Adamo Marcori

Adamo Marcori was an Italian composer born in Arezzo in 1763 who died in Montenero, near Livorno, in April 1808. His career belongs to the musical life of Tuscany and Naples at the end of the eighteenth century, and he is of interest chiefly for his work as chapel master and for a body of music that is largely sacred in character.

His career began with the opera buffa La dispettosa in amore, to a libretto by Giuseppe Palomba, which was premiered at the Teatro dei Fiorentini in Naples in the autumn of 1791. By 1796 he was already serving as chapel master at the church of Santa Maria della Pieve in Arezzo. According to Masseangeli, a source the reference describes as unreliable, he had been elected to that post in March 1786, a detail that should be treated with caution. In December 1799 he was appointed chapel master of the cathedral of Pisa, where he remained until his death.

According to the obituary published in the Magasin encyclopédique, his works were distinguished by a natural and expressive beauty, although they were criticised for a disregard of the rules of harmony. The archive of the Pisa cathedral once preserved a substantial corpus of his music, including masses, motets, psalms and a Te Deum, among other pieces. Today little remains beyond an introit and a tract for four voices with instruments, while the five autograph antiphons are preserved in the Masseangeli collection.