Biography
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Born
23 May 1741
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Born In
Motta di Livenza, Treviso, Veneto, Italy
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Died
21 March 1801 (aged 59)
Andrea Luca Luchesi (May 23, 1741 - March 21, 1801), was an Italian composer.
Andrea Luchesi was born at Motta di Livenza, the eleventh child of Pietro Luchese and Caterina Gottardi. The rather wealthy family descended from groups of noble families, who moved from Lucca to Venice in the 14th century (hence the name Luchese. From 1764/65 Andrea began to use the name Luchesi, which we can find written by his contemporaries also as Lucchesi, Lughesi, Luckesi, Lucchezzy, etc.). He grew up in his native town, receiving musical and general education from his elder brother Matteo, a priest, public tutor and organist.
At the age of 15 he moved to Venice. The protection of nobleman Jseppo Morosini enabled him to study with eminent musicians (Gioacchino Cocchi, Padre Paolucci, Giuseppe Saratelli, Domenico Gallo, Ferdinando Bertoni and the best-known of them Baldassare Galuppi). His career in Venice developed quickly: examiner of the organists commission in 1761, then organist at San Salvatore's (1764), composer of works for "organ or cembalo", instrumental, sacred and theatre music. He composed for official celebrations, the last one (1771) being the solemn funeral of the Duke of Montealegre, Spanish ambassador to Venice. As a famous virtuoso he was invited to play organ in and outside Venice, e.g. was in charge of inaugurating the new organ of the basilica of Saint Anthony in Padua.
His knowledge of musical theory was enhanced by the didactic and artistic relationship he had (until his departure from Venice) with two of the most advanced theorists of that time, Padre Francesco Antonio Vallotti (a Franciscan, encoder of the Theory of dissonance) and count Giordano Riccati (a mathematician, acoustics physicist, architect, author of an essay on the laws of counterpoint).
In the spring of 1765 his opera L'isola della fortuna was performed at the Hoftheater in Vienna.
While on tour in Italy in 1771, Leopold and Wolfgang Mozart met Andrea Luchesi and received one of his concertos for cembalo (Wolfgang was still playing the concerto in 1777, while Leopold and Nannerl used often the concerto for teaching and practising purposes).
At the end of 1771, he traveled to Bonn on a three-year contract, invited by the Prince Elector Archbishop of Cologne Maximilian Friederich who wished to raise the quality level of his court chapel. After the death of the previous Kapellmeister (Ludwig van Beethoven senior, i.e. the grandfather of Beethoven), Andrea Luchesi was nominated official court Kapellmeister in 1774.
He acquired the principality's citizenship and in 1775 married Anthonetta Josepha d'Anthoin, daughter of Maximilian Friederich's senior counselor. With the exception of a visit to Venice in 1783-84, he lived in Bonn until his death in 1801, although his role as Kapellmeister ended in 1794, when the French invasion troops suppressed the court.
The young Beethoven, at the court chapel from 1781 to 1792 as assistant organist, cembalo and viola player, was Luchesi's most talented (and famous) pupil, although Beethoven himself never acknowledged Luchesi as his teacher. When the court organist Christian Gottlob Neefe temporarily replaced the Kapellmeister as conductor and teacher during his 1783-84 absence, Luchesi assigned the organ service to the very young Beethoven. Antonin Reicha, Bernhard and Andreas Romberg, and Ferdinand Ries are other pupils who achieved minor renown.
Luchesi died at Bonn.
He had one daughter, who lived in Bonn till her death, and four sons. According to Neefe the first two sons (Maximilian Friederich, borb 1775-12-11, and M. Jakob Ferdinand, born 1777-12-18) were gifted musicians.
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