Gianluca Capuano transports us back to a Venice whose musical richness seems incredible to us today, where “every church, every theatre, every institution strove to trump all the others by boasting the best music in the city. Music also echoed in the streets and alleyways, particularly at night, along the banks of the canals and on the gondolas; as if from nowhere, beneath the window of an inn, the strains of an orchestra rise from a floating pontoon: a lover serenading his lady. The sound of music is to be heard everywhere in Venice”.

And from Venice we are led by Jean-François Lattarico to Rome as he glosses the life of Giulio Rospigliosi, the most emblematic and attractive exponent of the Roman school, thanks to the literary quality of his librettos and, above all, his position within the Roman curia as bishop, then cardinal, papal nuncio and finally Pope, under the name of Clement IX (1667-1669). In the 18th century, Toledo was known as “the second Rome”. Carlos Martinez Gil draws a social and religious portrait of that extraordinary city, where music played a constant and key role, as well as of the composers who endowed it with a vast musical treasure that has survived to the present day.

On the next stage of our journey, David Vickers takes us to England in pursuit of one of the most fortunate partnerships in the history of music, the duo formed by the poet John Dryden and the composer Henry Purcell, whose joint legacy includes works such as King Arthur and The Indian Queen. Our tour concludes with Brian Robins’ excellent essay on the two great oratorios composed by Haydn in his latter years: The Creation and The Seasons.

Also in this issue, Robins interviews the German harpsichordist, conductor and musicologist Ludger Rémy, who has steadily brought to our attention the works of 18th-century composers from northern and central Germany in performances distinguished above all by their total integrity and passionate commitment.