Antonio Florio, Rota’s disciple who rediscovers forgotten music

One day, Nino Rota reassured the restless young man who was one of his pupils at the ‘Niccolò Piccinni’ Conservatoire: “Life itself will guide you towards what you are meant to do.” And so it was, for shortly afterwards Antonio Florio, born in Bari in 1956, discovered his artistic calling in the arduous world of early music. Founder and director of the Cappella Neapolitana ensemble, and a member of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia, Florio has discovered and continues to rediscover composers and works that have not been performed for centuries, such as those of the 17th-century Neapolitan master Francesco Provenzale; the madrigals of Fabrizio and Scipione Dentice; motets by Gaetano Veneziano; and works by Gaetano Latilla, Giovanni Paisiello, Domenico Scarlatti and Leonardo Vinci (including ‘Li Zite ’n galera’ and ‘La Partenope’). He has unearthed scores from Italian and foreign libraries, and particularly from the musical archive of the Oratorian Fathers housed in the Girolamini Monumental Complex.

A delightful ‘treasure hunt’ that would have delighted Rota and bears witness to his magical influence on his dearest disciples – an influence also mentioned by another of his protégés from Bari, Maestro Nicola Scardicchio, in an interview with Il Foglio on Christmas Eve 2022.

They have all moved me, and there are hundreds of them. To give you an idea, they take up ninety large files in my library. If I had to name just a few, I would mention the works of Leonardo Vinci, who was an underrated author but whose works are now performed all over the world, and those of Francesco Provenzale, another great forgotten figure.

He remained forgotten from Provenzale’s death in 1704 right up to the present day, until, thanks to the discoveries made together with the musicologist Dinko Fabris, my invaluable companion on this journey, we rewrote a page of history that restored his status as a leading figure in his field. In July, he staged "Il (Lo) schiavo di sua moglie" at the Festival della Valle d’Itria in Martina Franca—an opera that had not been performed for 354 years—and it was a major success. On 20 September, he presented another previously unperformed work at the Girolamini: the four-part motet "Quo fugiam, misero", rediscovered in the Oratorian archives.

These are documented on around fifty records: a collection is available on Spotify. Among the most recent recordings is a milestone in comic theatre: the oldest Neapolitan comic intermezzo, attributed to the priest Francesco Antonio Boerio. The DVD is entitled “Bello tiempo passato” and is inspired by the Commedia dell’Arte, featuring four characters who each sing in a different language: Italian, Neapolitan, Spanish and an almost entirely invented Calabrian dialect. The latest CD is “Son regina e sono amante”, a tribute to Niccolò Piccinni, my illustrious fellow countryman, featuring arias from opera buffa and opera seria performed by the soprano Rosa Feola.

I met him when I was fourteen at the Bari Conservatoire, where I graduated in cello, piano and composition. When he retired, we stayed in touch: he was a father figure, a man of insatiable curiosity and immense erudition, who had such a command of Latin and Greek that he could actually speak them. He closely followed my studies and, whenever he travelled abroad, would bring me music books that were impossible to find in Italy at the time. I was also fortunate enough to witness his meetings with Fellini while they were working on soundtracks, as I was living in Rome, where I honed my skills with two renowned teachers: the cellist Giuseppe Selmi and the conductor of the Cappella Giulia, Armando Renzi. Rota then introduced me to Francesco D’Avalos, a Neapolitan composer from a family of ancient nobility, who lived in his family’s immense palace. He struggled to maintain and restore it, but he also hosted the British royal family there. Unfortunately, his city can also be ungrateful and short-sighted, and so has always given him scant recognition.

It was for Rota and D’Avalos: a cellist dropped out of Roberto De Simone’s La gatta Cenerentola whilst the tour was stopping off in Zurich, and the two of them sent me to stand in. I stayed on with De Simone for the subsequent Mistero Napolitano as well, and so I developed a passion for exploring the Baroque repertoire. At that time the city was experiencing a remarkable artistic ferment that persisted despite the 1980 earthquake and its aftermath. He devoted himself to musicological research and in 1987 founded the Cappella Pietà de’ Turchini, named after one of the four ancient Neapolitan conservatoires; it was later renamed to its present name, the Cappella Neapolitana.

There is a great deal of it, scattered all over the world. We have even found examples in the libraries of Ottawa and Münster, but it is important for the city to become more aware of this heritage. And for it to be associated in the collective memory with this vast body of work as well, and not just with traditional Neapolitan songs – the beauty of which I do not dispute.