Eleonora Gonzaga, the third wife of Emperor Ferdinand III, established the tradition of the Sepolcri, the Holy Week oratorios in front of the Holy Sepulchre, at the Viennese Imperial Court. Her daughter Eleonore, who resided in Innsbruck as the wife of the imperial governor Karl of Lorraine, introduced this genre in the Tyrolean residence city. The Innsbruck court conductor Pietro Nicolò Sorosina created his oratorio "Adamo ed Eva" perhaps during his time as organist for the Empress Dowager Eleonora in Vienna or later in Innsbruck – the work is preserved in the so-called "bedchamber library" of Eleonora's stepson, Emperor Leopold, who enjoyed exchanging ideas about music with his stepmother. Leopold, himself a composer and a true music fanatic, devoted his life to attracting the best musicians to his court and acquiring the most interesting works for his collection. The native Venetian Marc’Antonio Ziani was a singer at San Marco and a conductor in Mantua before Emperor Leopold appointed him as his deputy conductor in 1700. Under Charles VI, Ziani rose to become the imperial court conductor. His oratorio "La Passione dell’Orto" is preserved in a manuscript dated 1708 in the music collection of the Austrian National Library – a previously little-noticed masterpiece.

BONUS 1: 19:15 Introduction talk with theologian Józef Niewiadomski

BONUS 2: Between the two concert parts, a baroque sermon by Józef Niewiadomski

Further information about the event series “Innsbruck Court Music”

Price information:

Price information at https://www.tiroler-landesmuseen.at/termin/innsbrucker-hofmusik-03-santo-sepolcro-karwochenoratorien-um-1700-von-pietro-nicolo-sorosina-und-marcantonio-ziani/?datum=202303241900

Image credit(s): Photo: TLM /Klemens Weisleitner, Reinhold Sigl, Reinhold Sigl