Giulia who composed the Baptism of the Feminism, reach regal decorations and become “Commendatore” of the Italian Republic

A. Renoir, "At  the Theater", 1876- 1877.

She was the first and sometimes the only woman whose music compositions  were played in the most important theaters all over the world, who was produced abroad and decorated for her fine compositions even from the former and last Italian Royals, she was Giulia Recli.

She was born on 4^th December  1884 in Milan, her father was the “Commendatore” Luigi Recli, who was among the founders of the Ambrosiano Bank and her mother was the pianist Luisa Biancardi [1]. Her musical studies was carry on by the most important teachers of her  time  as Alessandro Bonci , her vocal coach, or as Giovanni Maria Anfossi, her piano coach, and Ildebrando Pizzetti, her composition coach.

Her first plays are from the 1910s and in 1914 the Scala of Milan commission her a composition which will become the symphonic  poem entitled “Alba dell’anima”  (The Sunrise of the Soul), in 1919 one of her tone poem, which lyrics were written by her sister Maria, poetess, was played at the Politeama Rossetti in Trieste [2].

Her symphonic poem, played at the Augustus Theatre in Rome, and directed by the magnificent Master Tullio Serafin with the Santa Cecilia’s Orchestra, was defineted by the "Giornale d’Italia" (The Newspaper of Italy) “such as a baptism of the Feminism in music” because for the first time on the theatrical table there was the name of a female composer [3]. 

In the 30’s she met and established  with the Director of the Scala Choir, Vittore Veneziani [4], a long lasting collaboration which will be interrupted only with the world war but will restart at the end of that one.

In the 50’s she was eletted Vice President of the Italian Musician Trade Union, in Italian SMI Sindacato dei Musicisti Italiani [5], and won few international awards as that one for women composers  in Basilea and that one in Trieste with Campanelle  (Little Bells) Song [6]. In the USA she won the second and First award in the New York Musical Association with the composition for piano and singing called “Villereccia Song” [7]. Her lyrics were too much appreciated in the USA and even produced by the Schirmer  right from the 30’s but were also appreciated all  over the world if they were played in the most important world’s theaters such as the Metropolitan Opera of New York, the Royal Albert Hall of London, the Scala in Milan, the Opera in Brema and also in the Opera in Budapest.

From 1951 to 1966 she became Principal of the Lyceum of Milan and therefore she  decided to organized classes, concerts, awards [8]  to give  talented young people the opportunity to learn and to be noticed.

In 1965 the execution of one of her composition by the Orchestra of RAI (The Italian National Television) was celebrated even by the “Bible of the Music”: Billboard [9]while in this same years, her last, she was honoured also by the Italian Republic for her artistic and philanthropic engagement as in the past years she was also decorated for her high merits for her compositions by the Italian Queen [10]. Now the Italian Republic too glorified her work with two awards, the only female composer to receved the Ordine di Commendatore of the Italian Republic [11] in the 1964 and in 1969 just one year before she died, on 19^th December 1970,  in Brivio which has founded a local band called “Giulia Recli” in her honour. 

[1] “Chi è?: Dizionario degli italiani di oggi”, FORMIGGINI A. F., Ed. Formiggini, 1928, pag. 403.

[2] “Le Lombarde in musica”, Fondazione Adkins Chiti: Donne in Musica, Colombo, 2008, pag. 136.

[3] Ivi, pag. 135.

[4] Ivi, pag. 138.

[5] Ivi, pag. 141.

[6] Ibidem.

[7] Il Carroccio- The Italian Rewiev, vol. 18, pag. 70.

[8] “Le Lombarde in musica”, Op. cit., pag. 141.

[9] “Gal Writers are honored”, Billboard”, edizione del 4 dicembre 1965, pag. 22.

[10] “Women of notes: 1000 women composers born before 1900”, LAURENCE A., Ed. R. Rosen Press, 1978 , pag. 79.

[11] “Donne in Musica”, ADKINS CHITI P., Ed. Armando, 1996, pag. 177.

Chiara by virtue, Margarita by honor that is the most important composer of the 1600 Italian scenery

Federico Moja, 1821- 1885.

Margarita Cozzolani was born in November on the 27 in 1602, in Milan. She was one of the most appreciated Italian composers of the 1600s.

Margarita was born in a rich and wealthy family of merchants and received, as a tradition, her education within the home, among the subjects given to her there was also Music which seems highly fit to her. So her artistic skills were assigned to the family Rognoni, known and respected masters of instrumental and vocal music of the era. But Margarita will see the opportunity to use her musical skills not so much in a good marital or family indoor rather in the shelter of a cloister, in fact as equally of a custom of the time, preceded by aunts and a sister, Margarita will be a Benedictine in the convent of St. Radegonda, near the Duomo of Milan, in 1620, at the age of eighteen, and will be consecrated with the name, she has chose, of Chiara.

This new condition of nun, however, does not inhibit her to use her talents as part of her monastic experience, moreover, it is not known with certainty the value of her vocation which then can not be denied in advance. In her convent, Sister Chiara then endeavored to work of Music, reorganizing Singings, Psalms, Vespers of the Eucharistic celebration with such sophistication and complexity to be able to attract whole crowds to the Convent to attend the executions of those nuns defined by a contemporary "[...] under the black spoils seem to the listener, candid, harmonious swans, that, fill the hearts of surprise, and kidnap their languages of encomiums".  [1]

In fact, the fame of her skills and ability as a composer earned her the opportunity to publish four works that are not unfortunately  entirely all came down to us.

"Visit of the Cardinal", by Salvatore Frangiamore, 1853.

The peculiarity of her arrangements was that her works had three metrics for as many choruses that melted with the symphony and the verses in double or triple time; Cozzolani's scoring establishes three sets of paired parts: two violins, two sopranos, two tenors and  basso continuo. [2]

Her musical works nevertheless convey between the period of 1640 to 1650 because  Sister Chiara was elected Abbess of Santa Radegonda and prefered focused on the commitments and responsibilities of her new charge so or to avoid to her Convent unpleasant situations or to meet the Cardinal Alfonso Litta's wishes who  hoped moderation of the use of Music in Churches, her activity was interrupted.

Sister Chiara, Maragarita, Cozzolani, died, in the Convent, presumably between 1676 and 1678.

Her and the luster that her music led to her Convent, remains in a panegyric of Filippo Picinelli in his  work , entitled "University of Literati Milanesi" in 1670 in which he writes:

"The nuns of St. Radegonda of Milan, in the possession of the music are equipped of such exquisiteness so rare, that are recognized for the first singers of Italy. [...]. Among that religious ones, deserves the most highest merits Donna Chiara Margarita Cozzolani, named Chiara thanks to virtue; and Margarita, for the nobility of talent, rare, and excellent honor, who if in the year 1620 wore that  sacred dress, she succeeded in the exercise of music such a big success that from 1640 up to 1650 has sent to the press, four works of music".

Works:

• Primavera di fiori musicali a 1. 2 . 3. 4. voci,dedicata all’Eminentissimo Cardinal Monti Arcivescovo di Milano, Milano, 1640, perduta;          
  "Spring of musical Flowers in 1.2.3.4. voices, dedicated to the Cardinal Monti Archbishop of Milan, Milan, 1640, Lost;
• Mottetti a 1. 2. 3. e 4 voci al Serenissimo Principe Mathias di Toscana, Venezia, 1642;
  Motets at 1.2.3.4. voices to his Eminence Prince Mathias of Tuscany, Venice, 1642;
• Scherzi di Sacra Melodia, Venezia, 1648;  perduto;        Jokes of sacred melody, Venice, 1648, Lost;
• Salmi à otto voci concertati con Mottetti et dialoghi a 1. 2. 3.4.e 5. voci all’Illustrissimo Monsignor Badoaro Vescovo di Cremona, Venezia, 1650.                    
  Psalms in eight voices with concerted motets and dialogues in 1. 2. 3.4.5 voices to the Illustrious Monsignor Badoaro Bishop of Cremona, Venice, 165

[1] PICCINELLI F., “Ateneo dei Letterati Milenesi”, Ed. F. Vigone, 1670.

[2] KURTZMAN J., a cura di, “Vesper and Compline Music for Four Principal Voices:Agostino Agazzari, Giovanni Francesco Anerio, Giovanni Battista Biondi da Cesena, Maurizio Cazzati, Antonio Cifra, Chiara Margarita Cozzolani, Bonifazio Graziani, Giovanni Legrenzi, Isabella Leonarda, Tarquinio Merula, Lodovico Viadana”, Ed. Routledge, 2014.

See you on September

Happy Holiday

Maria Teresa the germanist of the italian women

Henri Matisse, "Reading Woman with Parasol".

Maria Teresa Morreale was born on July 16th in 1933. She was a German scholar and linguist, to whom we owe the translation of important works by women and not only.

After graduated at the Faculty of Letters and Philosophy of Palermo she moved immediately in Cologne, Germany, where she explores German culture by enrolling in the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Cologne and where in the meanwhile she also teaches Italian at the Italian Cultural Institute. Then she moved to Bonn after winning a scholarship from the Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung, but it does not come to an end because shortly she was appointed assistant in the Magistrale Faculty at the University of Palermo where she devoted herself particularly to the period of the German Romanticism.

At the end of the 70s of the twentieth century, she moved again, this time in Mogadishu, at the Somali National University, where she teaches Italian through a project of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Back in Italy in Palermo she came back to teach at the Faculty of Foreign Languages ​​and joins the Italian Association of Teachers of German Language ADILT of which she would be the manager at the regional level for many years . In 1982 she became an associate professor.

Her linguistic research will keep her to sweep the door in the years  touching various aspects of the relationship between literature and the history of the science of literature through the study of the works by Gervinus to travel literature, from the plays of Brecht to the German fiction of the nineteenth century. But her attention will also focus on the works of the german women and about the "Frauenfrage" (female issue).

In 1975 she began her collaboration with the magazine DWF Donnawomanfemme writing an article on the novel "Malina" of the Austrian poetess and writer Ingeborg Bachmann, titled "Malina or overpowering the female ego" where she analyzed the work of the Austrian writer noting that being a woman leads to a state of isolation for the mere fact of being born a female.

Hedwig Dohm in 1870

In 1976 she wrote the essay, of nearly twenty pages, about Nietzsche and women, titled "Nietzsche and women, according to a German feminist of the late nineteenth century", in which she fully translated an article by Hedwig Dohm came out in 1898 on the Berlin magazine "Die Zukunft" and where she went on to introduce how Nietzsche, open minded about morals when comes to women's emancipation instead can not conceive of any emancipation of women because he sees them only as an instrument of pleasure and descent for men.

In the same year she published also a very interesting article and debate: "Debate (Who, for whom, how. Scientific research on the side of the woman)," in which Maria Theresa and the other editors compared and discussed the difficulties for women researchers to carry out their studies in a disciplinary system designed by and for men.

The following year it was the turn of the essay on "The Women's Education in the two Germanies" and yet "Women and literature in Germany. Comments and insights on the German culture of the eighteenth century " on Quaderno, Vol. 14, Institute of Foreign Languages ​​and Literature, which will be pubblished later in 1981 with the title of  "Born to read. Remarks about German culture of the eighteenth century. "

In 1982 she released an essay on the writer and playwright by Ilse Langner called "Ilse Langner: theater, plays, travel stories". Meanwhile she also collaborates with the magazine Leggeredonna and the University of Pavia and the National Research Center CNR participating at the realization of the book "From the lounge to the party. German women writers between bourgeois revolution and the right to vote "by Lia Secci in 1982, in which she will provide an important contribution about Hedwig Dhom, Helene Lange and Luise Büchner  having written the final note of the reprinted book" Luise Büchner. Die Frauen und Ihr Beruf. "in 1981.

Then in 1982 she participated at the IV International Congress of Sicilian Studies with a report on "Luise Büchner, an intellectual Hessian". In 1984, inspiring from the figure of the poetess Ingeborg Bachmann, who she knew personally, she wrote an essay about this author and  her Frankfurt Lectures. In 1986 she will participate at the Georg Büchner's Seminar with the report "The Kato-Rede by Georg Büchner in the memories of his sister Luise" and finally in 1988 she published the book "Luise Büchner: a poet."

The well-known German Researcher will then continue her journey by scholar with other topics related to the German culture and will die in 1996 in Palermo, on February 14th.