Account books, names and music Count Wenzel von Morzin´s Virtuosissima Orchestra KAPSA, Václav

RESUMEN: The private Kapelle within aristocratic households represent an important facet of musical life in 18th-century Bohemia. Such ensembles flourished especially around 1720, when a time of relative peace and prosperity coincided with a peak in opulent local aristocratic lifestyles. As a case study of the phenomenon, this article examines the celebrated orchestra of Count Wenzel Morzin, who is well known through his contacts with Antonio Vivaldi. With the help of numerous, although rather fragmentary, pieces of ducumentary evidence from the period- encyclopaedias, parish registers, chronicles, newpapers and archival sources such as financial accounts- it is possible to trace the beginnings of the ensemble, to provide new information about Vivaldi´s engagement as Morzin´s " Maestro di musica in Italia´ and to gain insight into the membership of the Kapelle, as well as recover details of the salaries of the musicians in the mid-1720s. Finally, the article outlines Morzin´s contacts with composers and characterizes the repertory of the orchestra by defining parallels between its persinnel and the instrumental music written by Morzin´s "house composers" and musicians Antonín Reichenauer, Christian Gottlieb Postel and Frantisek Jiránek, which is now scattered around several, mainly German, music collections. Keywords: Czech lands; 18th-century instrumental music, Antonio Vivaldi, Tafelmusik, Kapellen, solo concerto, court, bassoon, Johann Friedrich Fasch, Antonín Reichenauer, Frantisek Jiránek.