Cimarosa, Domenico (1749–1801)

Italian composer. He wrote more than 60 operas, including the witty Il matrimonio segreto/The Secret Marriage (1792). He also wrote orchestral and keyboard music.

He studied at Naples, where his masters included Antonio Sacchini and Niccolò Piccinni, and produced his first opera there in 1772. Later he lived by turns in Rome and Naples, became famous with several operas, travelled much, and in 1787 went to the court of Catherine II in St Petersburg, Russia. In 1791 the emperor Leopold II invited him to Vienna to succeed Antonio Salieri as court Kapellmeister. There he produced his most successful opera, Il matrimonio segreto, based on The Clandestine Marriage by George Colman and David Garrick; it was encored in its entirety at its premiere. His engagement in Vienna ended the same year, when, on the death of Leopold, Salieri was reappointed. Cimarosa returned to Naples, where he became maestro di cappella to the king. He was imprisoned because of his involvement in the Neapolitan rising of 1799. On his release he set out for St Petersburg, but died in Venice on the way, allegedly by poison.

Works Opera over 60 operas, including Le stravaganze del conte, L'Italiana in Londra (1779), Il pittore parigino, La ballerina amante (1782), L'Olimpiade, Artaserse (1784), L'impresario in augustie, Cleopatra (1789), Idalide, Il matrimonio segreto (1792), Le astuzie femminili (1794), Il marito disperato, L'impegno superato, Gli Orazi ed i Curiazi, Penelope (1795), Achille all' assedio di Troia.

Other Masses, oratorios, cantatas.