Scarlatti was a prolific composer. He wrote one hundred and fifteen operas and two hundred masses, besides oratorios, cantatas and other works.
He is of importance to the Orchestra because of the new way he wrote for the instruments. He made the accompaniment of vocal recitative of new importance and gave the Orchestra a great part to do throughout the entire opera. The strings formed the groundwork of his Orchestra; and he also used oboes, flutes, bassoons, trumpets, drums and horns (the latter an innovation).
CONCERT BY SCARLATTI, TARTINI, MARTINI, LOCATELLI, AND LANZETTI
Scarlatti was the creator of modern opera, and the “Father of Classical Music,” the forerunner of Gluck, Mozart and Haydn and many others. Dr. Burney put the debt that great composers owe to Scarlatti concisely when he said: “I find part of Scarlatti’s property among the stolen goods of all the best composers of the first forty years of the present century.”
With regard to his treatment of the violoncello, Dr. Burney says:
“The violoncello parts of many of his cantatas were so excellent that whoever was able to do them justice was thought a supernatural being. Geminiani used to relate that Francischello, a celebrated performer on the violoncello at the beginning of this century, accompanied one of these cantatas at Rome so admirably, while Scarlatti was at the harpsichord, that the company, being good Catholics and living in a country where miraculous powers have not yet ceased, were firmly persuaded it was not Francischello who had played the violoncello, but an angel that had descended and assumed his shape.”
Scarlatti also divided his strings into four parts and carefully balanced with them the wind instruments that he used; but the strings were the most important and stood out in relief against the wind; or, if we prefer to think of the matter another way, the wind was subordinate to the strings.
Very little is known regarding his private life.