Le sacre stimmate di San Francesco d'Assisi Maria Anna von Raschenau (c1650–1714), ed. Janet K. Page Middleton, WI: A-R Editions, 2019 pp. xxxviii + six plates + 92, ISBN 978 1 987 20255 7

Abstract

Studies of musical life in cloistered women’s communities are often hindered by the lack of documentary and musical sources or by difficulties in accessing archives. Still elusive, to some extent, is the richness of the life conducted within the walls of institutions that were formally closed to the outside world but were, as a matter of fact, promoters of significant artistic and musical activities. Convents were not only places designated by the nobility to accommodate young women, but also symbols of political prestige and cultural centres for artistic patronage and musical practice. Recently, musicology has been shedding light on the musical activities of the nunneries of the modern age, thanks above all to the contribution of scholars like Robert Kendrick, Craig Monson and Colleen Reardon, who have demonstrated the musical vitality of some of these institutions. In fact, in various European contexts, music was often a point of contact between the cloistered community and city life: religious houses flaunted their power and prestige by organizing solemn celebrations with professional singers and instrumentalists, thus becoming producers and patrons of sacred music. The studies of Janet K. Page add a significant element to the investigation of convent music in Austria. Page has rediscovered the close relationship between the Habsburg court and Viennese religious institutions, revealing the political and cultural value of this type of environment. The Augustinian convent of St Jakob auf der Hülben in Vienna was certainly one of the most interesting examples: visitor reports from the mid-seventeenth century describe female musicians as the protagonists of musical performances that took place there. The musical practices of these nuns did not consist simply in accompanying the liturgy, but also included theatrical performances, oratorios and sacred genres. The oratorio Le sacre stimmate di San Francesco d’Assisi was composed in 1695 by the canoness Maria Anna von Raschenau, and it represents today the most complete example of this sort of production. As Page explains in the detailed Introduction, Maria Anna von Raschenau arrived in the convent of St Jakob around 1672 as a novice, but her musical activity began earlier in the Viennese imperial court, where her father, Johann Rasch von Raschenau, was employed. It is worth noting that the imperial court itself provided Maria Anna with a ‘scholar’s stipend’, allowing her to receive adequate musical training in singing, composing and playing instruments such as keyboards, violin, viola da gamba and transverse flute. Between 1694 and 1709, at St Jakob, Raschenau composed seven major musical works dedicated to the Emperor Leopold I. Le sacre stimmate was performed in 1695 on 25 July, during the feast of St James, the patron saint of the convent. However, the only surviving manuscript of this oratorio is a version that was probably written by a court copyist, since, as Page explains, Leopold I loved to follow the music during the performances. Therefore, since it is not a copy intended for musical realization, it is not surprising that it contains some errors and omissions. Furthermore, the score, now