Lisbona 1822: La vita musicale attraverso la stampa periodica

Abstract

The musical news - often minimal or fragmentary - which are found in the Lisbon press of 1822, completed with the other available sources, contribute towards a reconstruction of the context in which João Domingos Bomtempo established the Sociedade Filarmónica, a first attempt at a stable concert organization in the Portuguese capital. This enterprise, as well as the projects of creating a modem music school, the measures toward the regulation and control of the theatrical activity and the incentive to the national theatre, or the performance in that same year of the most prestigious French dramatic repertoire, are all part of the climate established by the Liberal Revolution in which sectors of the intelectual and political elite felt the need to reorganize and modernize the cultural life of the country. Even though this was not possible during this first brief Liberal experience, it is interesting to note that many of the central points of Lisbon's musical and theatrical life during the nineteenth century had all been lucidly individualized and stressed during this phase.