Musica Toscana, Inc., (MTI)  a 501(c)(3) educational foundation, was incorporated in Kentucky in 1999.  Its objective is to promote the music written or premiered in Tuscany  during the period from 1590 to 1859, the years in Florentine history called the “forgotten centuries” by Eric Cochrane¹. We will, however, concentrate upon the latter part of this period beginning about 1670, since the Renaissance and the beginning of opera in Tuscany are relatively well-known while the 18th and early 19th have received little attention from musicians and musicologists. Seemingly for  reasons embedded in the political turmoil of the birth of the Italian kingdom,  Florentine and Tuscan music of the era of the grand dukes from Pietro Leopoldo (assumed power in 1765) to Leopoldo II (abdicated in 1859) passed into oblivion and quite unjustly became unknown territory to modern musicologists until a few decades ago².  Even Tuscan musicians and musicologists until the late 20th century ignored native in favor of Neapolitan or Venetian music despite the fact that in the last decade of the 18th century, Tuscany (especially Florence) produced more original operatic scores than any other city of the Italian states.

     Thus it could happen that the modern Italian authorities, the sovrintendenze, failed to identify and preserve in Italy the largest known 18th-century private music library belonging to the Ricasoli family and containing a substantial quantity of unique manuscripts and prints of music by Tuscan composers.  It can be supposed that this blindness on the part of the authorities was the result of the fact that in 1984, the year that it came upon the international market, they could not look for the names of these unknown Tuscan composers in the standard encylopedias, including Italian ones, and therefore assumed that the music had little of value for the patrimony of the nation.   This collection, once the possesion of the Baron Bettino Ricasoli, one of the founding fathers of the Italian nation, is now in the Dwight Anderson Music Library of the University of Louisville.

     The presence of this exceptional collection in Louisville is a basic reason for the creation of MTI and the initiation of the scholarly and practical series, the MONUMENTS OF TUSCAN MUSIC, (now in the process of issuing its fifth volume) and the biannual concerts performed in Louisville usually in November and May.  However, these two series are not limited to the publication and performance of music found solely in the Ricasoli Collection but include music in whatever location in the world.  And the society intends that this Tuscan repertory, containing many works of great beauty that will profoundly enrich the historical music now generally enjoyed and appreciated, be made known not just locally but to the world.  

     Until the present date, this work has been accomplished with money from members and private donors.  No government agency, in spite of repeated applications, has regarded the project with favor.  And if MTI is to continue, it needs the support of all  readers of this web site. (See CONTRIBUTIONS.)