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| Composers Biography - Languages - |  |
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Nicola Porpora
[ Life | Works | Photo Gallery | Home Page] |
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Porpora was internationally famous during his lifetime both as a composer (particulary of vocal music and opera) and as a singing teacher. "Angelica" (of the great librettist Pietro Metastasio) was his first important poem intended for musical setting: one of Porpora's singing pupils, the later much-famed castrato Farinelli, made his dèbut in this same work. He was in Milan, Naples, Dresden and other cities in Europe: his great period of operatic composition occurred between 1718 and 1742, after which his popularity among theatre audiences declined. His final years of retirement were spent in considerable poverty.
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Though Porpora wrote several instrumental works, his output in this field was small by comparison with that of his vocal works. These can be classified under the heading of secular operas; sacred operas and oratorios; secular cantatas and serenatas and other works.
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