Vincenzo Grimani (15 May 1652 or 26 May 1655 – 26 September 1710) was an Italian cardinal, diplomat, and

opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libr ...

librettist A libretto (Italian for "booklet") is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major litu ...

Biography

Grimani was born either in

Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...

Mantua Mantua ( ; it, Mantova ; Lombard and la, Mantua) is a city and '' comune'' in Lombardy, Italy, and capital of the province of the same name. In 2016, Mantua was designated as the Italian Capital of Culture. In 2017, it was named as the Eur ...

. He is best remembered for having supplied the libretto for George Frideric Handel's early operatic success '' Agrippina'', although he also supplied libretti for ''Elmiro re di Corinto'', by

Carlo Pallavicino Carlo Pallavicino (Pallavicini; c. 1630 – 29 January 1688) was an Italian composer. Pallavicino was born at Salò. From 1666 to 1673, he worked at the Dresden court; from 1674 to 1685, at the '' Ospedale degli Incurabili'' (a conservatory wher ...

, and ''Orazio'' by G. F. Tosi. All the operas were produced at the Teatro S Giovanni Grisostomo, which he owned, while the remainder of

his family ''His Family'' is a novel by Ernest Poole published in 1917 about the life of a New York widower and his three daughters in the 1910s. It received the first Pulitzer Prize for the Novel in 1918. Plot introduction ''His Family'' tells the story of ...

owned several other Venetian opera houses. Politically he was allied to the Habsburg cause, and this alliance and his importance diplomatically to the Habsburgs led to him being made a cardinal in 1697. In 1708, he further received the honour of viceroyalty at

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

, where he died. His libretti are markedly different from the later moralizing tone of

Metastasio Pietro Antonio Domenico Trapassi (3 January 1698 – 12 April 1782), better known by his pseudonym of Pietro Metastasio (), was an Italian poet and librettist, considered the most important writer of ''opera seria'' libretti. Early life Me ...

and Apostolo Zeno, whose ideas came to dictate '' opera seria''. His libretto for Agrippina is marked out by its amorality and the domination of aria over recitative. His portrayal of the Emperor Claudius has been perceived as an oblique attack on the character of Pope Clement XI. Grimani frequently clashed with Clement in the course of protecting the interests of the Habsburgs at the Vatican.

References

* Harris S. Saunders: "Grimani, Vincenzo", ''Grove Music Online'', ed. L. Macy
grovemusic.com
subscription access; accessed 5 December 2006). {{DEFAULTSORT:Grimani, Vincenzo 1653 births 1710 deaths 18th-century Italian cardinals 17th-century Italian diplomats 18th-century Italian writers 18th-century Italian male writers

Vincenzo Vincenzo is an Italian male given name, derived from the Latin name Vincentius (the verb ''vincere'' means to win or to conquer). Notable people with the name include: Art * Vincenzo Amato (born 1966), Italian actor and sculptor *Vincenzo Bell ...

17th-century Italian cardinals