Algarotti Francesco, Count, *11 December 1712, Venice, †3 May 1764 Pisa, Italian writer and art theorist. He belonged to a group of well-educated aristocratic dilettantes and was friends with Voltaire and the encyclopaedists. After completing his studies (Bologna, Padua, Florence) and years of travelling (1733–39; France, England, Russia, Germany), he worked at the courts of Frederick II and Augustus III of Saxony in Berlin and Dresden between 1740 and 1753. From 1753, he returned to Italy (Venice, Bologna, Pisa). In his numerous treatises (saggi), he addressed topics under discussion in the academic world at the time, including architecture and painting. He went down in music history as the author of the famous treatise Saggio sopra l’opera in musica (1755, 2nd expanded edition 1763; French, German and English translations). Disputing the tendencies of Neapolitan opera (of the seria type), with its formal conventionalism, artificiality and overloaded plots, excessive display of virtuosity, and the over-emancipation of music (“the cause of music’s decline is its creation of its own separate kingdom”), Algarotti calls for a return to the original (Florentine) principles of opera, to a harmonious unity of all its elements (poetry, music, gesture, dance, and painting), with a clearly emphasised primacy of the dramatic idea as the unifying force of the work. Opera, he argues, should present the play of passions in a natural and direct way (“the main spring and soul of the performance”) and should act through the magic of enchantment and wonder. Accordingly, Algarotti advocates choosing mythological subjects (e.g., from Virgil and Euripides), as well as exotic and fantastic ones (e.g., from Ariosto and Tasso), considering them most suitable for preserving operatic illusion (“the trills of an arietta are more fitting in the mouths of Apollo or Venus than of Caesar or Cato”); historical subjects he regards as less appropriate for opera, too difficult for achieving naturalness and plausibility.
Algarotti saw the role of music as important, yet “executive and auxiliary” in relation to the premises of the drama.; its principal task is to prepare the listener to receive the events on stage, to evoke general categories of feelings that are specified in more detail by the text, and reinforce the power of its expression. He also specifies the means leading to the goal, which for him is “the delight of the eyes and ears, the stirring and moving of hearts, without violating reason”. These include: linking the overture to the work as a whole (an anticipatory function); the natural integration of dances and choruses into the course of the action; the combination of recitatives and arias broken up by ritornellos into a naturally outlined scene filled with expressively melodic arioso, supported by a reinforced bass line and accompanied in accordance with the changing expression of the text; and the use of instrumentation for dramatic rather than purely concertante purposes.
Algarotti’s ideas found their ideal application in the work of Ch.W. Gluck, forming the basis of his opera reform.
Editions: Opere del conte Algarotti, 17 vols., Venice 1791–94; Saggio sopra l’opera in musica, 2nd facsimile edition, Bologna 1975.
Literature: C.T. Malherbe Un précurseur de Gluck: le comte d’Algarotti, “Revue d’histoire et de critique musicale” II, 1902; E. Wellesz Algarotti und seine Stellung zur Musik, “Sämmelbande der Internationalen Musikgesellschaft” XV, 1913/14; A. Ambrogio L’estetica di Francesco Algarotti, Syracuse 1925; E. Bonora Algarotti, in: Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol. 2, Rome 1960; G. Roncaglia Il conte Francesco Algarotti e il rinnovamento del melodramma, “Chigiana” XXI, 1964.
