Antonio Vivaldi

Photo Mosaic

Antonio Vivaldi heard the whole turning year in music. A Venetian priest, virtuoso violinist and impresario of the Baroque, ordained at twenty-five but soon dispensed from saying public Masses for reasons of ill health, he poured his gift into hundreds of concertos, sacred choral works and more than fifty operas. Much of it was written for the all-female ensemble at the Ospedale della Pietà, a home for abandoned children, and his most beloved creation, The Four Seasons, still paints its storms and springs in every corner of the world.

His Sun in Pisces is the most mystical and divine of all placements, the old-soul artist who shines through the mystical and esoteric, feeling the whole human condition like a sponge and translating it into sound. That Sun falls in the seventh house of others, so he shone through partnership, patrons and the ensembles he wrote for, forever creating in relationship. His Leo Moon gave him the dramatic, theatrical heart of a born performer, king and queen in one. His Virgo Ascendant lent the precise, detail-perfect craftsman who consolidated the concerto form itself. He died in poverty in Vienna in 1741, forgotten for centuries, then gloriously reborn.