The Journal of Seventeenth-Century Music

Volume 24 (2018) No. 1

Musical Patronage and Diplomacy: The Case of Prince Paolo Savelli (†1632)

Valerio Morucci*

Abstract

Study of Prince Paolo Savelli’s role as a patron and diplomat, and of composers connected with Savelli’s circle—Stefano Landi, Girolamo Frescobaldi, and Giovanni Valentini, among others—illuminates the connection of musical patronage with diplomacy in early modern Italy. Savelli played a vital role in the migration of Italian musical culture to the imperial court. The musical ties of Rome with Vienna went back to the beginnings of Ferdinand II’s reign and did not start with Froberger’s time in Rome as previously believed.

1. Introduction: The Household of Paolo Savelli

2. Music and Musicians in the Savelli Home

3. Savelli as an Agent and Diplomat

4. Frescobaldi and Buonamente

5. Conclusion

Acknowledgement

Appendix

Figures

References

1. Introduction: The Household of Paolo Savelli

Canto la più vetusta e più gradita
stirpe, e di più valore,
che il Lazio, Europa, e l’universo onora,
la cui gloria infinita
sormonta il ciel, di cui nell’occhio vago
scorge fra noi di tanta idea l’imago

(I sing of the most ancient, esteemed, and valorous lineage, which Lazio, Europe, and the universe honor, whose infinite glory surmounts the sky, of which the distant eye descries the image of so great an idea)

1.1 These verses from a canzone by Enea Rasi were composed for the wedding of Paolo and Caterina Savelli.^[1] As Rasi poetically proclaims in the text, the Savellis were among the noble Roman families of longest lineage. In the early seventeenth century, there were several unions of baronial clans, among them the marriage of Costanza Savelli, sister of Prince Paolo, with Giovanni Antonio Orsini and the marriage of their daughter Giustiniana Orsini with Ferdinando Orsini. These were important political events in early modern Rome because they stabilized interfamilial alliances and widened clientage networks.

1.2 Costanza, Paolo, Giulio, and their brother Federico were the children of Bernardino Savelli and Lucrezia dei Conti (see Figure 1). The lives of Paolo Savelli and the members of his family unfolded at the summer residences situated in the towns of Albano and Ariccia, and especially in the Roman Palace of Monte Savello (at Teatro Marcello), which remained their primary residence (Figure 2).^[2] The Savelli family spent large sums of money on the decoration of their palaces, especially for the acquisition of paintings to be displayed in them. Paolo (see Figure 3) was an art collector connected with painters of the caliber of Orazio Gentileschi and Caravaggio. Nearly two hundred volumes are listed in Savelli’s inventory, which, although far from complete, shows a humanistic education appropriate to the social rank of the Prince of Albano, a noble title that Paolo received in 1607 from Pope Camillo Borghese (Paul V).^[3] The books Paolo owned spanned topics from military literature and general history to rhetoric, music, and architecture. Savelli’s inventory focused primarily on the Palace of Ariccia and only marginally on the residence of Monte Savello, for which we lack complete information. Despite this lacuna, his inventory gives us an idea of the musical instruments owned by the Roman prince, which were used for court performances. In it we find references to leather-decorated organs and harpsichords, lutes, Spanish guitars, and various music books (Appendix, document 26). Furthermore, Paolo’s interest and involvement in music is thoroughly demonstrated in his correspondence, which is housed in the State Archive of Rome.

1.3 Using unpublished documents, this study will first reconstruct the circle of musicians associated with Paolo Savelli’s household. It will then turn to Savelli’s patronage activities in Rome as an ambassador and agent of the imperial court in Vienna as well as a Papal chamberlain. It will ultimately show that Savelli played an important role in the migration of Italian musical culture to northern Europe in the seventeenth century. In so doing, this paper illuminates the multiple functions that a powerful aristocrat could assume as a patron and mediator.

2. Music and Musicians in the Savelli Home

2.1 Almost all the account books of the Savelli family before the first half of the seventeenth century have been lost; thus, it is not possible to draw up a precise list of his household staff, including the salaried musicians. We must rely largely on the surviving correspondence of Prince Paolo Savelli to understand his role as a patron and imperial agent in Rome and to identify some of the composers who were part of his courtly network. In 1598 Savelli was the dedicatee of Antonio Artusini’s Il primo libro di madrigali a cinque voci (Venice: Gardano, 1598). The nature of Savelli’s relationship to Artusini is unclear. The musician seems to have lived in Ravenna, and there is no record of his musical activity in Rome. In the dedicatory preface (Appendix, document 1), Artusini proclaims his “servitù” and “osservanza” to Savelli, which were formal terms of this period that commonly denoted reverence and humble subservience, but he did not necessarily proclaim protection (protezione) or a long-term patronage relationship. Artusini was not a musician of particular fame. The dedication of his madrigals to Savelli was perhaps motivated by his desire to obtain financial support to cover the cost of publication.

2.2 There is evidence of theatrical performances in Savelli’s circle, which can be traced back to the second decade of the seventeenth century. In this period, prince Paolo and his brothers sponsored comedies at court. Singers and composers who were members of Savelli’s household were also active in the courts of other Roman patrons and participated in operatic spectacles organized at their residences. In 1614, for instance, Paolo Savelli lent to Prince Peretti one of his court musicians, a certain Ludovico (Gualtiero?), for the performance of Jacopo Cicognini’s Amor pudico.^[4] At least two other unnamed comedies seem to have been staged at the Savelli court in February 1618.^[5] A new dispatch shows that Paolo Quagliati was a musico of the Savellis in that year; therefore, it is possible that he may have participated in and provided the music for these theatrical works. The dispatch says, “Paolo Quagliati, who is most honorable of our house, recommended Buonamente to our brother the Cardinal.… I also recommend him to Your Lordship.”^[6] This passage also mentions the young composer Giovanni Battista Buonamente, whose talent seems to have attracted the attention of the Savellis, and, as we shall see, he later became a protégé of Prince Paolo.

2.3 In 1619 a commedia in musica based on Torquato Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata was performed at the Savelli court. The event was so significant that Roman chronicles reported with praise that “different plays with music were staged in several houses, one of which, very beautiful and important with magnificent apparatus, [was] in the palace of the Signori Cardinal and Prince Savelli, in the presence of the most prominent persons, men, and women of the city.”^[7] The performance is also mentioned in a letter from Piero Guicciardini, a Medici agent in Rome, to the secretary of state in Florence. Unfortunately, only one of the compositions for this comedy has survived: the lament for solo voice and continuo preserved in I-Vc Torrefranca 250, fols. 45–48, a manuscript that John Walter Hill linked to Montalto’s circle. Here it is referred to as the “Lament Sung by the Signora Olimpia Saponara in the Comedy of the Most Illustrious Signor Cardinal Savelli” (“Lamento cantato dalla Signora Olimpia Saponara nella comedia dell’Illustrissimo Signor Cardinal Savelli”). This is confirmed by two other sources, one of which ascribes the lament to Ottavio Catalani.^[8] If Catalani composed the lament for Saponara, a singer apparently connected to the Savellis, then one may deduce that the composer maintained some type of professional contact with the family, even though he was officially a protégé of Marcantonio Borghese until at least 1621.^[9]

2.4 Savelli’s relationship with Catalani can only be conjectured, but his patronage of Stefano Landi can now be established with more precision. A new letter of Prince Paolo to Landi shows that in March 1618, Savelli was already in contact with the composer:

I have received the aria that Your Lordship sent me,^[10] which was very welcome to me, as are all the works of your genius that you will be pleased to share with me, committing to your complete satisfaction in composing serious or cheerful things. I [am] sure that you will always know how to exercise your ability in concordance with my taste.^[11]

In the dedicatory preface to his Arie a una voce (Venice: Gardano, 1620), Landi makes clear that by June 1620, he was a member of Savelli’s household (Appendix, document 4). One of the extant payrolls, which remain unpublished, contains two payments of 24 scudi to Landi for his monthly salary. The second payment bears the date of February 8, 1621, but no other compensation to Landi is reported in this account book for the remainder of the year. Therefore, it seems likely that Landi left Savelli’s household in the same month.^[12]

2.5 By the end of 1622, Landi was in professional contact with Cardinal Ludovico Ludovisi, one of Savelli’s closest friends and political allies. Musical exchanges between the Savelli and Ludovisi houses happened on other occasions, as with Loreto Vittori, whose career in Rome was linked to multiple patrons. In concomitance with the death of Prince Paolo in the summer of 1632, the Savellis hired Vittori, a singer and composer. Vittori received 24 scudi in the summer of 1632 (no exact date given) in recompense for various expenses for the funeral of the Prince of Albano. Although Vittori was still a protégé of Cardinal Ludovisi, who died in November of the same year, he was clearly connected to the Savellis and seems to have been remunerated for some type of musical service provided during the funeral of Prince Paolo. The same financial document contains a payment issued to the friar of the monastery and the church of Santa Maria in Aracoeli for “one hundred masses and one cantata.”^[13] All these expenses pertain to liturgical ceremonies that Cardinal Giulio organized to commemorate the death of his brother. The choice of location was not arbitrary because the Savellis exercised control over the church, where they built their family chapel. The association of the Savellis with this church is still apparent today; the internal space preserves the remains of Cardinal Giulio, and its facade displays the family’s coat of arms. As for Vittori, it is possible that his relationship with the family continued until 1637, the year he joined Antonio Barberini’s famigliari.

3. Savelli as an Agent and Diplomat

3.1 So far I have reconstructed the circle of musicians connected with the household of Paolo Savelli based on the unpublished documentation available (mostly account books). Now, by examining his private correspondence, I will focus on a more individual aspect of Savelli’s patronage activity in early seventeenth-century Rome, namely on his role as agent and diplomat. The ramifications of diplomacy for the fluctuating system of European alliances and its connection to musical patronage in early seventeenth-century Italy make up a complex system that deserves more attention. In particular, scholars have overlooked the musical link of Roman baronial families to the aristocracy of northern Europe. As the case of Prince Paolo Savelli demonstrates, the activities of an influential diplomat in Rome during this period were multifarious and not merely confined to politics; they also encompassed art and music.^[14] The Savelli family’s pro-Austrian political position resulted in important military and diplomatic appointments assigned to Paolo and his brother Federico by the emperor. In August 1620 Paolo Savelli was appointed imperial ambassador with residence in Rome, taking the place of his brother Federico; in December of the same year, he received the title of Knight of the Order of the Golden Fleece.^[15] This allegiance to the emperor also strengthened the social position of the Savellis within the ranks of the Roman aristocracy. In his role as imperial ambassador, marshal of the Holy Church, and papal chamberlain, Savelli was at the center of the diplomatic and musical life of the papal city.

3.2 Paolo Savelli’s correspondence with various members of the Habsburg court shows that his web of connections was a means through which Emperor Ferdinand II hired musicians in Rome.^[16] The Eternal City, which provided many opportunities for both local and foreign patrons, was a main hub for engaging young composers and singers and for all types of musical exchanges. The first musici Savelli recruited for the imperial court were young singers. He was responsible for the early training of two castrati (eunuchi),whom the emperor requested in May 1619. Their musical training in Rome lasted more than two years—longer than expected—and they did not arrive in Graz until May 16, 1621 (Appendix, documents 2, 3, 5, 6). Another singer—a contralto—and a member of Savelli’s household was sent to the emperor to replace an unnamed musician from Loreto, whose bad health had delayed his departure. On August 26, 1623, Prince Paolo communicated to the imperial agent, Cristoforo Lanchini, that, “Cifra, the chapel master, one bass, one contralto, and one violinist have been brought here for the service of the Archduke Carlo. Cifra, an honorable person, is well known in his profession.”^[17] Antonio Cifra was one of several composers who were recruited by the emperor while working under the watchful eye of Savelli. The musicians in another group, including a violinist, were trained in Bologna and also requested for court performances (Appendix, document 10).

3.3 The Prince of Albano had also introduced Giovanni Priuli and Giovanni Valentini to the court of Ferdinand II. Priuli wrote to Savelli for the first time on December 7, 1622, to report about the musical pursuits of Baldassare Poggioli, another court singer sent to Vienna. Two years later (May 25, 1624), Priuli sent to Savelli some of his compositions for the pope, perhaps with the aspiration of obtaining a musical appointment in Rome.^[18] However, he never left the emperor’s service and was succeeded by Valentini as chapel master of the Viennese court. Valentini’s relationship with Savelli was not a mere case of diplomatic mediation because the Roman prince also maintained patronage bonds with the musician. A copialettera of May 6, 1622 (Figure 4) shows that Valentini’s compositions circulated between Vienna and Rome, where they were performed in the circle of Savelli:

For the enjoyment that our Imperial Majesty and Lordship had from the musical compositions that you sent, you receive all the honor, which your virtue deserves. In this particular respect, I receive it with much favor that Your Lordship has decided to share them with me, for which I thank you with all my affection, and assure you that then I shall provide that they are I shall not fail to have them sung here by the best in [this] profession. so as to answer for the correspondence Meanwhile I offer myself to the service of Your Lordship for all occasions here, and I shall strive for you to recognize the high esteem in which I hold your merits, and the satisfaction that I gain from knowing the goodwill that you have toward toward [sic] those youths whom I have sent to serve His Majesty our Caesar, happiness ever be granted to him. Rome, May 6, 1622.^[19]

3.4 In these words, one notices a rather unusual informality for a patron-client interaction, which more typically entailed a paternalistic and unequal relationship between individuals of different social classes. This can be explained by the fact that Valentini had done Savelli two favors: he sent some compositions (claiming that they were well received) and promoted youths that Savelli has sent to serve the emperor. In helping those youths gain the emperor’s support, Valentini did Savelli a substantial favor, increasing the latter’s own reputation. Therefore, Savelli had to respond accordingly, and in a more extravagant way than he would with other musicians in a common epistolary interaction. Valentini is in fact inferior to Savelli, but he has access to someone of far higher rank than he (the emperor). Consequently, Savelli has to treat Valentini as if he were of equal or higher rank himself. This is an interesting case of a patronage relationship in which a musician gets elevated in stature (by noble patrons) precisely because he has greater access than many to the highest position of power.^[20] In the letters that Valentini later addressed to Savelli, however, the hierarchical barrier of formal writing and the typical obsequious tone of a composer in need of favors emerge. Valentini, counting on Savelli’s protection and acting as a “friend of a friend,” approached him about a recommendation for one of his relatives, identified in a letter as Vescovo di Nona. A few years later, the musician dedicated to Savelli his Sesto libro di madrigali (Venice: Vincenti, 1625), publicly acknowledging this long-distance patronage relationship (Appendix, documents 11, 13). Of this work, which contains concerted madrigals and scherzi for three and six voices with instruments, only one of the partbooks (sesto) has survived.^[21] The last contact between Valentini and the Roman prince occurred on August 10, 1625, when Valentini informed Savelli about the progress of two other young musicians sent to the imperial court (Appendix, document 15).

4. Frescobaldi and Buonamente

4.1 In the following two years (1626–1627), Savelli was in frequent contact with Empress Eleonora Gonzaga and Archduke Leopold V (Archduke of Further Austria and the younger brother of the emperor). The empress supported the poet and librettist Alessandro Striggio and interceded with Savelli for a recommendation for Striggio’s son Vincenzo. Although Striggio lived in Mantua and not in Rome, he maintained a long-distance relationship with the Prince of Albano (Appendix, documents 14, 16). A long correspondence between the latter and Leopold V shows that Savelli also mediated on behalf of a young female harp player, whom the emperor awaited. The harp player in question was supposed to have traveled to the imperial court via Florence, but an unexpected illness and the involvement of her family prevented her from doing so (Appendix, documents 17–24). Savelli supervised the training of the harp player during her period of study in Rome with the composer and teacher Girolamo Frescobaldi, who was paid the sum of 30 scudi for the lessons.^[22] In two earlier letters, dated February 20 and May 14, 1627, Archduke Leopold had requested that Savelli advance other payments to Frescobaldi for teaching the young organist Giorgio Pescatori, another future imperial musician. The composer was paid 36 scudi for each three-month period of lessons (12 scudi a month). Savelli’s intervention was needed to advance the payment to cover the expenses for Pescatori’s trip to Venice, which were to be reimbursed later (Appendix, documents 21, 23, 25).

4.2 As Frederick Hammond has contended, Frescobaldi’s reputation in Europe “was such that he has been claimed as teacher of a number of improbable students.” The influence of Frescobaldi in German-speaking countries has been assessed on the basis of the dissemination of his printed works north of the Alps. Coincidentally, none of Frescobaldi’s works printed before 1627–1628 are found in the archives of Vienna or in other Austrian cities.^[23] There is no proof that any of Frescobaldi’s pupils reached Austria before the late 1630s. However, the documents presented here show that Savelli’s diplomatic ties facilitated the training and circulation of Frescobaldi’s students within the orbits of Rome and the Habsburg court. The documents also bring to the fore three aspects of Frescobaldi’s life and of his musical influence, both inside and outside of Italy:

Frescobaldi was connected with the circle of Paolo Savelli, and the latter also acted as a recruiter and intermediary between Frescobaldi, his students, and the emperor.

His technique was assimilated by young students who were trained in Rome for the imperial court.

The teachings of Frescobaldi may have reached Austria through his pupils earlier than previously hypothesized, well before the period of Johann Jakob Froberger’s studies with Frescobaldi in Rome in the late 1630s and before Froberger’s return to the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II.

As for this last aspect, it is worth noting that in 1637, Duke Federico Savelli mediated for the imperial court to bring Froberger to Rome to study with Frescobaldi. The emperor asked Federico to contact his nephew Bernardo Savelli to help with the payments and lodging for Froberger in Rome. There are no indications of where Froberger sojourned during his entire stay in Rome, but it has been conjectured that in 1640, he resided in the Savelli palace at Monte Savello.^[24]

4.3 Paolo Savelli’s prominence as a patron-diplomat is even more obvious in his involvement with the career of the composer Giovanni Battista Buonamente.^[25] As seen above, Federico Savelli and Paolo Quagliati recommended Buonamente to Prince Paolo in 1618. Six years later (1624), Paolo was in direct correspondence with the musician, who wrote to thank him for the continuous favors received. Buonamente also notified Savelli about the departure of Cardinal Alessandro Orsini (Paolo’s relative) from Vienna to Rome. The cardinal seems to have maintained close ties to the imperial court and to Buonamente (Appendix, document 12). In 1628, Empress Eleonora Gonzaga wrote a letter to Savelli (Figure 5). In it she approves of his interest in looking out for Buonamente but expresses the hope that the Pope not be disturbed so often; she would nevertheless like Savelli to secure the Pope’s stewardship until Buonamente’s behavior is deemed appropriate for her husband (Ferdinand II) to host him:

Eleonora, through the favor of divine mercy Empress of the Romans, and Queen of Germany, Hungary, Bohemia, etc.

Illustrious and honest sir, beloved to us. From your letter written to us on December 25 we happily learned of your mindful care in securing the stewardship for the musician Buonamente. Yet in this matter, in order that it not be necessary to interrupt the Blessedness of the Pope so many times, it would be most welcome to us if you could secure from his Holiness through your duties interposed by our man that he deign to prolong the remembered stewardship up until the time when the said Buonamente will be involved in the Caesar’s services. For, when his Holiness can have firm confidence that his Caesarean Majesty, our most dear Lord and husband, will permit the same Buonamente in his court only when he behaves respectably, so much more certainly do we wish to await his benign consent. As for the rest we attend you with our customary and most kind affection.

Sent from the Castle of Prague on February 4, 1628.

Eleonora.^[26]

It is evident that Prince Savelli was protecting the musician and managing his career in the broader diplomatic context of musical relations and socio-cultural contacts between Rome and Vienna.

5. Conclusion

5.1 The circumstances surrounding Prince Paolo, Buonamente, and Frescobaldi point to the existence of a patron-broker-client network related to musical patronage in early seventeenth-century Rome, for which no examples have heretofore come to light. In his dyadic role as a patron and broker, Savelli conducted international negotiations, organized musical exchanges, and facilitated financial transactions. As cultural historian Daniela Frigo argues, the term “international” is not adequate and may be replaced by “supra-state,” for the former “presupposes the existence of nations, or at least of homogeneous political organizations, which establish relationships with each other.”^[27] This, of course, was not the case in sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century Italy, a geographical territory still not politically unified, nor of Rome, a city divided by internal antagonisms and contrasting factions.

5.2 In conclusion, the patronage of Prince Paolo Savelli brings to the fore a neglected aspect of music in early seventeenth-century Rome, namely, the connection of musical patronage with diplomacy. This opens a research venue in the study of the multiple functions that a powerful aristocrat could assume as a patron. It shows how supra-state political roles facilitated the fluid movement of musicians and contributed to the creation of patronage networks of clients in the socio-cultural context of Italy and Europe. Furthermore, the hitherto-unknown documents discussed here illuminate Savelli’s role in the migration of Italian musical culture to the imperial court in the seventeenth century. His courtly circle shows that the ties of Rome with Vienna went back to the beginnings of Ferdinand II’s reign and did not start with Froberger’s time in the Eternal City, as previously believed.

Acknowledgment

I would like to thank the anonymous readers of this journal for their valuable comments and suggestions.

Appendix

Appendix. Documents: dedicatory prefaces, letters, inventory

Figures

Figure 1. Savelli-Orsini genealogy

Figure 2. Palace of Monte Savello in Rome

Figure 3. Portrait of Prince Paolo Savelli

Figure 4. Copialettera of Paolo Savelli to Giovanni Valentini

Figure 5. Letter of Empress Eleonora to Paolo Savelli