Maddalena Sirmen

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Maddalena Sirmen

Maddalena Sirmen , also Maddalena Laura Lombardini Sirmen , (born December 9, 1745 in Venice , † May 15, 1818 ibid) was a Venetian violinist , singer and composer .

life and work

Maddalena was born in Venice as the daughter of Gasparina Gambirasi and Pietro Lombardini. She received her musical training from 1753 after an admission competition for free lessons at the Ospedale dei Mendicanti , one of Venice's four renowned music schools for girls. At the age of 14 she was already giving violin lessons at the Mendicanti. A letter from Tartini dated March 5, 1760, in which he describes his method of playing the violin, testifies to her own violin lessons with Giuseppe Tartini . Today this letter is one of the most authentic and important testimonies to old performance practice. In 1761 and 1764, the head of the Mendicanti gave her permission to travel to Padua to perfect her violin playing with Tartini.

In 1767 she successfully applied to the head of the Ospedale to release her from her obligations in order to marry the violinist Lodovico Sirmen, who came from Ravenna . At that time Sirmen was concertmaster at the Basilica of S. Maria Maggiore in Bergamo .

In the same year she went on a concert tour with Sirmen, which took her to Faenza , Turin and Paris . While Sirmen returned to Italy, from now on she performed without her husband. She traveled to London , where she gave concerts for three consecutive seasons, first as a violinist and later as a singer in oratorios. In 1771 her six trio sonatas were printed as Opus 1 by John Welcker in London. William Napier published her violin concertos from 1772 to 1773, and in 1773 she published six duets (Opus 4). In the same year Tommaso Giordani published a version for harpsichord of her violin concertos. In 1779 she performed at the court of Dresden , where her fee was twice as high as that of the next person on the payroll of Italian singers at the court. In 1784 she sang in Saint Petersburg accompanied by her husband . A year later she was back in Paris, where she probably received bad reviews for her violin playing for the first time.

Maddalena and Ludovico Sirmen had a daughter together. An adopted daughter lived in the Maddalena Sirmens household in Venice. Maddalena Sirmen had managed and increased her fortune independently during her successful career. With the collapse of Venice due to the invasion of Napoleon, she lost her fortune, she died impoverished on May 18, 1818 in Venice.

Maddalena Simmen's compositions were probably composed during her time at the Ospedale dei Mendicanti, in order to be performed there by the coro , the orchestra of the Ospedale. Her publications differ in the date of the publication year and opus numbers: Her six trios were published as “oevre première” in Amsterdam in 1770, while her six string quartets were first published as “Opera III” in Paris in 1769 under her and her husband's name. Today researchers doubt whether Ludovico Sirmens was co-authorship. Today these string quartets are accorded considerable importance in the history of the string quartet, like the string quartets op. 9 by Joseph Haydns , which were published simultaneously in Paris. The sheet music for her pieces was in the possession of Leopold Mozart .

Works

  • 6 trios for two violins and violoncello op.1
  • 6 Violin Concertos, Op. 2 [No. 1–3] and op. 3 [No. 1-6]
Arrangement for harpsichord by Tommaso Giordani , London: Napier 1773 [as op. 3]
  • 6 string quartets op.3
  • 6 duets for two violins op.4
  • Sonata for violin and basso continuo in A major, Vienna 1785
  • Trio for two violins and violoncello in B flat major, Ms.

Discography

  • String Quartets Nos. 1-6. Accademia Della Magnifica Comunita. Tactus ( Naxos ) 2000.
  • String quartets by Emilie Mayer , Fanny Mendelssohn and Maddalena Laura Sirmen. Erato Quartet Basel, Cpo Records (2000).
  • Violin Concertos op.3 No. 1–6. Piroska Vitarius and the Savaria Baroque Orchestra, Hungaroton .

Appreciation

The Lombardini Quartet , founded in 2016, is named after Maddalena Laura Lombardini Sirmen and plays works by composers of the early classical period on historical instruments.

swell

  • A letter from the late Signor Tartini to Signora Maddalena Lombardini (now Signora Sirmen) published as an important lesson to performers on the violin. London 1779 ( full text on archive.org, Italian with English translation).

literature

  • Elsie Arnold, Jane Baldauf-Berdes: Maddalena Lombardini Sirmen. Scarecrow Press 2002, ISBN 978-0-81084107-9 .
  • Elsie Arnold: Maddalena Lombardini Sirmen (1745-1818). In: Jane Baldauf-Berdes: Women Musicians of Venice. Oxford 1996, p. 308.
  • Marc-Joachim Wasmer: Maddalena Laura Lombardi Sirmen (1745-1818). In: Clara Mayer (editor): Approach VIII - to seven female composers. Furore-Edition 890, Kassel 1997, pp. 73-93, ISBN 3-927327-39-5 .
  • Carlida Steffan:  Lombardini, Maddalena Laura. In: Mario Caravale (ed.): Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (DBI). Volume 65:  Levis-Lorenzetti. Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Rome 2005, pp. 494-496.
  • Erwin R. Jacobi: Traité des agréments de la musique. H. Moeck Verlag, Celle / New York 1961, pp. 132-139 (facsimile of the Tartini letter with translations in German, French and English).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Facsimile with translations in German, French and English, edited by Erwin R. Jacobi: Traité des agréments de la musique. H. Moeck Verlag, Celle / New York 1961, pp. 132-139.
  2. ↑ Mercure de France. May 14, 1785, p. 76f. In: sophie-drinker-institut.de, accessed on November 16, 2019.
  3. ^ Robert Hugill: Maddalena Lombardini Sirmen. In: musicweb-international.com (English), accessed on November 16, 2019.
  4. ^ Arnold 1996, p. 308.
  5. ^ Lombardini Quartet. In: lombardiniquartett.at, accessed on November 16, 2019.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Sirmen, Maddalena
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Sirmen, Maddalena Laura Lombardini (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Venetian violinist, singer and composer
DATE OF BIRTH December 9, 1745
PLACE OF BIRTH Venice
DATE OF DEATH May 15, 1818
Place of death Venice