Vincenzo Legrenzo Ciampi (2 April 1719 – 30 March 1762) was an Italian composer.[1] He is best known today as the composer of a song that cannot be certainly ascribed to his pen, "
Tre giorni son che Nina in letto senesta", formerly long attributed to
Pergolesi and better known simply as "Nina".[2]
Education and early career in Italy
Ciampi was born in
Piacenza and studied at the Naples
Conservatorio della Pietà dei Turchini with
Francesco Durante and
Leonardo Leo.[3] His first known success was the comic opera Da un disordine nasce un ordine, performed at the
Teatro dei Fiorentini in Naples in 1737, when he was only eighteen.[4] Five more of his comic operas were produced in Naples up to 1745,[4] and he also received commissions for operas to be presented in Rome and other Italian cities.[3] In 1746 he was engaged as a harpsichordist at the opera house in
Palermo,[5] and his
opera seriaAtaserse was performed there in 1747.[6] That same year he was engaged at the
Ospedale degli Incurabili in Venice as an assistant to the maestro di coro G. B. Runcher, whom he had succeeded by 1748.[7]
London
Ciampi was one the first music directors of the Ospedale to be given extended leave, and by the autumn of 1748 he was in London. His replacement at the Ospedale was
Gioacchino Cocchi. In London Ciampi was the composer and director of music for a company of Italian singers under G. F. Crosa, who presented the first season of Italian comic opera at the
King's Theatre, London.[8] The company's repertory consisted of works already presented in Venice, among which was Gli tre cicisbei ridicoli in which appeared the popular song "Tre giorni son che Nina", often attributed to Pergolesi. This caused
Barclay Squire and others to suggest the song was actually composed by Ciampi, however, according to Frank Walker, "this is extremely doubtful".[9] Ciampi continued to appear in London until 1756.[10]
^Van Boer 2012, p. 131. Ciampi's middle name "Legrenzo" is frequently misspelled "Legrenzio", an error by Fétis 1860, corrected by Fétis & Pougin 1878.
Letellier, Robert Ignatius (2010). Opéra-Comique: A Sourcebook. - Page 241 1443821683 2010 Vincenzo. CIAMPI. (1719-1762). Le Caprice amoureux, ou Ninette à la cour Comédie mêlée d'ariettes parodiées de Bertolde à la cour en deux actes. Librettist: Charles-Simon Favart. Music parodied from Vincenzo Ciampi and various other ...
Walker, Frank (1948). "'Tre giorni son che Nina': An Old Controversy Reopened", The Musical Times, vol. 90, pp. 432–435.
JSTOR935254.
Walker, Frank (1954). "CIAMPI, Vincenzo Legrenzio", vol. 2, pp. 293–294, in Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians. New York, St. Martin's Press.
OCLC13586086.