SPONTINI (Gaspare Luigi Pacifico). Three Romances with Piano - Lot 35

SPONTINI (Gaspare Luigi Pacifico). Three Romances with Piano or Harp Accompaniment. Paris, chez Melles Erard [pl. 598, 1805 or 1806]. In-folio, long-grained red morocco, cover boards decorated in the margins with gilt friezes, green silk endpapers (period binding). Title and 7 pp. Superb present copy, which according to the title page, repeated in gilt lettering on the first board, consists of "Trois Romances dédiées à Mademoiselle Zillia Mariette Auriol par Gaspard Spontini". According to Montauban registers, David Joseph Mariette Auriol, a miller, married Anne Senilh in 1788. Their children were Zillia (1789) and Pierre Daniel Mariette (1790). As far as Spontini was concerned, his activity seems to have been unceasing from the moment he arrived in Paris; in 1804, he took an interest in the "French style" and placed several opéras-comiques at the Théâtre Feydeau, without neglecting to frequent the best salons: there he met Madame de Staël and particularly Joséphine de Beauharnais, who appointed him "Compositeur de la chambre de Sa Majesté L'Impératrice" in 1805. The following year, after composing his "Trois Romances", he also provided a brilliant Cantata dedicated to Emperor Napoleon I. Very elegant contemporary binding, with minor stains on the front cover.