On 25 January 2015 the final concert of the Resonance Early Music Festival was performed before an enthusiastic audience in the Vienna Konzerthaus. As a fitting close to the series Alessandro Quarta conducted the Concerto Romano and five singers representing the four seasons and Jove in a stunning performance of Alessandro Scarlatti's 1716 serenata La Gloria di Primavera (‘Nato è già l’austricao sole’). First heard at Naples in celebration of the birth of the Habsburg Archduke Leopold, it was performed on the evening of 19 May 1716, in the palace of Don Nicola Gaetano d’Aragona according to the libretto printed by Michele-Luigi Muzio at Naples in 1716. The Gazzetta di Napoli, however, contradicts the libretto, reporting three performances at Naples, on 20, 21 and 23 May, presumably to accommodate the crush of aristocrats determined to witness the serenata:

Nicolò Giuvo (before 1708–1748), the poet who composed the cantata text, is named on the title page of Muzio's libretto (reproduced in Roberto Pagano, Alessandro Scarlatti (Turin: Edizioni Rai Radiotelevisione Italiana, 1972), opposite page 321), where he is identified as a member of the Arcadian Society (detto trà pastori di Arcadia EUPIDO). The original singers, composer and designer responsible for this conspicuous festa are named on page 3 of the libretto:

These were indeed some of the most distinguished voices at Naples in 1716, followed with consummate skill at Vienna this year by Salvo Vitale (bass, Giove), Lucia Napoli (mezzosoprano, Primavera), Francesca Aspromonte (soprano, Estate), Hillary Summers (alto, Autunno) and Luca Cervoni (tenor, Inverno).

The Neapolitan libretto included an oversized engraving (also reproduced in Pagano, Alessandro Scarlatti) by Giuseppe Maliar of the scena designed by Cristoforo Scor for the original performance. Like many serenatas, La Gloria di Primavera consists of a dispute concerning precedence among allegorical or mythological characters – in this case, which of the four seasons deserves the most praise or glory for its part in the birth of the much-desired Austrian Archduke. At the end of part one of the serenata the four seasons unite in a chorus invoking the presence of Jove to decide their dispute. After the pause and refreshments, early in part two Jove makes his appearance to render judgment, descending from on high on a cloud or macchina, as shown in Maliar's engraving. Thankfully, nothing like this was attempted in the splendid Vienna Konzerthaus, where the serenata was performed in the manner of an oratorio, without scenery or costumes.

In older work lists for Scarlatti a Viennese performance of the serenata is listed for 1716. There is, however, no real evidence for this. Several manuscript scores in the Austrian National Library and in the Bavarian State Library were prepared for the Viennese early-music enthusiast Raphael Georg Kiesewetter, who had the serenata performed at his house concerts on 26 December 1825 and in November 1828. For the 1828 performance it seems Kiesewetter had Scarlatti's orchestration modernized, somewhat in the manner of Mozart's reorchestration of Handel, with the addition of clarinets. Curiously, La Gloria di Primavera was given in London in 1721, as proved by a libretto published there by Thomas Wood, and by several published notices recounting a performance in the King's Theatre in the Haymarket. Margherita Durestanti, one of the original singers from Naples, appeared in the London performance, which in all likelihood was organized by Alessandro's brother Francesco as a commercial venture. There is, of course, no evidence that Alessandro ever visited Britain. (All the sources for this serenata are described in Thomas Griffin, ‘The Late Baroque Serenata in Rome and Naples: A Documentary Study with Emphasis on Alessandro Scarlatti’ (PhD dissertation, University of California Los Angeles, 1983), 691–699 and 802–805.)

As would be expected of an Arcadian poet, Giuvo's text is filled with pastoral imagery (murmuring fountains, whispering breezes, meadows full of flowers). The final ensemble, in fact, is little more than a parody of the final chorus from Act 1 of Torquato Tasso's Aminta. But Giuvo's text also contains many striking conceits and surprising metaphors, and offers a convoluted baroque syntax more akin to the Gongorism of an earlier era than to the expected pastoral constraints of the early eighteenth century. Since Giuvo and Scarlatti are remembered primarily for their contributions to the operatic tradition of the era, it comes as no surprise to find a number of commonplace textual images as well as musical topoi characteristic of late baroque opera and oratorio in this serenata. Spring's aria 13 provides a characteristic example: ‘Solca il mar scioglie le vele / se mai posa il vento, e l’onda / e la sponda / lascia il provido nocchier.’ (Plough through the sea, let billow / the sails. If ever the wind, / waves and tide are against you, / leave it to the cautious helmsman.) Scarlatti responds well to the pastoral imagery as well as to the unapologetic baroque exuberance of this poetry. All twenty of the solo arias, the one duet and two of the seven ensemble pieces (called choruses) of the serenata consist of da capo structures. Often they begin with melodic phrases of odd length that are rarely answered in a symmetrically balanced way. Yet the music achieves coherence thanks to Scarlatti's contrapuntal discipline and keen sense of harmonic progression. Scarlatti invariably derives cogent musical ideas from the poetic texts, sometimes of surprising wit, as in Summer's aria 5, where the Austrian artillery fire upon the Turks in the B section with repeated notes in the lower strings.

As Edward Dent recognized long ago, Scarlatti's handling of instruments is most interesting in his arias. In the set pieces of La Gloria di Primavera the composer combines strings, flute, oboes, bassoons and trumpets in an exceptionally diverse array of concertini and concerti grossi. Some of these combinations resemble the practice of Scarlatti's younger contemporaries, but his essentially conservative stance is more often in evidence in the contrapuntal differentiation that the composer enforces between the singing voice and the accompanying instruments – for example, between the ‘concerto grosso d’oboe e fagotti’, strings and voices of chorus 11, or the contrast of the ‘concerto di due oboe’ and Jove's voice in aria 26. The twenty-eight recitatives of the serenata are generally more florid and shapely than those found in a typical opera of the era. Six particularly affecting recitatives are set accompanied by strings.

Alessandro Quarta produced his own edition of the serenata for the Viennese performance. A modern edition of the serenata, along with an English translation of the text, by this writer can be found at <www.ascarlatti2010.net/main_page/primavera>. It is based on the three earliest manuscript scores from Scarlatti's era in the Naples Conservatory Library. At the Viennese performance conducted by Quarta, timpani, not found in the early sources, were employed to spectacular effect at suitably glorious moments. The earliest scores of the serenata call for a flauto, usually thought to mean a recorder. At the recent Viennese performance a baroque transverse flute was heard instead, to stunning effect. Quarta deserves particular praise for his judicious tempos, suitably allegro to maintain the happy spirit of this festive serenata, but not so rushed as many young conductors today seem to think necessary.

Sadly it must be reported that the Archduke Leopold, celebrated at his birth by La Gloria di Primavera, lived only a few months. Had he lived, Europe might have been spared several wars the Habsburgs were required to fight in order to secure the imperial succession for his sister Maria Theresa. While Leopold is barely a footnote to history, and the Habsburg Empire is long gone, the enthusiasm of the Viennese audience for Scarlatti's music confirms the original order of the old adage vita brevis ars lunga.