Antonio Denzio

Who is Antonio Denzio?

Antonio Denzio was an Italian impresario, tenor, and librettist. Born in Venice to a family of musicians and operatic personnel, he pursued a career mainly as a singer until 1724, when he traveled to Bohemia as a member of the opera company of Antonio Maria Peruzzi, probably his uncle. Peruzzi had the idea of bringing an Italian opera company to central Europe to perform first in Prague, then Dresden and Leipzig. The company was first brought to Bohemia under the patronage of Count Franz Anton von Sporck, who had it play at his palace at Kuks in northwest Bohemia in the summer of 1724. The performances were so successful that he permitted the company to perform free of charge in his palace in Prague. After disagreements with Peruzzi, Denzio was able to supplant him as impresario before the end of the year 1724 and continued productions in the Sporck palace until 1735. Peruzzi left with some of the Peruzzi-Denzio players to found the Breslau Opera. Denzios opera theater at Sporck's palace was the first standing opera theater in the city. His productions were popular with the Bohemian nobility until about 1729, after which Denzio's finances deteriorated.