Vivaldi Red Priest

Few names are as synonymous with the great city of Venice as that of Antonio Vivaldi. The composer, best known for The Four Seasons, lived here from his birth in 1678 until his death in 1741.

One of the most famous Baroque composers, Antonio Lucio Vivaldi, affectionately known by many in his time as “the Red Priest” due to his auburn locks, was born in Venice in 1678. His father, who. Vivaldi, whose red hair inspired the nickname 'The Red Priest,' worked with the Ospedale for over 30 years, teaching general music and strings, as well as composing much of the repertoire that the girls played. Later on, he was appointed music director for the entire program. Antonio Vivaldi is a rising star in the music world. He's a brilliant composer and consummate performer. An ordained priest, known for his mane of flowing red hair, he is called 'Il Prete Rosso,' the Red priest. But Vivaldi's mind was focused more on music than delivering mass.

But was the composer touched by infernal hands? Our investigation today leads us into the shadowy realm of the Devil, and his claim over the maestro.

So come with me once more into the twisting streets of the Castello district. We’ll find out if Lucifer prevented Vivaldi from writing his finest work.

We’ll start with a church.

The church of San Giovanni in Bragora lies not far from the brick heart we investigated a couple of weeks ago.

Founded in early 8th century and dedicated to St John the Baptist, the church itself has an interesting name. No one is sure where ‘Bragora’ comes from. Does it come from the Venetian word bragola, meaning market square? Or does it come from agora, the Greek word for square? These candidates seem more likely.

Yet others harken back to the days when Venice was a pair of twin islands. The cult of Castor and Pollux held sway here, and this area would have been found on one of those islands. The word b’ragal, meaning two men, could give the area its name, referring to this mythical pair. We know Castor and Pollux better as the constellation Gemini, or the patron saints of sailors.

Anyway. The area around the church is linked with Vivaldi, who was born nearby. He was baptised quickly, apparently being at Death’s door upon birth. Even more strangely, the infant was subjected to a range of exorcisms in the church two months later.

Vivaldi enters the Church.

According to the legend, the Devil still managed to get his claws into Vivaldi during the first two months of his life. He left a diabolical spirit in the infant that the exorcism didn’t fully evict. His decision to become a priest sprang from his awareness of his unique nature.

Ordained as a priest at 1703, Vivaldi was nicknamed il Prete Rosso, ‘The Red Priest’. The name referred both to his red robes, and his flaming hair colour. Ill health meant he was excused from saying mass and withdrew from his religious duties.

Was it really ill health? According to a letter Vivaldi wrote to a senior member of the church, he suffered great pain when he said mass. The pain grew so fierce he even left the altar three times during his first year as a priest. Was this because of the evil spirit within him?

Susan Adams speculates that constant travel outside of the Venetian Republic wore Vivaldi out. Perhaps a weak constitution prompted his retirement from saying mass, rather than demonic possession.

He remained a priest but instead became a music master for a nearby conservatory for orphaned girls. The noted violinist started composing music, with his first works appearing in 1705.

Vivaldi makes his music but annoys Lucifer.

Despite his skirmishes with the infernal, Vivaldi continued to write angelic music. He angered the Devil with his refusal to give in to demonic urges. Satan knew he’d lose Vivaldi’s soul to God, and in an act of supreme spite, stopped the composer from committing his greatest work to paper. If the Devil couldn’t have Vivaldi, then the world couldn’t have his finest melody.

Given the beauty of a piece such as ‘Winter’, from The Four Seasons, we can only imagine what it would have sounded like.

Vivaldi continued to resist the Devil right up until his death. Some say his only regret on his deathbed was his inability to write that final piece. He clearly didn’t benefit from his infernal links since he died in poverty.

Or did he find a way to preserve the music after all?

If you believe the legend, the spirit of Vivaldi remains in the great city. On those nights when the wind ruffles the canals, Vivaldi writes on the water itself. While no one ever sees him, some swear you can sometimes hear stray notes carried on the wind.

If you find yourself in Venice, try to listen out for the lost symphony on breezy nights.

You can find other Venetian tales like this one either here on my blog, or in Venetian Legends and Ghost Stories by Alberto Toso Fei (affiliate link).

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Antonio Vivaldi, in full Antonio Lucio Vivaldi, (born March 4, 1678, Venice, Republic of Venice [Italy]—died July 28, 1741, Vienna, Austria), Italian composer and violinist who left a decisive mark on the form of the concerto and the style of late Baroque instrumental music.

Life

Vivaldi’s main teacher was probably his father, Giovanni Battista, who in 1685 was admitted as a violinist to the orchestra of the San Marco Basilica in Venice. Antonio, the eldest child, trained for the priesthood and was ordained in 1703. His distinctive reddish hair would later earn him the soubriquetIl Prete Rosso (“The Red Priest”). He made his first known public appearance playing alongside his father in the basilica as a “supernumerary” violinist in 1696. He became an excellent violinist, and in 1703 he was appointed violin master at the Ospedale della Pietà, a home for foundlings. The Pietà specialized in the musical training of its female wards, and those with musical aptitude were assigned to its excellent choir and orchestra, whose much-praised performances assisted the institution’s quest for donations and legacies. Vivaldi had dealings with the Pietà for most of his career: as violin master (1703–09; 1711–15), director of instrumental music (1716–17; 1735–38), and paid external supplier of compositions (1723–29; 1739–40).

Antonio Vivaldi Bio

Soon after his ordination as a priest, Vivaldi gave up celebrating mass because of a chronic ailment that is believed to have been bronchial asthma. Despite this circumstance, he took his status as a secular priest seriously and even earned the reputation of a religious bigot.

Vivaldi’s earliest musical compositions date from his first years at the Pietà. Printed collections of his trio sonatas and violin sonatas respectively appeared in 1705 and 1709, and in 1711 his first and most influential set of concerti for violin and string orchestra (Opus 3, L’estro armonico) was published by the Amsterdam music-publishing firm of Estienne Roger. In the years up to 1719, Roger published three more collections of his concerti (opuses 4, 6, and 7) and one collection of sonatas (Opus 5).

Vivaldi made his debut as a composer of sacred vocal music in 1713, when the Pietà’s choirmaster left his post and the institution had to turn to Vivaldi and other composers for new compositions. He achieved great success with his sacred vocal music, for which he later received commissions from other institutions. Another new field of endeavour for him opened in 1713 when his first opera, Ottone in villa, was produced in Vicenza. Returning to Venice, Vivaldi immediately plunged into operatic activity in the twin roles of composer and impresario. From 1718 to 1720 he worked in Mantua as director of secular music for that city’s governor, Prince Philip of Hesse-Darmstadt. This was the only full-time post Vivaldi ever held; he seems to have preferred life as a freelance composer for the flexibility and entrepreneurial opportunities it offered. Vivaldi’s major compositions in Mantua were operas, though he also composed cantatas and instrumental works.

The 1720s were the zenith of Vivaldi’s career. Based once more in Venice, but frequently traveling elsewhere, he supplied instrumental music to patrons and customers throughout Europe. Between 1725 and 1729 he entrusted five new collections of concerti (opuses 8–12) to Roger’s publisher successor, Michel-Charles Le Cène. After 1729 Vivaldi stopped publishing his works, finding it more profitable to sell them in manuscript to individual purchasers. During this decade he also received numerous commissions for operas and resumed his activity as an impresario in Venice and other Italian cities.

In 1726 the contralto Anna Girò sang for the first time in a Vivaldi opera. Born in Mantua about 1711, she had gone to Venice to further her career as a singer. Her voice was not strong, but she was attractive and acted well. She became part of Vivaldi’s entourage and the indispensable prima donna of his subsequent operas, causing gossip to circulate that she was Vivaldi’s mistress. After Vivaldi’s death she continued to perform successfully in opera until quitting the stage in 1748 to marry a nobleman.

In the 1730s Vivaldi’s career gradually declined. The French traveler Charles de Brosses reported in 1739 with regret that his music was no longer fashionable. Vivaldi’s impresarial forays became increasingly marked by failure. In 1740 he traveled to Vienna, but he fell ill and did not live to attend the production there of his opera L’oracolo in Messenia in 1742. The simplicity of his funeral on July 28, 1741, suggests that he died in considerable poverty.

Vivaldi Red Priest

After Vivaldi’s death, his huge collection of musical manuscripts, consisting mainly of autograph scores of his own works, was bound into 27 large volumes. These were acquired first by the Venetian bibliophile Jacopo Soranzo and later by Count Giacomo Durazzo, Christoph Willibald Gluck’s patron. Rediscovered in the 1920s, these manuscripts today form part of the Foà and Giordano collections of the National Library in Turin.

Antonio Vivaldi Songs He Wrote

Antonio Vivaldi Red Priest