maria Theresia and Wenzel Anton von Kaunitz- Rietberg . His enthusiasm for theater still came from Genoa, where his family owned some of the most famous theaters. He introduced comic opera, worked here with Charles-Simon Favart from Paris and promoted Christoph Willibald Gluck , whom he introduced to the librettist Ranieri de 'Calzabigi , the librettist of the opera Orfeo ed Euridice , which premiered in Vienna in 1762. Durazzo made Gluck the unofficial dramaturgical director of the theater. Not only was he significantly involved in the operatic reform associated with the name Gluck, he also reformed the ballet, in collaboration with Gasparo Angiolini , and introduced public concerts. He also promoted the German theater through Joseph Felix von Kurz (Bernardon). But there was also opposition to his reforms and therefore he resigned in 1764 and became imperial ambassador in Venice. There he collected prints which, with the support of Albert Kasimir von Sachsen-Teschen, formed the basis of the Albertina collection. His important musical collection (including autographs by Antonio Vivaldi ) is in the National Library in Turin. In 1771 Mozart visited him in Venice.

Count Durazzo with his wife, painting by Martin van Meytens

In 1750 he married the then eighteen year old Ernestine Aloisia Ungnad von Weissenwolff .

literature

• Giovanni Assereto:  Durazzo, Giacomo Pier Francesco. In: Fiorella Bartoccini (ed.): Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (DBI). Volume 42:  Dugoni – Enza. Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Rome 1993, pp. 150-153.
• BA Brown: Gluck and the French Theater in Vienna. 1991.
• R. Haas: Gluck and Durazzo in the Burgtheater. 1925.
• L. Leoncini (Ed.): Giacomo Durazzo. Teatro musicale e collezionismo tra Genova, Parigi e Venezia. Genoa 2012.
• A. Lanzola: Melodramma e spettacolo a Vienna: vita e carriera teatrale di Giacomo Durazzo (1717-1794). Dissertation. University of Genoa, 2010.
• Angela Valenti Durazzo: Il Fratello del Doge. Giacomo Durazzo un Illuminista alla Corte degli Asburgo tra Mozart, Casanova e Gluck. La Compagnia della Stampa, 2012.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ In Mozart's Words