Leo, Leonardo (Lionardo Oronzo Salvatore de) (1694–1744)

Italian composer. His comic operas (often in Neapolitan dialect) were ranked with those of Giovanni Pergolesi and had a great influence on later Italian masters of the genre. He also wrote much church music. Niccolò Piccinni and Niccolò Jommelli were among his pupils.

He was a pupil of Francesco Provenzale and Nicola Fago at the Conservatorio della Pietà dei Turchini, Naples, 1709–13, where his first oratorio was performed in 1712. Appointed supernumerary organist to the court at Naples in 1713, he rose to become maestro di cappella just before his death. He taught at the Conservatorio della Pietà from 1715 (appointed primo maestro in 1741) and the Conservatorio S Onofrio from 1725 (appointed primo maestro in 1739).

Works Opera Sofonisba (1718), Lucio Papirio, Caio Gracco (1720), La 'mpeca scoperta (in Neapolitan dialect, 1723), Timocrate, Il trionfo di Camilla, La semmeglianza di chi l'ha fatta, Il Cid, Catone in Utica (1729), La clemenza di Tito (1735), Demofoonte, Farnace (1736), Siface, Ciro riconosciuto, L'amico traditore, La simpatia del sangue, L'Olimpiade (1737), Vologeso, Amor vuol sofferenza (La finta Frascatana, 1739), Achille in Sciro (1740), Scipione nelle Spagne (1740), Il fantastico (Il nuovo Don Chisciotte, after Cervantes, 1743), and about 40 others.

Other oratorios Il trionfo della castità di S Alessio (1713), Dalla morte alla vita (1722), La morte di Abele, S Elena al Calvario (1734), S Francesco di Paolo nel deserto, and others; Masses, motets, psalms, and other church music; concerto for four violins, six cello concertos; harpsichord pieces.