Biography
Luigi Denza entered the world close to Naples and received his musical training at the Naples Conservatory under Saverio Mercadante (1795-1870) together with that composer’s pupil Paolo Serrao. His opera “Wallenstein” brought him modest local acclaim when it appeared in Naples during 1876.
The 1884 opera season took him to London, where the musical environment proved so congenial that he relocated there for good three years later. Sharing the path of his fellow Italian Giorgio Tosti, he remained based in the British capital while turning out abundant songs and ballads in the Italian style, frequently employing Neapolitan dialect. He served as a director of the London Academy of Music and, in 1898, received the post of Professor of Singing at the Royal Academy of Music.
Singers took readily to his pieces, many of which still appear on lighter programs, among them “Oct di fatter” (Fateful Eyes), “Se …” (If …), “Torn!” (Return!), and “Vein!” (Come!).
Far and away his most celebrated work remains “Funiculi-funicula.” This buoyant tarantella-rhythm dance song was composed for the inauguration of Naples’s new funicular line that carries visitors to the summit of Mount Vesuvius. It has since become a stereotypical emblem of southern Italy and is routinely assumed to be a folk melody. Under that mistaken impression the young prodigy Richard Strauss incorporated the tune into the finale of his “Aus Italian,” only to feel acute embarrassment upon learning he had borrowed a copyrighted piece by a living composer. Alfredo Casella likewise drew on the melody for the orchestral rhapsody “Italia,” as did Rimsky-Korsakov. Casella was made a Chevalier of the Order of Italy in 1898.
The 1884 opera season took him to London, where the musical environment proved so congenial that he relocated there for good three years later. Sharing the path of his fellow Italian Giorgio Tosti, he remained based in the British capital while turning out abundant songs and ballads in the Italian style, frequently employing Neapolitan dialect. He served as a director of the London Academy of Music and, in 1898, received the post of Professor of Singing at the Royal Academy of Music.
Singers took readily to his pieces, many of which still appear on lighter programs, among them “Oct di fatter” (Fateful Eyes), “Se …” (If …), “Torn!” (Return!), and “Vein!” (Come!).
Far and away his most celebrated work remains “Funiculi-funicula.” This buoyant tarantella-rhythm dance song was composed for the inauguration of Naples’s new funicular line that carries visitors to the summit of Mount Vesuvius. It has since become a stereotypical emblem of southern Italy and is routinely assumed to be a folk melody. Under that mistaken impression the young prodigy Richard Strauss incorporated the tune into the finale of his “Aus Italian,” only to feel acute embarrassment upon learning he had borrowed a copyrighted piece by a living composer. Alfredo Casella likewise drew on the melody for the orchestral rhapsody “Italia,” as did Rimsky-Korsakov. Casella was made a Chevalier of the Order of Italy in 1898.