Giuseppe Tartini - Lettere e documenti / Pisma in dokumenti / Letters and Documents - Volume / Knjiga / Volume I

82 Inserted in the voluminous Zibaldone musicale di memorie, documenti, estratti di ope- re stampate e manoscritte, lettere, autografi, ecc., in gran parte per servir di materiali alla storia, alla biografia, e alla bibliografia della musica 78 compiled by Gaspari, we find in- stead a copy of a letter from Tartini to Ferdinando degli Obizzi, dated 18 January 1744, not present in the Martini collection. This letter probably arrived in Gaspari’s hands through his friend Angelo Catelani, 79 who in a letter dated 21 April 1851 states that he has received from Davide Campori some letters from Jommelli, one from Tartini, and others found “among the Obizzi papers, inherited from the Estensi”. 80 2. The relationship with G.B. Martini 2.1 The early years: conjectures on their meeting Giovanni Battista Martini was born in Bologna on 24 April 1706, not far from the basil- ica of San Francesco where he assumed the role of maestro di cappella in 1725, at the age of just nineteen. His father, Anton Maria, who played the violin and cello, had given his children music lessons from early childhood, launching Giovanni Battista and the first- born Giuseppe on an early musical career. His schooling included the study of grammar and arithmetic in depth; in 1721, at fifteen, he decided to commit to a religious life, ap- plying to the Friars Minor Conventual of Saint Francis to be admitted to the figliuolan- za of the convent, the first step towards priesthood. After just eight months he donned the religious habit and undertook his novitiate in Lugo, where he took his vows before returning permanently to Bologna, a city he would seldom leave thereafter. 81 On Tartini’s first Paduan years and on his following journeys we have a fair amount of information: his brief university experience in Padua, his marriage, his escape to Assisi, his employment in the Marche region and his return to the Venetian territories. 82 In 1721 he was appointed “first violin and capo di concerto ” of the orchestra of the basil- ica of S. Antonio in Padua. The documentary sources known to date fail to provide any evidence of an encounter between Martini and Tartini, so their relationship is essential- ly proven by the letters. The first epistolary exchange dates to 10 December 1730 and introduces the key topic of the correspondence, that is to say, the matters of music theory connected with 78 Gaspari, Miscellanea musicale. 79 Composer and music scholar from Emilia. See Bruno Cagli, “Catelani, Angelo”, in Ng. 80 I-Bc, Ep. Gaspari-Catelani. 81 Busi, 1891: pp. 1-15. 82 See Petrobelli, 1968: pp. 147-149.