Leonardo Leo

Extract

When I last had the honour of reading a paper before this Association, I tried to show you how Alessandro Scarlatti gathered up the results of all the musical experiments which Italian composers had made during the seventeenth century, and wove these various threads into that smooth and supple texture which formed the foundation of what we call classical music. He was of course not alone in the accomplishment of this great task, but we may certainly regard him as by far the most important and the most influential of the musicians who were at work upon it. Historians have sometimes refused to accept him as the real founder of the Neapolitan School of the eighteenth century. Certainly there were composers and teachers at Naples before Alessandro Scarlatti, but it was not until Scarlatti had established himself there that Naples became the musical centre of Italy and therefore of Europe. Nevertheless, I do not wish to maintain that it was the spirit of Scarlatti which animated the teaching of that school of composition, although the Neapolitans always regarded him as their figurehead; indeed I shall have occasion to point out to you this afternoon how soon his immediate influence was forgotten. But the generation that followed him did include a few composers whose work was inspired by ideals almost as lofty as his; and of these the man who has most claims on our respect is Leonardo Leo.