Ruggiero Fedeli

Ruggiero Fedeli (* around 1655 in Venice ; † January 1722 in Kassel ) was an Italian singer ( bass ), composer and conductor .

Life

Ruggiero Fedeli was the son of Carlo Fedeli , a concert master at St. Mark's Basilica in Venice. He had his first employment as a viola player in various theaters in Venice and in the chapel at St. Mark's Basilica, and in 1674 he was accepted into the choir as bassist. From 1677 he lost this position due to unauthorized absences. Because of his apparently difficult character, he lost other posts, for example in 1681 after a short time as Kapellmeister in Bayreuth, and in 1687 in Dresden, where he opposed the vice-conductor Nicolaus Adam Strungk . He was the head of an Italian opera company that in 1690 in Regensburg staged the first demonstrable performance of an Italian opera, the Opera pastorale La Silvia . Several job changes followed: Among other things, he was in Berlin, where he worked from 1691 to 1695 and, also in 1695, is mentioned as a singer at the court of Hanover.

In May 1701 Fedeli was employed as Kapellmeister at the court of Kassel, with remuneration of 550 Reichstalers and free service . With the benevolence of Landgrave Karl von Hessen-Kassel , Fedeli was able to initiate court music from the French to the Italian style. Under Fedeli, the court orchestra rose to be one of the best in Germany, employing up to 18 members at all times, plus the chapel boys. Johann Adam Birkenstock was one of Fedeli's students and employees in Kassel . Between 1702 and 1709 Fedeli worked occasionally at the royal court in Berlin, as there was a close family connection with the royal house and the son of the landgrave. Georg Philipp Telemann mentioned that Fedeli took part in the performance of Giovanni Bononcini's opera Polifemo in Berlin in 1702 , in an “orchestra with a large number of capell and concert masters”. Fedeli repeatedly directed performances at other courts, for example in Braunschweig in 1702 or in Wolfenbüttel in 1704. For his services, Landgrave Fedeli gave Gut Kragenhof near Kassel free and lifelong use.

In both secular and ecclesiastical works, Fedeli's compositional style is based on the models of the Neapolitan school . In 1706 Reinhard Keizer published a collection of arias in Hamburg under the title Componimenti musicali ... , in which he included two arias by Fedeli, otherwise the surviving part of Fedeli's works, including sacred music and secular cantatas, has been handed down exclusively in manuscripts.

Johann Mattheson and Ernst Ludwig Gerber mentioned Fedeli in their encyclopedias.

literature

• Hartmut Broszinski, Rashid-Sascha Pegah:  Fedeli, Ruggiero. In: Ludwig Finscher (Hrsg.): The music in past and present . Second edition, personal section, volume 6 (Eames - Franco). Bärenreiter / Metzler, Kassel et al. 2001, ISBN 3-7618-1116-0  ( online edition , subscription required for full access)

Web links

• Student performance of the baroque opera Almira by Fedeli, 2013 in Kassel
• List of stage works by Ruggiero Fedeli based on the MGG at Operone
• Eleanor Selfridge-Field:  Fedeli family. In: Grove Music Online (English; subscription required).

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Fedeli, Ruggiero . Entry in the database of the Oberpfälzer Kulturbund (currently not available)
2. ↑ Hansjörg Drauschke: Fedeli's short curriculum vitae on the Ortus-Verlag website ( memento of the original from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
3. ^ Ernst Ludwig Gerber: New historical-biographical lexicon of the Tonkünstler. Volume 2. Kühnert, Leipzig 1812, Sp. 97 ( Textarchiv - Internet Archive ).