Phil. Trajetta and the American Conservatorio: Solfeggio, Thoroughbass, and Partimento in the Nineteenth-Century United States

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In 1799, Filippo Trajetta (1776-1854), son of the celebrated composer Tommaso Trajetta, left Naples for the United States of America. A pupil of Fedele Fenaroli and Niccolò Piccinni, Trajetta would spend the rest of his life cultivating Neapolitan musical traditions in the New World. He founded three successive schools of music, each called the American Conservatorio: in Boston (1800-1802), New York (c.1812-c.1820) and Philadelphia (1828-c.1850). While these institutions faded without establishing an enduring “American partimento tradition”, Trajetta’s influence nevertheless rippled across musical life: his pupils pursued careers as composers, organists, music journalists, and even the first conductor of the New York Philharmonic. Trajetta’s remarkable life and works shed new light on the dissemination of solfeggi and partimenti beyond Naples, and on the early development of American musical culture.


Sean Curtice is a Ph.D. candidate in the joint doctoral program of the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg and the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis. He holds an MA from the Schola (2016) and another from Northwestern University (2020). Other projects of his include ongoing participation in the Luigi Cherubini Forschungsprojekt of the HKB in Bern, the composition of a piano concerto in the style of Mozart, collaborations with Early Music Sources, and contributions to journals including Music Theory & Analysis, Notes, and Eighteenth-Century Music.