Massimo Scapin, an Italian conductor of both opera and the symphonic repertoire, composer, and pianist, holds degrees in piano and choral conducting from the State Conservatory of Music in Perugia, in orchestral conducting and composition from the National College of Music in London, and in religious science (magna cum laude) from the Pontifical Lateran University. Massimo appeared as guest conductor and pianist in Europe, Japan, Kazakhstan, Korea, and the United States. He was also a Vatican Radio commentator and entertainer. He currently serves as Director of Liturgical Music at St. John Cantius Church in Chicago.
Author: Massimo Scapin
The Musician Pope Who Excommunicated Luther
Five hundred years ago, on the night of December 1, 1521, a few days before his forty-sixth birthday, a great pope of the so-called Renaissance died: Leo X, whose original name was Giovanni de’ Medici. The second son of Lorenzo …
Glorious Music for Our Glorious Co-Redemptrix
It is necessary “to snatch the Rosaries from the hands of the old ladies!” How can we forget this declaration from Cardinal Michele Pellegrino (1903-1986), Archbishop of Turin between 1965 and 1977, to his clergy and often heard during the …
The Great Monument of Palestrina
One hundred years ago today, the city of Palestrina inaugurated the monument dedicated to the greatest son of this ancient town located 23 miles east-southeast of Rome, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, the “Prince of Music” born here in 1525. It …
Bellarmine the Musician
Editor’s note: please see Mediatrix Press for The Bellarmine Translation Project. Today four centuries have passed since the death, at almost 79 years of age, of St. Robert Bellarmine. A memorial tablet on his birthplace praises him as “the glory …
The Literary Summa of Christian Civilization and its Music
It is the seventh century since, at the age of 56, on the night of the 13th of September 1321, the brightest star of Italian literature died in his exile at Ravenna: Dante Alighieri. The father of the Italian language …
The Glory of St. Dominic
This year marks a special year dedicated to the “Preacher of Grace,” which began with the Epiphany 2021 and will end on January 6, 2022. It marks eight centuries from the dies natalis, the day of heavenly birth of Saint …
The Prince of Musicians
They called him princeps musicorum, prince of musicians, and 500 years ago tomorrow, on August 27, 1521, he passed away in Condé-sur-l’Escaut, nowadays Northern France, where the last seventeen years of his life he was provost of the collegiate of …
The First Major Recording Star was a Catholic
One hundred years ago, at the age of forty-eight, the tenor par excellence died in Naples: Enrico Caruso. He was born on February 27, 1873, in a large family and he enjoyed singing from childhood. Thanks to the Rev. Giuseppe …
St. Joan of Arc
590 years ago, on May 30, 1431, a young French saint died at the age of 19, The Maid of Orleans, that is, virgin, as she is called by all and Friedrich Schiller in his homonyms drama of 1801: Joan …
Napoleon, Europe, and Haydn’s “Mass in Time of Affliction”
Two hundred years ago, “by the tidings, in amaze / the earth is held, and with her gaze / the parting hour doth mutely scan / of this great spirit,” as we read in Alessandro Manzoni’s The Fifth of May. …
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