Domenico Scarlatti
He
was the son of Alessandro Scarlatti,
another composer. In 1701 he was appointed organist and composer of the vice-regal
court at Naples, where his father was Maestro di cappella.
It
may have been in Venice that he first met Handel, with whom he formed a strong attachment.
By
1707, however, Scarlatti was in Rome, assisting his father at San Maria Maggiore, and he
remained in Rome for over 12 years, occupying posts as maestro to the dowager Queen of
Poland from 1711, to the Marquis de Fontes from 1714, and at St. Peter's Church.
He
thus provided music for both sacred and secular employers, but he was unable to free
himself from a domineering father until he obtained legal independence in January 1717.
In
1719 Scarlatti resigned his positions in Rome and apparently spent some years in Palermo
before taking up his next post, as mestre of the Portuguese court in Lisbon.
The
Lisbon earthquake of 1755 destroyed documents about his career there, but his duties
included giving keyboard lessons to John V's daughter, Maria Barbara, and his younger
brother, Don Antonio.
When
Maria Barbara married the Spanish crown prince in 1729 Scarlatti followed her to Seville
and then, in 1733, to Madrid, where he spent the rest of his life.
Although
he continued to write vocal music, sacred and secular, the main works of his Iberian years
are the remarkable series of keyboard sonatas, copied out in his last years and taken to
Italy by his colleague, the castrato Farinelli.
Scarlatti
married twice: in 1728 a Roman, Maria Catarina Gentili, and in 1739 a Spaniard, Anastasia
Maxarti Ximenes.
None
of his nine children became a musician.
In
1738 he was honoured with a knighthood from King John V of Portugal, to which he responded
by dedicating to the king a volume of Esercizi per gravicembalo, the only music published
during his lifetime under his supervision.
Some of his most famous works are:
'Cat Fugue' (Esercizzio or Sonata)
Fugue (Esercizzio or Sonata), K 058
Fugue [Esercizzio or Sonata], K 287
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