On March 9, 2026, José Antonio Montaño will participate as a guest speaker in the Master’s Degree in Musicology at the Complutense University of Madrid.The session will take place at the Faculty of Geography and History. He will share the panel with Álvaro Torrente, Professor of Musicology and Director of the ICCMU, and Carmelo Di Gennaro, Director of the ICCMU’s Festival Farinelli, in a meeting focused on the intersection between research, cultural management, and artistic projection.
José Antonio Montaño’s lecture will focus on the Didone Project, an international research initiative devoted to the study of eighteenth-century Italian opera, in which he has been involved since 2021. This ambitious project has enabled the cataloguing, editing, and analysis of nearly 3,000 arias from 200 operas with librettos by Metastasio, establishing one of the most extensive databases dedicated to this repertoire.
In his presentation, he will address not only the scholarly dimension of the Didone Project—essential for understanding the circulation of dramatic and musical models in eighteenth-century Europe—but also its practical application: the recovery of previously unpublished repertoire, the critical edition of forgotten works, and their transformation into artistic and recording projects with international reach.
The session will thus provide students with a comprehensive perspective on how musicological research can become a driving force for creation, innovation, and cultural management, connecting heritage, historically informed performance, and contemporary artistic production.