Biography
Stefano Landi produced works across an array of vocal forms, among them madrigals, multiple volumes of arias, motets, and compositions adhering to the restrained Roman manner. The operas he created, however, proved most consequential in shaping the Roman operatic idiom. Landi pursued studies at the Collegio Germanico as well as the Seminario Romano, where instruction from Gazzari became available to him. In 1618 he assumed the post of master of the chapel to the Bishop of Padua and, while occupying that position, completed his initial opera, La morte d’Orfeo. Returning to Rome by 1620, he remained there for the remainder of his career, holding posts at several churches and serving both the Borghese and Barberini households. For the Barberini family he wrote the sacred opera Sant’ Alessio in 1631 or 1632, a work that stands as a landmark for three reasons: it was the first opera to draw on a historical subject, the first to center on a saint, and the first to explore a character’s inner life. The score itself reveals Landi’s artistic significance through its stylistic variety, incorporating instrumental sinfonias, comic roles, choral passages, dances, and recitatives together with ensemble numbers charged with pathos.