related works
Genre:
Vocal music
Subgenre:
Voice and instrument(s)
Scoring:
voc 2ob/vl vla/lute vc/db org/cemb
And blind she remained : voice, piano and percussion, 1978, revised 1987 / Tera de Marez Oyens
Genre:
Vocal music
Subgenre:
Voice and instrument(s)
Scoring:
voice perc pf
Two love poems : for voice, clarinet, viola, cello and harpsichord / Walter Hekster
Genre:
Vocal music
Subgenre:
Voice and instrument(s)
Scoring:
voice cl vla vc cemb
Quote... unquote : for mezzo-soprano and small ensemble (version with harp) / Klaas ten Holt
Genre:
Vocal music
Subgenre:
Voice and instrument(s)
Scoring:
sopr-m fl cl vla vc 2perc hp
composition
Il Martirio di Santa Caterina : Oratorio for 5 voices and ensemble / Antonio Caldara, with libretto by Francesco Accolti; transcribed and edited by Cees Wagemakers
Other authors:
Wagemakers, Cees
(Editor)
Caldara, Antonio
(Composer)
Description:
Together with George Friderick Handel and Alessandro Scarlatti, one of the most prolific composers in the baroque period is Antonio Caldara (1670-1736). "Il Martirio di Santa Caterina" (1708), an oratorio written in the time that oratorios were more popular than operas in Rome because of the papal ban on operas being performed
during Lent. Operas were called ‘immoral’. That’s why several operas by Scarlatti and Caldara were called proibita (forbidden).
Like more often in cases like these composers found an escape for their inspiration and artistry in composing a religious work with the same dramatic style as an opera. Though unstaged these oratorios were performed in richly decorated settings with large orchestras
and highly-paid singers.
Caldara composed many operas and oratorios, from which the best-known are: "Maddalana ai piedi di Cristo", "Santa Francesca Romana", "La Conversione di Clodevedo Re di Francia", "Morte e
Sepultura di Cristo".
For "Il Martirio di Santa Caterina" Caldara got the commission from Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni. The libretto was written by Francesco Forzoni Accolti (1674-1708).