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GIEHCM Seminar | Music Collectors: From the 18th Century Court to the Private Salons of the 20th century

PERMANENT SEMINAR ON HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL STUDIES IN MUSIC

The Permanent Seminar of the research group Historical and Cultural Studies in Music of INET-md intends to be a forum where all its members (integrated and collaborators), as well as other invited researchers from the academic, cultural and artistic circles, may present their work and discuss ongoing projects and research.

  

2023.04-27 | 18:00 | FCSH (Av. de Berna) | Tower B | Room 201
Free Access in person and online (ZOOM link below)

 
 
 
MUSIC COLLECTORS: FROM THE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY COURT TO THE PRIVATE SALONS OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
 
D. Mariana Vitoria de Bourbon (1718-1781) and the acquisition of music scores and librettos for the Royal Court: family and diplomatic networks
 
2023-04-24-Mariana-Vitoria
 
The passion for music of Mariana Victoria of Bourbon (Madrid, 1718 - Lisbon, 1781), infanta of Spain and later princess of Brazil and queen consort of Portugal by her marriage to D. José, is witnessed in many of the letters she sent from Lisbon to her mother, Isabel de Farnesio. From this correspondence emerges her taste for playing the harpsichord and singing, as well as opinions on musical interpretations and musicians. Less known is her role as a collector of scores and librettos, although some recent studies point to important clues in this direction (Montes, 2015; Maione 2018). Unlike what happens with Maria Bárbara de Bragança and her remarkable musical library, left in her will to Farinelli, we do not know of an inventory or a list of works acquired or commissioned by Mariana Victoria, but we can see that a substantial part of the scores are currently preserved in the Ajuda Library. The diplomatic and family correspondence (especially the letters exchanged with her brother Charles, King of Naples and later Charles III of Spain) show that she frequently requested that the latest musical novelties be sent to Lisbon. Other sources, subsisting in Portuguese and Spanish archives, also contribute to demonstrate that Mariana Victoria established links with different European cultural and musical contexts and played a significant role in the constitution of the musical heritage of the Royal House - a contribution that has been overshadowed by the prominence given to King D. José, as patron of the sumptuous Tejo Opera House, destroyed by the 1755 earthquake. This paper presents a preliminary mapping of the family and diplomatic networks of Mariana Vitória and the circulation of opera scores and librettos, including the identification of specific works. The influence she exerted on her four daughters will also be briefly touched upon, since at least two of them (the future Queen Maria I and Maria Francisca Benedita) contributed in the following years to the expansion of the royal court's musical library.
 
 
 
From intellectual and artistic curiosity to performance and dissemination: the musical collections of Ema Santos Fonseca (1897-1968)
 
 
2023-04-24-Ema-Romero
 

Ema Santos Fonseca (Faro, 1897- Lisbon, 1968) was an amateur singer and musician who stood out especially in the Lisbon musical milieu for her work of diffusing unknown musical repertoires in the context of several series of conferences-concerts included in the project "Divulgação Musical" (1923-1940). Having started the series of recitals in her private salon, Ema Santos Fonseca also promoted part of these events in spaces such as the Salão do Conservatório Nacional, the Liga Naval Portuguesa, the Universidade Popular Portuguesa and the Academia de Amadores de Música. Given the dissemination and innovative nature of the project, the process of acquiring scores and bibliography related to the subjects, composers and musical styles chosen to be presented, allowed her to build up a vast specialised library. Only her personal library alone includes more than 1500 volumes covering collections of music histories, biographies of composers, limited or rare editions of music, collections on aesthetics and philosophy of music, a series of books specialising in the learning and instruction of lyrical singing, as well as publications on folk music. On the musical side, the collection of scores used for each of the 142 concerts by "Divulgação Musical" enriches its holdings with more than 1,000 works, both printed and manuscript.In this paper, I intend to present the preliminary results of a work-in-progress on the estate assets of Ema Santos Fonseca / Divulgação Musical, reflecting on the way in which the singer eventually organized a specialized musical collection (including her library and her score collection). This reflection will be framed on the three fundamental axes of her project's programming: 1 Modern Chamber Music; 2 Polyphonic Vocal Music from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance; 3 Folk Music / Popular Song.