Anselmo Berti
| Anselmo Berti | |
|---|---|
| Born | Menton, Monaco until 1848, France since 1861 |
| 💀Died | New York City, USA |
| 💼 Occupation | |
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Anselmo Berti (1780 – April 12, 1852) was an American opera singer, educator, piano and classical music teacher. Born in 1783 in Menton and raised in a small community, Anselmo played in the musical band of Menton prior to becoming one of the first Italian singers in the United States.[1]
Historical Framework
Italian immigration to the US and its culture arrived relatively late: the Doggett's New York City Directory for 1850-1851 [2] shows that of the total 80,290 names in the Directory only 226 were identified with reasonable certainty as Italian [3]: one of these is Anselmo Berti [4]. Between 1820 and 1830, according to the statistical analysis of the Census Population of the United States in 1860, only 389 Italians arrived in the whole US country [5]. Many of the Italians during this period were driven to the US by the political disturbance that "accompanied the efforts of Italian patriots to achieve national independence and liberty" [6]. In this context, classical music singers and composers 'gave musical expression to Italian nationalist aspirations' [7].
Life
Anselmo Berti was a pioneer of Italian music in New York.[8] (according to the American music literature he was the 5th Italian music teacher to teach in North America, after Mrs Mazzanti in 1774)[9]. Anselmo Berti highly contributed to disseminating Italian opera, culture and music in the United States. According to the literature of the period and newspapers of the time he was a "noted singing master" [10]. At that time, professional singers of classical music were soloists in churches and auditoriums, and Anselmo Berti was noted for his performances at Saint Esprit church and the Park Theatre [11].
Although born in Menton [12], at that time part of the Principality of Monaco, he considered himself “born in Italy” [13][14]: his house was a meeting point of Italian exiles in New York (Antonio Meucci, Giuseppe Avezzana, Lorenzo Da Ponte, Giuseppe Garibaldi) and a place where young representatives of wealthy bourgeois families of New York were introduced to Italian opera and bel canto.
Anselmo was initially known in America as a guitarist and a singer. He was a leading guitar virtuoso of the early 19th century [15].
However, towards the end of his career as a singer, he began to teach music, giving lessons on the piano and guitar: in 1833 Anselmo published an advertisement in the newspaper New York Evening Post to promote himself as a professor "singing in the best Italian style" [16].
From 1821 Anselmo lived in New York [17], and moved to Washington in the 1820s before returning to New York at the beginning of the 1830s [18][19][20]. In New York he was also noted as a classical music tenor at the French Church of Saint Esprit, with an annual salary of 150 dollars [21]. Became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1824 [22][23]. He made his residence for many years in Lower Manhattan (102 Leonard street, New York City) [24].
In 1832, Anselmo Berti married Mary Dessac, a teacher, from Baltimore, Maryland, descending from English and French families. He had two sons, Candido Berti who was also known in New York in the 1860s as a pianist and Olimpia, who was a music teacher. Anselmo participated fully in the cultural life of New York, gaining popularity and respect [25]. Anselmo committed suicide in 1852 in New York with an overdose of laudanum [26], when at work at Curtis Institute of Music [27][28][29]
References
- ↑ In the world of Music, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.2050-411X.2000.tb00285.x.
- ↑ Doggett's New York City Directory for 1850-1851, https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/823dd000-436c-0137-7a82-6fb4d18894ab
- ↑ It is not immediate to define a citizen as Italian since Italy became a nation-state belatedly on 17 March 1861, when most of the states of the peninsula were united under King Victor Emmanuel II of the House of Savoy, which ruled over Piedmont. Before Italian unity, several states with different cultures, traditions, languages and dialects existed in this part of South Europe.
- ↑ Italians in New York during the first half of the nineteenth century, https://www.jstor.org/stable/23149683
- ↑ Census Population of the United States in 1860
- ↑ Italians in New York during the first half of the nineteenth century, https://www.jstor.org/stable/23149683
- ↑ Gossett, P. (1990). Becoming a citizen: The chorus in Risorgimento opera. Cambridge Opera Journal, 2(1), 41-64
- ↑ The New-York Book of Prices for Manufacturing Piano-fortes, Society of Journeymen Piano-forte Makers.
- ↑ In the world of Music, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.2050-411X.2000.tb00285.x.
- ↑ Appletons' Annual Cyclopædia and Register of Important Events of the Year 1892, https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Appletons_Annual_Cyclopaedia_and_Registe/k3RQAQAAMAAJ?hl=it&gbpv=0
- ↑ G. Odell, Annals of the New York Stage
- ↑ Mentonasc is the dialect historically spoken in and around Menton, France. It is classified as a dialect of Occitan, with some influence from the neighbouring Ligurian dialect. Italian was, for centuries, an official language in the territory of the Principality of Monaco. In 1848, the people of Menton seceded from Monaco, and proclaimed themselves a "free city" during the 1848 revolutions related to the Italian Risorgimento.
- ↑ US Census, 1840.
- ↑ US Census, 1850.
- ↑ Annals of the New York Stage: 1821-1834, George Clinton Densmore Odell · 1970.
- ↑ New York Evening Post, Sept. 10, 1833.
- ↑ Longworth's American Almanac, New York Register, and City Directory, 1822.
- ↑ The Huegonot Church of New York, https://www.seekingmyroots.com/members/files/H007266.pdf.
- ↑ Longworth's American Almanac, New York Register, and City Directory, T. Longworth & Son, 1822.
- ↑ United States City and Business Directories, ca. 1749 - ca. 1990.
- ↑ The Huegonot Church of New York, https://www.seekingmyroots.com/members/files/H007266.pdf.
- ↑ US Passport applications, 1795-1925.
- ↑ New York, Southern District Index to Petitions for Naturalization, 1824-1941, database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XGVH-PNT : 9 September 2021), Anseleno F Berti, 1824-1941.
- ↑ United States City and Business Directories, ca. 1749 - ca. 1990", database.
- ↑ The Collection of American Silhouette Portraits Cut, August Edouart, 1913.
- ↑ Greenwood Cemetery, New York, Certificate of Death, New York, 1852.
- ↑ Four Centuries of Italian-American History - Giovanni Ermenegildo Schiavo, 1952.
- ↑ FamilySearch, Free Family Trees and Genealogy Archiveshttps://familysearch.org.
- ↑ Death records, New York, 1795-1952.
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