ARMID@Venezia
Music and digital humanism in Venice

The Torrefranca Collection was added to the library in 1973, as a result of the efforts of librarian Mario Messinis and the scholar Giancarlo Rostirolla. Originally, the collection was part of the private library of the famed musicologist Fausto Torrefranca and contains precious ancient musical documents, both handwritten and printed. Of special note among the manuscripts is the presence of a beautiful codex, of Roman origin, entitled Grilanda musicale di arie di diversi eccellentissimi autori, which contains one of the very rare copies of the Lamento di Arianna by Claudio Monteverdi. The printed material includes numerous examples of cinquecentine (collections of frottole and madrigals) and a rich collection of theoretical treatises.

Many opera librettos are present in the collection. Among these are over four thousand examples of melodrama dating from the 17th to the 19th century. These rare items often include elegant frontispieces and plates, and have been invaluable to the documentation of the history of melodrama from this period.

The catalogue of this collection can be consulted online at www.librettodopera.it, while the librettos will soon be fully available online at, http://corago.unibo.it.

In 1949, as a result of the initiative of the institute's director Gianfrancesco Malipiero and Count Alvise Giustinani, the library acquired the Giustiniani Collection. This rich collection belonged to the Giustiniani Recanati or 'delle Zattere', which was a branch of a well-known aristocratic venetian family. This took over the management of the S. Moisè theatre which had previously been managed by another branch of the family. The collection reflects the wide variety of repertoire practised in the city in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The works include theatre music (complete scores and individual arias), music for keyboard, chamber music and vocal music intended for entertainment in private and academic contexts, sacred music and copies of theoretical of didactic musical treatises, some of which are excepts, while others are complete. Many of these are attributed to masters working at St. Mark's, at other churches and at the four Venetian hospitals.

A large part of the material (672 manuscripts and 60 printed editions) have been recorded in the printed catalogue edited by Maria Giovanna Miggiani (Florence, Olschki, 1990). There remain over 360 manuscripts and printed items - recently discovered - including over 70 autographs by Baldassare Galuppi - which are currently under study and which are being catalogued.

Since 1940, the Conservatory has housed three collections - belonging to the Correr Museum - the Legato Martinengo, the Collection Carminati and the Collection Esposti and Provenienze diverse, which contains the actual music archive of the Ospedale della Pietà.

The Martinengo and Carminati sections preserve manuscripts of both instrumental and vocal music, symphonies, concerts, sonatas, variations, dances, arias and entire dramas, precious printed editions from the 17th and 18th centuries, such as an example of the Suonate a tre op. 1 by Arcangelo Corelli, published in Venice by Giuseppe Sala in 1684, and that of the Concerti a cinque op. 5 by Tomaso Albinoni, (G. Sala 1707).

Among the dramas, the score of Andromeda liberata, a "serenata-pasticcio" with music by, among others, Albinoni and Vivaldi is of particular note. The Esposti e Provenienze diversi Collection hold the musical heritage of the Ospedale della Pietà, which survived until the fall of the Serenissima. These are mainly the so-called "part-books", i.e. volumes containing the individual parts intended for the “choir daughters” and transcribed by “copyist daughters”. For example, there is the “Book of Anna Maria”, Anna Maria being perhaps the most famous of the virtuosos of the Pietà, for whom Vivaldi composed a large number of concertos for violin and viola d'amore. Among the composers contributing to the collection are Vivaldi, Porta, Porpora, Bernasconi, Latilla, Sarti and Furlanetto. The autograph manuscript of Vivaldi's aria «Sovvente il sole», a piece from Andromeda liberata, is the only one in the city by the Prete Rosso. The fragmentary nature of this collection, which is distributed over more than one hundred dossiers, has led to the reorganisation and computer cataloguing of the material. This activity is being coordinated by Dr. Chiara Pancino.

The statute of the 'Liceo Società Musicale' provided for the creation of a library from the outset of the institution.  The original nucleus was formed from donations from the founding members, musicians, professionals and amateurs, and refined connoisseurs mostly belonging to the Venetian bourgeoisie and aristocracy. The collection includes musical manuscripts, popular and rare musical editions and volumes of musicological literature. Among the rarities are the unique printed edition of the Pièces de clavessin by Élisabeth-Claude Jacquet de La Guerre (1666 -1729) and the Suonate da camera a tre op. I di Antonio Vivaldi (G. Sala 1705). The manuscripts, of different provenance, are copies dating from the mid-18th to the early 19th century. These include copies of some scores of operas by Cimarosa, Paisiello and Rossini, sometimes contemporary or slightly later than the principes. The Collection also includes the rich collection assembled by some members of the Venetian Pascolato family, which documents the sacred music production of the city in the 19th century, works performed by the Philharmonic Society of Santa Cecilia and of the major religious institutions of the city (Churches, Hospitals, Oratories, Schools).