Stabat Mater (Scarlatti)

Stabat Mater by Alessandro Scarlatti is a religious musical work composed for two voices (soprano/alto), two violins and basso continuo, in 1724, on a commission from the Order of Friars Minor, the "Knights of the Virgin of Sorrows" of the Church of San Luigi in Naples[1] for Lent The text, the Stabat Mater sequence, is a 13th-century liturgical text meditating on the suffering of Mary, mother of Christ.

Considered outdated by those who had ordered it, Scarlatti's work was replaced in 1736 by the famous Stabat Mater by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi.

Scarlatti set the Stabat Mater three times.

The Stabat Mater consists of eighteen pieces that can be grouped into four parts, starting and ending with a duet.

Scarlatti's late composition impresses by its extraordinary musical richness, variety of forms, chromatic freedom and flexibility of expression.

The "Deposizione", mid-15th century, by Napolitan Colantonio (Naples, Museo di Capodimonte ).
First page of the Stabat Mater in a copy from the 18th century, kept in Florence at the Conservatorio Luigi Cherubini