Sonate a Violino, e Basso o Cembalo, di Carlo Zuccari di Casal Maggiore Dedicate al Merito Imparegiabile Dell' Illmo. Signor Conte Don Gioseff' Antonio Arconati Visconti Feudatario di Lomazzo, Rovelasca, Guanzate, Cirimedo, Fenegrò, ed Arconate, Confeudatario di Formigara, Cornaleto, e sue Pertinenze; de Sigri. Sessanta Decurioni Dell Eccma. Citta di Milano; Regio Ducal Luogo Tenente Del Vendo. Spedale Maggiore Gentiluomo di Camera di S.M.C.C.: e suo Consigliere nel Supremo Consiglio d'Italia. &.&.&. Parte Prima [-Seconda]. Opera Prima. [Op. 1]. [Score]

[Milano], 1747. Oblong folio. Contemporary full dark brown mottled calf with "Sonate" gilt within decorative rectangular gilt border and decorative gilt rules to edges to both boards, spine in decorative compartments gilt with black leather title label gilt, marbled endpapers.

1f. (recto title within elaborate engraved border, verso blank), 1f. (recto dedication, verso blank), i-v, [i] (blank), vi-x, [i] (blank), xi-xv [i] (blank), xvi-xx, [i] (blank), xxi-xxv [i] (blank), xxvi-xxxii, [i] (elaborate engraved title to "Parte Seconda" with floral motifs, fruit, and seashells), 30 pp. Engraved throughout.

The fine engraved title to the first part incorporates floral motifs, musical instruments, sculptural bust, palette, paintbrushes, and an open book of music, with coat of arms at head.

With "Io. M. Ripa sculp. Mediolano" printed to foot of first page of music.

Provenance
The Earl of Abingdon, with annotation in pencil to recto of front free endpaper, in all likelihood Willoughby Bertie, 4th Earl of Abingdon, Lord Norreys (1740-1799), English peer, music patron, and composer; Norreys was an associate of J.C. Bach and Carl Friedrich Abel, and a patron of Haydn; later noted musicologist and collector Geneviève Thibault Comtesse de Chambure (1902-1975), with her bookplate to front pastedown; "A.n" in contemporary manuscript to verso of front free endpaper.

Binding slightly worn, rubbed, bumped, and warped; free rear endpaper lacking. Minor internal wear.

A strong impression, in exceptionally good condition overall. First Edition. Rare. BUC p. 1103. RISM Z351 (two copies only in the U.S., at the Newberry Library, and the Library of Congress; the present copy, the only one recorded in France, was subsequently sold at a Paris auction of the collection of the Comtesse de Chambure).

Zuccari, an Italian violinist and composer "studied the violin first in his home town, later in Parma, Guastalla and Bologna, and finally in Cremona with Gasparo Visconti. Giuseppe Gonelli taught him counterpoint. In 1723 Zuccari arrived at Vienna in the suite of Count Pertusati. Having won favour at the imperial court, he travelled on to Olomouc, where he stayed for four years, and visited various German towns. In 1733 he married and in 1736 settled in Milan, where he founded a school. In 1741 he participated in the famous academy held at the Collegio dei Nobili under the direction of G.B. Sammartini, who was to call on his services as a violinist on several future occasions. During this period he acquired the nickname Zuccherino quoted in some contemporary sources. Around 1760 he was living in London, where he became a member of the Italian opera orchestra and had some violin compositions published, including his celebrated set of 12 adagios in dual plain and ornamented versions (The True Method of Playing an Adagio). He had returned to Italy by 1765, when he led an orchestra under Sammartini in an academy held at Cremona to mark the passage of the Archduke Leopold. Burney reports having heard him in Milan in 1770, noting that Zuccari was considered 'a good musician'. In 1778 he retired to Casalmaggiore." Michael Talbot in Grove Music Online

"One may point to his regular adoption of a three-movement cycle ..., the complexity of melodic elaboration and the exclusion of the bass from the thematic discourse; but despite there 'modern' features his basic harmonic and contrapuntal language departs little from that of Corelli's disciples. In fact, the easy mastery of conventional forms processed by his contemporaries is supplemented by a similar mastery of contrapuntal procedures associated with earlier generations. A movement such as the fugue in the second solo sonata, where two (occasionally even three) instruments are simulated by means of multiple stopping on the single violin, is a remarkable demonstration of the improvements which a more methodical approach could bring to a well-established species of composition cultivated in Italy from Corelli's time." Michael Talbot in The New Grove 2 Vol. 27, p. 874.

A highly attractive copy of a very rare publication, elegantly engraved.