Cardiff University Chamber Choir

Peter Leech director

Late eighteenth-century Rome was a vibrant, cosmopolitan city where hundreds of highly-trained musicians jostled for musical posts in the city’s numerous churches, and where patronage was determined by influential cardinals forever seeking favour with Rome’s most powerful employer, the Pope. By a decree of 1716, Pope Clement XI had ordered that anyone practicing music in Rome must be a member of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia and pass its entrance exam. In 1774 the Roman musician Maria Rosa Coccia (1759-1833), a pupil of Sante Pesci, passed the exam and was the first woman to become a maestra di cappella of Rome, but her gender never allowed her to gain a post. Nevertheless, she composed a wide variety of works ranging from instrumental solos to oratorios, cantatas and church music.

Programme to include:

Maria Rosa Coccia: Dixit Dominus, Magnificat, Veni creator spiritus

Sebastiano Bolis: Cinque Assoluzzione (first complete performance)

Sante Pesci: Christus natus est nobis

Booking

£10, £8, students and under 18s free entry

The venue

Llandaff Cathedral
Llandaff
Cardiff
CF5 2LA