“I was born underground in Borgo Canale”: Donizetti’s birthplace
Located in the ancient street of Borgo Canale, Gaetano Donizetti’s birthplace was declared a National Monument on 28th January 1926, by Royal Decree No. 338. The building reveals the original social characteristics of the urban area, so very different from today’s, as crumbling and humid houses for families at the service of aristocratic and high-bourgeois buildings inside the walls. Donizetti’s parents lived there from their marriage in 1786 until...
Teatro cittadino: Donizetti al Donizetti
Nato su interesse di Bortolo Riccardi – produttore e commerciante di seta dal quale prese inizialmente il nome – il Teatro Donizetti sorge su un’area di Bergamo bassa destinata tradizionalmente alla fiera e ai commerci. Inaugurato nel 1791, è ricostruito in muratura dopo un incendio e riaperto nel 1801, quando la programmazione è affidata a Giovanni Simone Mayr. Donizetti vi fu accolto trionfalmente nel 1840, in occasione della rappresentazione della sua opera L’esule di...
The upper town theatre: the “Sociale” of the “Città alta”
The theatre “Teatro Sociale“, originally the “Teatro della Società”, is located at the heart of the “Città Alta“, or “Upper Town”. Designed by Leopoldo Pollock, it was inaugurated in 1809 with the intent to rival the “Teatro Riccardi” built in the “Lower Town”, now “Teatro Donizetti“. There, the young Gaetano Donizetti formed part of the chorus for performances by Giovanni Simone Mayr’s “Charitable...
The autograph of Lucia at the Angelo Mai library
The Angelo Mai Library and Donizetti by Marcello Eynard The Angelo Mai Civic Library is one of the richest and most frequented of Italy’s historical preservation libraries. It opened in the second half of the eighteenth century on the testamentary bequest of Cardinal Giuseppe Alessandro Furietti, and has since been owned and administered by the Municipality of Bergamo. Essentially dedicated and equipped for...
The Donizetti Museum
The Donizetti Museum is situated on the first floor of the ‘Domus Magna’, in Via Arena, 9. The figure of Gaetano Donizetti is presented to us through an exhibition of portraits, personal objects and autograph scores of the composer, following a thematic/chronological path of 5 stages: 1. The celebrations of 1897; 2. Studies in Bergamo and Bologna; 3. The burgeoning composer; 4. The career opera composer; 5. The man: in private and at work. The museum tour takes in multimedia...
The tombs of Donizetti and Mayr in the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore and the ‘charitable lessons’ classroom
The ‘MIA’ across centuries of culture and charity The Misericordia Maggiore, "Greater Mercy" or "MIA", as it has been historically abbreviated over the centuries and appears in several works of art in the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, was founded in Bergamo in 1265 as a spiritual and charitable association by two Dominicans, Bishop Erbordo and Blessed Pinamonte da Brembate, who dictated the original statute. The goal of the MIA was to help the poor, the sick, prisoners, and others in...
