Torna A Surriento
Ernesto De Curtis
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Browse piano sheets by Ernesto De Curtis on Zen Virtual Piano. De Curtis was born in Naples on October 4, 1875, the fourth of seven children of the painter-decorator Giuseppe De Curtis and Elisabetta Minnon. His older brother Giambattista was a poet and painter, his younger brother Federico a flower painter, and through his mother he was a great-grandson of the composer Saverio Mercadante. He studied piano from the age of eight with Vincenzo Valente, a neighbor, then harmony with Daniele Napoletano, and finished his piano and composition studies at the San Pietro a Majella Conservatory. A great-grandfather who was a composer, beside a neighbor teaching piano, may suggest music reached him from more than one direction. Two brothers in the arts, a poet-painter and a flower painter, may suggest creative siblings alongside the father's trade. Treccani corrects accounts calling him self-taught, probably confused with his brother: he had regular studies and a piano diploma. After helping his father briefly, he formed a variety duo with a singer friend, himself at the piano, playing in Naples, Rome and Viareggio, where Puccini complimented the duo. His brother Giambattista, older and already famous, encouraged him to write songs, and the first he presented to the public was 'A primma vota in 1897, which came second in a competition, the jury calling it brilliant and charming but too refined for popularity. A brother who encouraged him and a duo praised by Puccini may suggest support from more than one direction early on. The year 1897 marks his rise in Neapolitan song, where in forty years as composer and accompanist he worked with the leading poet-musicians of what is considered the golden age, among them Bovio, Galdieri, Murolo, Bracco, Nicolardi and Di Giacomo, besides his brother. Amalia came out in 1902, on a text by Giambattista dedicated to Amalia Russo, whom Ernesto would later marry, and Torna a Surriento, again on a text by Giambattista, was composed that year and published by Bideri in 1904. A long list of poets he worked with suggests how widely connected he was in Neapolitan song. Treccani calls Voce 'e notte, composed in 1903 on an autobiographical text by Edoardo Nicolardi and published in 1904, a luminous point in Neapolitan song, a melodic nocturne balanced between heartache and cry. In 1923, while in New York and confined to bed after bruising a leg, he composed 'A canzona 'e ll'emigrante (Luntananza) on a poem by Ernesto Murolo, and he called the song the song of pain. He returned to Naples for good in 1934 and settled in a small house on the Vomero hill, where he kept composing though a long, incurable pleural illness kept him between bed and armchair. Songs set to texts by Nicolardi and Murolo may suggest he often worked from poets' words, as with his brother's texts. A song composed in New York while confined to bed, beside later years spent between bed and armchair, may suggest that confinement and composing went together more than once.
Browse piano sheets by Ernesto De Curtis on Zen Virtual Piano.
De Curtis was born in Naples on October 4, 1875, the fourth of seven children of the painter-decorator Giuseppe De Curtis and Elisabetta Minnon. His older brother Giambattista was a poet and painter, his younger brother Federico a flower painter, and through his mother he was a great-grandson of the composer Saverio Mercadante. He studied piano from the age of eight with Vincenzo Valente, a neighbor, then harmony with Daniele Napoletano, and finished his piano and composition studies at the San Pietro a Majella Conservatory. A great-grandfather who was a composer, beside a neighbor teaching piano, may suggest music reached him from more than one direction. Two brothers in the arts, a poet-painter and a flower painter, may suggest creative siblings alongside the father's trade.
Treccani corrects accounts calling him self-taught, probably confused with his brother: he had regular studies and a piano diploma. After helping his father briefly, he formed a variety duo with a singer friend, himself at the piano, playing in Naples, Rome and Viareggio, where Puccini complimented the duo. His brother Giambattista, older and already famous, encouraged him to write songs, and the first he presented to the public was 'A primma vota in 1897, which came second in a competition, the jury calling it brilliant and charming but too refined for popularity. A brother who encouraged him and a duo praised by Puccini may suggest support from more than one direction early on.
The year 1897 marks his rise in Neapolitan song, where in forty years as composer and accompanist he worked with the leading poet-musicians of what is considered the golden age, among them Bovio, Galdieri, Murolo, Bracco, Nicolardi and Di Giacomo, besides his brother. Amalia came out in 1902, on a text by Giambattista dedicated to Amalia Russo, whom Ernesto would later marry, and Torna a Surriento, again on a text by Giambattista, was composed that year and published by Bideri in 1904. A long list of poets he worked with suggests how widely connected he was in Neapolitan song.
Treccani calls Voce 'e notte, composed in 1903 on an autobiographical text by Edoardo Nicolardi and published in 1904, a luminous point in Neapolitan song, a melodic nocturne balanced between heartache and cry. In 1923, while in New York and confined to bed after bruising a leg, he composed 'A canzona 'e ll'emigrante (Luntananza) on a poem by Ernesto Murolo, and he called the song the song of pain. He returned to Naples for good in 1934 and settled in a small house on the Vomero hill, where he kept composing though a long, incurable pleural illness kept him between bed and armchair. Songs set to texts by Nicolardi and Murolo may suggest he often worked from poets' words, as with his brother's texts. A song composed in New York while confined to bed, beside later years spent between bed and armchair, may suggest that confinement and composing went together more than once.
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Ernesto De Curtis
Common questions
Ernesto De Curtis was a Neapolitan composer and pianist-accompanist, born in Naples in 1875, who wrote many Neapolitan songs.
It is a song he composed with a text by his brother Giambattista De Curtis, published by Bideri in 1904.
His older brother Giambattista, a poet and painter who was already famous, encouraged Ernesto to write songs.
He returned to Naples in 1934 and settled in a small house on the Vomero hill, where he kept composing despite a long illness.