collaboration, seduction and music (are you surprised Mozart is involved?)

This morning while surfing the NPR website, I discovered a review/commentary on a new book about one of Mozart's collaborators.

Lorenzo da Ponte led a life to rival any of the characters he (librettist--that's opera-language for "person who writes the words") and Mozart (composer) set into music. A Jewish-born Catholic priest who slept around like his pal Casanova, wrote seditious poetry, and left at least two countries just ahead of the law, da Ponte lived into his nineties, ending up at Columbia University as the founder of Italian literature education in the US. Needless to say, he and Mozart got along very well.

Here's more information--and, of course, music links...


And a belated happy 250th birthday to Mozart! (We're celebrating all year, of course...)