POLIFONIEPOLIFONIE Storia e teoria della coralitàHistory - and theory of choral III , 2015 FONDAZIONE GUIDOD’AREZZO CENTRO STUDI GUIDONIANI ENGLISH VERSION ENGLISH FONDAZIONE GUIDO D’AREZZO Regione Toscana, Provincia e Comune di Arezzo

POLIFONIE Storia e teoria della Coralità History and theory of choral music

Arezzo 2015

ENGLISH VERSION Index

“Ex consideratione textus et harmoniae observiren”: the rythmic and metric interpretation of XVI and XVII century vocal music (first part) Giovanni Acciai 3

Stood the mournful mother weeping from Jacopone to Caldara, Pergolesi and Rossini Piero Mioli 18

The choral music of Friedrich Nietzsche. The cultural environment and the Christmas Oratorio (1860-1861) Simone Zacchini 31

ROUND TABLE “Thirty Years of FENIARCO” edited by Carlo Pedini 36

hg

2 Giovanni Acciai “EX CONSIDERATIONE TEXTUS ET HARMONIAE OBSERVIREN”: THE RYTHMIC AND METRIC INTERPRETATION OF XVI AND XVII CENTURY VOCAL MUSIC

PREMISE much from our that it may Over a century and a half ago, Heinrich Bel- lead the performer to (often gross) mis- lermann, the great German musicologist, understandings. Furthermore, it is a well- author of fundamental studies about an- known fact that when the original written cient musical notation, in the preface to his symbols are translated into another code (in essay Die Mensuralnoten und Taktzeichen our case, into modern writing) they inevita- des XV. und XVI. Jahrhunderts,1 affirmed bly lose they original vitality. Indeed, musi- that “Die genaue Notenkenntniss jener Zeit cal notation is not only representative of a ist jedenfalls das erste Erforderniss zum system of communication, as others devised Verständniss ihrer Musikwerke, wiewohl by man throughout centuries, but at the nicht das einzige” (The exact knowledge of same time it embodies a group of implied the notation of an epoch is the first, if not values that affect both the shape and the the only thing necessary to understand the content of the musical message delivered. musical works it brought us). There is no It is still a widespread belief that the knowl- need to explain that by writing “die genaue edge of ancient musical notation is only Notenkenntniss” Bellermann not only made a technical matter, which has to be - com reference to the mere principle that regu- mitted to a few professionals who are the lates the transcription of ancient note val- only experts able to transliterate an ancient ues into modern ones, but he also implied sign into the current one. In this way, each other and more subtle information con- performer, although lacking of any notion tained in the sign. Such was, for instance, about musical palaeography, could translate the problem of the rhythm and the way to sheet music into sounds without even un- keep it correctly, the musica ficta, the coun- derstand transcriber’s choices. terpoint, the relation between verbal and In reality, no opinion could be more wrong music meter, between the word’s semantic than this. Musical notation, as with any significance and melody’s figurative adher- other means of communication, is noth- ence destined to represent it and much ing but an instrument, in the true sense of more. Stricto sensu, the German scholar the term, and it ought to be considered as highlighted the great amount of information such. The graphic fact that, far from being the graphic symbol – the ancient as well as a superstructure, an old-fashioned garment the modern – enshrines, and that the task of that can be adapted to modern fashion, is modern performers is to interpret this cor- a fundamental vehicle to understand all rectly so that the musical idea they convey rhythmic, harmonic, dynamic, and agogic could be as persuasive as possible. features typical of the music they belong. Modern performers often consider XV, XVI The essential difference between modern and XVII century notation to be a minefield. musical notation (the traditional system The symbols of these notations seem to made up of notes, rests, figures of value, be similar to those we usually use in musi- etc., to be clear) and that of the past (in this cal practice, but their meaning diverges so case that dating back to the Renaissance and proto-baroque) lies in the presence of 1 H. Bellermann, Die Mensuralnoten und Taktzeichen des XV. und these implied values. The lack of precise XVI. Jahrhunderts, Berlin, Georg Reiner, 1858, Vorwort, p. iii. evidence, the loss of the performing tradi-

3 tion, and variations in taste, hindered their of Renaissance and baroque music reper- understanding far before that of their repro- toire, it does not matter whether sacred or duction nowadays. profane, is represented by vocal composi- It is true that the causes that made Heinrich tions where the link between music and po- Bellermann’s words no longer worthy of etry makes the two arts complementary and consideration nearly up to the present day, mutually indissoluble, the knowledge and hide behind this contradiction: ancient mu- mastery of their intimate essence is crucial sical notation has received much considera- to the comprehension of the problem. tion so far in the perspective of its historic It is common knowledge that polyphony development. To wit, as the evolution of the and monody derive from speech; the mu- sign’s progression over time, rather than sical shape great XVI and XVII-century that of its semantic function as record of a composers offer to it, is created in order memory, a tradition and an already lost per- to make this link exclusive and stimulating. forming habit. Music digs deep into speech, while speech What additional reason could urge medi- elevates music towards unexplored skies eval and Renaissance composers to avoid and emphasizes its unobtrusive expressive transferring into their music any other sign components.3 except that of a sound’s height and length? The melodic word, to whatever language it Their old-fashioned notation system, -se mantic poverty, indifference towards the -ex 3 How not to mention here the famous words contained in Luzza- pressive performance of their music? No, of sco Luzzaschi’s dedication to Lucrezia d’Este della Rovere, of the Sesto libro dei madrigali a cinque voci (Ferrara, Vittorio Baldini, course not. If anything, quite the contrary, 1596). Through this work, the new expressive needs of the late considering the solid technical preparation sixteenth-century music, based on the undisputed power of the poetry of eloquence, the rethoric in the art of stirring feeling, are musicians had. It should have been at least described. This book written by the humanist Alessandro Guari- pleonastic if not injurious to suggest these ni, son of the famous poet Giovanni Battista, represents its true ideological manifesto worth of being quoted almost integrally: performers (many of them were also com- “sono […] la musica e la poesia tanto simili, e di natura congiunte, posers) an interpretative path inseparable ben può dirsi, non senza misterio di esse favoleggiando, ch’ambe 2 nascessero a un medesimo parto in Parnaso. [...] Percioché non from their specific preparation. solamente ha la musica per suo fine il giovamento, e ’l diletto, line- Hence, it is necessary to go into the thoughts amenti della sorella naturalissimi, ma la leggiadria, la dolcezza, la gravità, l’acutezza, gli scherzi, e le vivezze che sono quelle spoglie, of musicians to whom the notation belongs, ond’elle con tanta vaghezza s’adornano, sono portate dall’una e and become familiar with the performing dall’altra con maniere tanto conformi, che bene spesso musico il poeta e poeta il musico ci rassembra. Ma come a nascer fu prima practices of the period when they lived and la poesia, cosí la musica lei (come sua donna) riverisce, ed a lei worked, if we want to learn how to read the cede della prima genitura l’onore. Intanto, che quasi ombra di lei divenuta, là di muover il pié non ardisce, dove la sua maggiore notations they used correctly. non la preceda. Onde ne segue, che se il poeta inalza lo stile, sol- Taking into account that almost the totality leva eziandio il musico il tuono. Piagne, se il verso piagne, ride, se ride, se corre, se resta, se priega, se niega, se grida, se tace, se vive, se muore, tutti questi affetti ed effetti, cosí vivamente da 2 Perhaps the presence of accurate interpretative captions in a lei vengon espressi, che quella par quasi emulazione, che propria- piece of music would entail, ipso facto, the solution to its - per mente rassomiglianza dè dirsi. Quivi veggiamo la musica de’ nostri forming problems. On the contrary, in our opinion, it complicates tempi alquanto diversa da quella che fu già ne’ passati, percioché them enormously, especially due to the obvious impossibility to dalle passate, le poesie moderne sono altresì diverse. e per tacer understand them all. di tutte le altre, che non sentono mutazione, se non di materia, The communis opinio that music of the past is, with regard to per- come canzoni, sestine, sonetti, ottave, e terze rime, dirò del- ma formance, less difficult than recent music should be firmly reject- drigale, che solo per la musica par trovato, ed il vero dirò, dicendo, ed. One of Palestrina’s motets or Monteverdi’s madrigals are no ch’egli nell’età nostra ha ricevuto per la sua perfetta forma, tanto easier to perform than one of Mahler’s symphonies or Debussy’s dall’antica diversa, che se quei primi rimatori tornassero vivi, a preludes. The level of difficulty in performance cannot and should pena potrebbono riconoscerlo, non sì mutano si vede per la sua not take into account the technical aspects a piece of music neces- brevità, per l’acutezza, per la nobiltà, e finalmente per la dolcezza, sary entails. On the contrary, it is to be sought after in the indeter- con che l’hanno condito i poeti che oggi fioriscono, il cui lodevole minable field of emotive perceptions that animated the author in stile i nostri musici rassomigliano nuovi modi, e nuove invenzioni the very first moment of creation. Simili modo, it is simply absurd piú dell’usate dolci, hanno tentato anch’essi di ritrovare; delle qua- to consider performing a Renaissance motet or madrigal regard- li hanno formata una nuova maniera, che non solo per la novità less tout court of the historical and cultural background of the sua, ma per l’isquisitezza dell’artifizio, potesse piacere, e conseguir time when these pieces of music were created. l’applauso del mondo”.

4 may belong, has a heartbeat. Syllables and ry performance techniques and they were stresses give it breath, the breath of life. In the base of articulation and phrasing espe- addition, it melts with the feeling enshrined cially for the correct pronunciation of liter- in words to which the eloquence of speak- ary texts. Accent was one means to perceive ing is not enough to express all their rich- meter and its interpretation in this sense ness: singing is essential. Singing as climax only became predominant starting from of an extremely complex process of expres- the second half of the XVII century. Not by sive aggregation, as supreme testimony of chance, the moment when “solo singing” an intimately mastered téchne and apoiesis . started to spread widely as well as music for The knowledge and mastery of the ancient key and string instruments, in order to look metric thus represents the condicio sine for their articulation. qua non to reach a deep knowledge of the rhythm at the base of the musical repertoire of the period taken into account. 1. THE CONCEPT OF “MEASURE” The term metro (meter) has to be con- IN THE XVII CENTURY sidered as the regular flow of rhythm, its subdivision, its pulse and its organization The concept of measure, , bar into “measures”. It is the movement of the line gradually changes during the XVI cen- rhythmic flow itself that regulates poetic tury, especially towards its end. verse. It is a common knowledge that some mod- ern notation symbols derive from the an- Phrases and periods that include several 5 measures are not regular necessarily. They cient mensural system. In the great majori- are perceived as the resolution of tensions 5 In the early Seventeenth century, the musical figures in use were produced when some of the metric units still those typical of the so-called “white” that they contain prevail over others. Despite became popular starting from the half of the XV century. These were as follows: Maxima (Duplex Longa), Longa (Long), Breve this, the irregularities in the construction (Double ), Semibreve (Whole note), Minim (), of phrases and periods lie on a structure of Semiminim (Crotchet or ), Fusa (Quaver or Eight note) and Semifusa (Semiquaver or ). Their values regular pulses that musicians and theorists varied according to the rules of perfection, imperfection, augmen- of the past indicated with the term tactus.4 tation, coloration and proportions used in mensural notation start- ing from the XIII century, and still used in the XVI century, as well Throughout the XVII and XVIII century, mu- as in the first half of the XVII century. sicians and theorists long debated about Whereas in modern notation, a figure without a dot always has a binary value, that is to say, it always includes the value of the meter in terms of quantitas notarum intrin- two figures it divides into; in ancient mensural notation, a figure seca or “good and bad notes”. These terms could both value two or three figures according to the mensural sign placed at the beginning of the piece of music. define pulse and measure without referring The terms , Tempus and Prolatio were used respectively to stress or to any other form of articulation. with reference to the figures of Longa-Breve, Breve-Semibreve and Semibreve-Minim. When “mensural” tactus was replaced with The ternary relation was called “perfect”; the binary one, “imper- the «bar» that could be sometimes slower fect”. Under some conditions a perfect figure could become imperfect, sometimes faster in relation to the notation that is to say abridged of a third of its value through a process symbols that represented it, and the emo- referred to as “imperfection”. The imperfection could affect the figure both “a parte ante” or “a tional meaning of the sheet music, bar and parte post” to wit before or after it. measure became “notation formulas” as In perfect mensure, the figures of subdivision (Breve respect to Longa; Semibreve respect to Breve and Minim respect to Semi- will be seen later. Singers and instrumental- breve) could double their value in order to obtain perfection (“al- ists learnt these formulas as parts of prima- teration”). Black notes or notes submitted to color were always imperfect, also in the ternary mensure. The tempus perfectum was indicated by a circle and the Breve val- 4 The word tactus appears for the first time in the treatise De mu- ued as three Semibreve; the tempus imperfectum was indicated by sica by Adam von FULDA (1490), ch. VII, p. 362, in M.GERBERT, a semicircle and the Breve valued as two Semibreve. Scriptores ecclesiastici de musica sacra, St. Blasien, 1784, tomus The prolatio perfecta ocuurred in combination with tempus per- III: “Tactus est continua motio in mensura contenta rationis”. fectum or imperfectum and it was indicated by a dot inscribed in

5 ty of cases, they were used without knowing Throughout the sixteenth century (espe- their original meaning. The same goes for a cially from the second half of the century) notes’ name through the passage from the as the use of short-value figures increased hexachordal to the octave system and for more and more in profane polyphonic com- the loss of the original level function by gui- positions, the Minim will be divided in two donian syllables, now turned into absolute parts so that, it will start to embody the pitch indicators. quality of tactus and Semiminim, that of a C-clef semicircle and its cut C-clef diminu- pulse. tion, for instance, are mensural symbols In some pieces of music, Semiminim will that in modern notation value respectively even become a tactus unit while Fusa will 4/4 and 2/2 that is to say, nothing to do with become a pulse unit. their original mensural value. Time notations that use numeral fractions Before reaching this level of transforma- such as 3/2 or 9/8 derive from proportion tion,tactus will still be linked to the value of signs transformed in time signs. Semibreve and when the bar line will be in- The mensural system related all duration troduced in the first scores, at the beginning values to the hand (also to the foot) “down- of the seventeenth century, it will be placed beat” and “upbeat” movement. Because of at intervals corresponding to the length of a its moderate speed, it was referred to, as al- tactus. This will create great confusion with ready said, as tactus or “pulse”.6 regard to terminology that still lingers up to Since in XVI-century polyphonic music day. Minim was the predominant pulse figure, The two movements of the hand, one «on each Minim was considered as a pulse and the downbeat», the other «on the upbeat» was represented by the hand movement in (positio and levatio) that represented the depositio (thesis) and in elevatio (arsis). The tactus had the same length in the binary association of these two movements corre- form (tempus imperfectum) while in the ter- sponded to the value of a Semibreve or tac- nary (tempus perfectum) the “downbeat” tus represented by the C-clef sign. doubled the “upbeat” (two movements “downwards” and one “upwards”). the circle or in the semicircle. In this case, the Semibreve valued Tactus could be aequalis or inaequalis. The as three Minims. Figures’ regular length could be modified through “proportions”, former included two pulses, the latter three. that is to say, it could be diminished or augmented by using math- C-clef and cut C-clef signs indicated the tac- ematic ratios. Proportio dupla, ratio 2:1 was indicated by a bar crossing the signs tus aequalis that could include two, four or of tempus perfectum or imperfectum. eight secondary pulses or, in other words, Other proportions’ symbols derived from fractions: 3/1. 3/2 and so on. All the signs and rules subtended to them remained in use two Minims or four Semiminims or eight in sixteenth-century music, though with some difference coming Fusa, respectively. from music practice. For instance, the fact that proportion dupla was not only considered as other proportions but it also qualified Since there is no metric distinction between the tempus with the medium crossing the semicircle or the circle, depositio and levatio, as exists between affirmed a precise agogic will, not just a simple relation between two opposite values. our modern beat sequences, it was pos- During the fifteenth and sixteenth century proportion tripla (3/1) sible to relate the six pulses contained in a and proportio sesquialtera (3/2), along with proportion dupla, the most used among proportions, were also combined to different tactus and a half either to three groups of mensural signs. two Semiminims or to two groups of three Early seventeenth-century theorists started to operate a distinc- tion between major and minor proportions, between “major Semiminims. sesquialtera” and “minor sesquialtera” according to the value of Three tactus aequalis under the C-clef sign tactus’ figure to which they had to be related. Moreover, they provided performers with the indication of the modus operandi could be understood as follows: three meas- to execute figures of value in the length of a tactus, or the regular ures of two Minims each [tempus imperfec- time unit measured by the rise and fall of the hand. tum]; two measures of three Minims each 6 The Italian term for the Latin tactus is “Battuta”; the German is “Takt” and the French is “mesure”. [tempus perfectum]; two measures of two

6 ternary Minims each [tempus imperfectum The following chart, proposed by Aldrich,7 cum prolatione minore]; six measures of does not include all the possible combina- two Semiminims each [tempus imperfectum tions but only those that appear more fre- diminutum]; four measures of three Semim- quently in music sources of the XVI and XVII inims each [tempus perfectum diminutum]. centuries.

7 P. Aldrich, Rhythm in Seventeenth-Century Italian Monody. With an Anthology of Songs and Dances, London, J. M. Dent & Sons, 1966, p. 43.

7 The tactus inaequalis contained three puls- the agreement that notes with a smaller val- es. It concerned the tripla, sesquialtera and ue should be performed faster than notes emiolia proportions and indicated the collo- with a bigger length. cation of three notes of the same value or As consequence, time was not only indicat- of an equivalent value in the time length of ed through traditional mathematical signs, two or, in some cases, of three notes in the but also with the figures’ length value. time length of one. Generally, pieces of music in 3/2 and cut C- The variety and sometimes the babel of clef relate the pulse to the Minim and have signs described in the writings of that time a slower rhythm than those in 3/4 and C-clef is the clear testimony of attempts made by where the pulse in on the Semiminim. composers and theorists to establish precise The testimonies of XVII-century theorists, time relations between tactus inaequalis which we are going to introduce here, start and tactus aequalis. to relate the pulse to the Semiminim. In musical sources from the second half of The words used to indicate time are use- the XVII century time signatures appear that ful to compensate the ambiguity of some indicate the presence of compound time metric problems. During the early sixteenth signatures: 6/8, 9/8, 12/8 but also others, century, captions as tarde, velociter, adagio no longer used today, such as 9/4, 6/16, and presto needed to underline intermedi- 9/16, 12/16. It is highly probable that these ate time changes due to the diminution of new signs represented the attempt to -de the tactus (semiditas) or proportion signs. vise a new model of metric notation. This vocabulary of agogic expressions Then during the XVII century, tactus gradu- would become increasingly rich and precise ally modifies its temporal inflexibility though throughout the XVII century. it was related to the same figures of value. Italian composers seemed to be the first to Performers began to get used to play short- use mensural and proportion symbols to in- er figures with a faster tactus related to the dicate time signatures of 3/4, 6/8 and 12/8, figure of Semiminim, instead of the classi- as we currently understand them. 3/1 and cal figure of Semibreve or Minim. Moreover, 3/2 time signatures are still associated with they interpreted mensural and proportion proportions used less frequently than in the signs no longer according to the rigid beat of past. pulsus cordis but according to a rhythm that Italian musicians and theorists who worked was sometimes slower, sometimes faster, between the end of the XVI century and the more appropriate “to the time of soul’s af- whole XVII century would introduce their fection not of the hand”.8 foreign colleagues to the practice of tactus. As said, with regard to the binary meter, tac- tus time value is performed with the same “downwards” and “upwards” movement even when tactus will start to include two or four pulses per movement. Proportions with a numerator bigger than denominator (“proportion inequalities”) were performed by using a rhythmic pulse faster than those with a smaller numerator. Another peculiarity of mensural notation is

8 C. Monteverdi, Madrigali guerrieri et amorosi […]. Libro ottavo, , Alessandro Vincenti, 1638. “Claudio Monteverde a’ chi legge”.

8 SUMMARY TABLE OF THE ORDO MENSURALIS

9 2. NOTE VALUES AND TACTUS

There is no doubt that in the shif from the Sixteenth-century mensural notation to the modern system, the most remarkable change was that observed in the relation between note values and tactus. In mensural music, tactus regulates “fast” or “slow” musical performance: fast music was written with short values (for instance “chromatic madrigals”) and slow music with longer values or ratios. The treatise De arte canendi (1540) by Se- bald Heyden (1499-1561)9 has influenced musicians and musicologists of the last cen- tury since it established that in the XVI cen- tury tactus was represented with unchange- able pulses.

Per eam enim temeritatem variorum Tac- tuum, omnis ratio & natura Proportionum have these proportion, augmentation and quam diversa signa inter sese habent, confu- diminution «novatores» understood about sa ac omnino deformata est. Quod quidem figures? It is true that, through different etiam nunc tanto aegrius ferimus quanto mi- types of tactus, they desire to obtain the nus opus fuerat plures ac eas diversas Tac- same results as past composers had by us- tuum species excogitare. Cum enim quam ing, more correctly and artistically, diminu- multiplices Tactuum species ob hoc tantum tion or proportion signs. excogitatas videamus, ut motum cantus sub- inde mutarent, nunc tardiorem nunc conci- Heyden then teaches that immutable tactus tatiorem nunc properantissimum faciendo. Quaeso ergo, quid nam illos novatores, de is essential to mensural notation, though he Proportionibus, Augmentationibus ac Dimi- admits himself that this is not the unique nutioribus intellexisse credamus? Certum and exclusive practice followed during the utique est, ex arte ipsa, quod illi per diver- sixteenth century. sas species Tactus praestare volverunt, idem As written in the Musice Active Micrologus veteres per integritatem aut diminutionem by Andreas Ornithoparcus (1490- XVI cen- Signorum aut Proportiones, multo & rectius, tury), John Dowland translated from Latin artificiosius praestitisse. to English in 1609,10 tactus was commonly Through these changes in tactus, the rela- tionship and nature of all proportions with compared to the value of Semibreve and their different types of signs has been con- identified with the pulse of the human wrist: fused and mistakenly interpreted. In fact, though useful, several types of tactus have [Tactus] est quida(m) motus manu p(rae) been invented that still exist nowadays. Be- centoris signoru(m) indicio formatus, can- cause of these diverse kinds of tactus, we tum dirigens mensuraliter. observe frequent time changes in a compo- 10 sition that make it sometimes slower, faster Andreas Ornithoparcus his Micrologus, or Introduction: con- taining the art of singing Digested into foure bookes. Not onely or even extremely fast. I wonder now, what profitable, but also necessary for all that are studious of musicke. Also the dimension and perfect vse of the monochord, accord- ing to Guido Aretinus. By Iohn Douland lutenist, lute-player, and 9 S. Heyden, De arte canendi, Nuremberg, Johannes Petreium, Bachelor of Musicke in both the Vniuersities. London, Thomas 1540, ch. A 3r e v. «Epistola nuncupatoria». Snodham, 1609.

10 Tactus minor is half tactus major and is called Semitactus since it relates to the Sem- ibreve diminished in proportio dupla. Only those who have little knowledge in the art of music perform it. Tactus proportionatus is when three dimin- ished Semibreve are opposite to one of tac- tus [proportio tripla, Ed.] or to two [propor- tio sesquialtera, Ed.]11

As evidenced in Ornithoparcus’ essay, semi- tactus or tactus related to Semibreve was not the only one practiced. Nothing pre- vented it from being related to other figures shorter than the Semibreve, as the Minim was. The speed of performance did not change in the choice between tactus major and tactus minor, since tactus major referred to a fig- ure that was twice the value of tactus minor. The choice depended on several factors, many of them linked to performance and the idea of the score the composer wanted Tactus is a certain movement of the hand to achieve. performed by the singers’ director, accord- Tactus could be regular or irregular. ing to the nature of the signs of a piece of According to Gioseffo Zarlino (1517-1590), music and their time notation. tactus was regular if it included two pulses only (one in depositio and one in elevatio); Tactus could be major, minor and proportio- irregular, if included three (two in depositio natus: and one in elevatio).12

Major [tactus] est mensura, tardo ac motu Potiamo dire che la Battuta si ritrova di due quasi reciproco facta. Hunc tactum et maniere: equale & inequale, ove si riduce ogni integru(m) et totalem nominant auctores. movimento che si fa con la voce. Et q(ue)m verus est omnium ca(n)tilenarum Et questo dico, perché gli antichi Musici & li tactus: Semibrevem non diminutam suo Poeti anco, i quali erano riputati una cosa ist- motu comprehendit: vel breve(m), in duplo essa; per un certo loro istinto naturale divisero diminutam. le voci in due parti & attribuirono ad alcune il Minor est majoris medium, quem breve & ad alcune il tenpo lungo; et al Semitactu(m) dicunt. Q(ue)m Semibrevem in tempo lungo applicarono due Tempi brevi & duplo diminutam suo motu mensurat, indoc- posero nel primo luogo quelle sillabe o voci de tis tantum probatus. Proportionatus est quo Tempo breve che sono di minor quantità; & nel tres Semibreves contra unam ut in Tripla, aut secondo quelle del tempo lungo, che sono di contra duas, ut in Sesquialtera proferu(n)tur maggiore. […] [...]. Si deve avvertire che considerarono la Battuta Tactus major relates to a measure with a in due parti: & tanto alla prima quanto alla sec- slow beat. Scholars define it as whole or to- tal tactus. Since this is the true tactus, the 11 A. ORNITHOPARCUS, Musice Active Micrologus, Lipsia, Valentin one present in every song, it includes a non- Schumann, 1517, liber secundus, caput tertium: De Tactu, c. f iijv. diminished Semibreve or a diminished Breve 12 G. Zarlino, Istitutioni harmoniche, Venezia, Francesco de I Fran- in proportio dupla. ceschi Senese, 1573, third part, ch. 49, p. 244.

11 onda attribuirono la misura del Tempo breve o Inequale aggiungevano à cotali segni il Punto, lungo si come li tornava piú comodo. come in questi esempi si può chiaramente ve- È ben vero che li Moderni applicarono primi- dere: eramente alla Battuta hora la Breve & hora la Semibreve imperfette, facendole equali al tem- po del polso, distinto in due movimenti equali; onde cotale Battuta si può veramente chia- mare Equale; conciosia che tra la Positione & la Levatione si ritrova la proportione di Equalità, essendo che tanto alla Positione quanto alla Levatione […] le appplicarono hora la Breve con la Semibreve & hora la Semibreve con la Mini- In order to avoid serious misunderstand- ma & et la divisero in due movimenti inequali, ings, it is worth pointing out that there were applicando alla Positione il Tempo lungo & alla physiological limits in the choice of tactus Levatione il Tempo breve, ponendole in Dupla speed. proportione. If the pulse was so slow it could not easily Et perché tra la Positione & la Levatione casca be held, the regens chori or the one who led la proportione di inequalità: però cotale - Bat the execution was forced to subdivide the tuta si può con verità chiamare Inequale. gesture and, as consequence, to double the Havendo dapoi essi Musici cotale rispetto, quando intendevano la Battuta equale, -seg bar speed. navano le lor Cantilene nel principio col- Cir If the pulse was too fast, the director was colo o Semicircolo intieri ovvero da una linea forced to act the other way round: two in due parti tagliati. & quando intendevano la beats in one, by halving the speed.

12 In the case where we wanted to create a rate theory and practice. In the following relation between these indications and the century, some colleagues, such as Agostino metronomic signatures, we would observe (1611-?) and Pier Francesco Valentini that the pulse becomes too slow around (1570-1654) wrote treatises entirely dedi- forty beats per second, and too fast around cated to tactus theory and practice. one hundred thirty-five beats. Being a committed conservator, such as Se- As a consequence of that tactus major per- bald Hayden, to the so-called “original prac- fectly fits at the core of this topic, since the tice” of Palestrina, Agostino Pisa in hisBreve human pulse generally oscillates between dichiaratione della battuta musicale,14 ar- sixty and eighty beats per second, while tac- gues over the idea of “music measure” that tus minor containes twice that rate. was spreading in that period. The same hap- Nicola Vicentino (1511-1572) offers a- re pened some years before when Giovanni markable analysis of this in his treatise Artusi strongly and spitefully railed against L’antica musica ridotta alla moderna pratti- the “harshness” and harmonic “licenses” ca where, while describing the way to “beat Monteverdi had inserted in some of his the measure”,13 he affirms that madrigals of the Quarto libro a cinque voci (Venezia, Ricciardo Amadino, 1603). questa misura si usa con tre ordini, il Primo It is no wonder that Pier Francesco Valen- si domanda ordine di batter , che tini, in his Trattato della battuta musicale,15 sotto una battuta sandarà una breve, ò due often disagrees with his colleague and chal- semibrevi, nel tempo minor imperfetto: il lenges many of theories, starting withtactus Secondo ordine si domanderà batter alla misura della semibreve nel tempo perfetto, variability. che già si soleva cantare tre semibrevi per In fact, according to Valentini, tactus can battuta, à imitatione del numero ternario, et and has to be maintained: per ora non s’usa, se non nella proportione di equalità: il Terzo ordine di batter la mis- tal volta adagio, e tal volta presto, e tal volta ura sarà detto di proportione sesquialtera, ’l presto e l’adagio mediocremente, secondo quando la compositione sarà signata con il richiedono li stile delle compositioni et il numero sesquialtero, et le semibrevi, ò min- sale delle parole; ime, si canteranno due contra tre: et i sopra at times adagio, at times presto, and at detti modi saranno qui apparenti times presto and adagio moderately, as the

In the XVI century, theorists talked about 14 A. Pisa, Breve dichiaratione della battuta musicale, opera non tactus in relation to notation, not as a sepa- solo utile ma necessaria a quelli che desiderano fare profitto nella musica, , Bartolomeo Zannetti, 1611.

13 N. Vicentino, L’antica musica ridotta alla moderna prattica, 15 P. F. Valentini, Trattato della battuta musicale, Rome, Vatican Rome, Antonio Barre, 1555, fourth book, ch. viii, p. 76. Apostolic Library, Ms. Barb. Lat. 4417, 1643.

13 compositions’ style and the word’s inner- most sense require;

Moreover, the theory regarding figures’ val- ue to which tactus can be related:

oltre la Breve et oltre la Semibreve, sì nella eguale come anco nella inegual Battuta, qual si voglia nota musicale, per mezzo delle date proportioni può essere misurata et abbrac- ciata dal tempo et intervallo di una Battuta. beside Breve and Semibreve, both in the same as in different Measures, whatever the note, it can be measured through given proportions and embraced by Measure time and interval.

In this respect, Valentini talks about “broad measure” to indicate a slow tempo and “quick measure” for a quick tempo, in order to conciliate different variations of pulse. This diversity of opinions among contempo- il Tempo maggiore imperfetto [C] denota rary theorists confirms the fact that in the che sotto lui la Massima vale otto battute, period between the XVI and XVII centuries, la Longa quattro, la Breve due, la Semibreve tradition was still very strong, and mensu- una, la Minima mezza, la Semiminima un ral notation innovations clashed with the quarto, la Croma un ottavo & la Semicroma durable habits of music practice still pre- la sestadecima parte. O vero per piú chiarez- za diciamo che delle Minime ne vanno due dominant, and the solid current theoretic per battuta, delle Semiminime quattro; delle conceptions not yet rejected. Crome otto & delle Semicrome sedici. In contrast with vocal music notation, short- the imperfect Tempus major [C] denotes value figures prevail in instrumental music that under his sign Maxima counts for eight (for lute, organ and harpsichord), whereas measures, Longa for four, Brevis for two, the figures of Longa, Breve and Semibreve Semibrevis for one, Minim for half, Semi- are less and less used than minims and mu- minim for one quarter, Fusa for one-eighth sical figures with a shorter value such as and Semifusa for the sixteenth part. Or, to be clear, we affirm that a measure should Fusa (hundred twenty-eighth notes) and include two Minims, four Semiminims, eight Semifusa notes (two hundred fifty-sixth Fusa and sixteen Semifusa. notes). Il Tempo minore imperfetto [C sbarrato] si The tactus equalis is still anchored to the può regolare in due modi, il primo è che si Semibreve, but the Semibreve now beats può cantare come maggiore imperfetto, slower than pulsus cordis and some theo- il secondo è che si devono cantare tutte le rists do not hesitate to openly talk about sue note per metà, si come ancora le pause four pulses per mensure, two in depositio si conteranno per metà & et questo è il suo proprio e se alcuni maestri l’insegnano a and two in elevatio. cantare come maggiore imperfetto lo fanno In this regard, here is what Antonio Brunelli per levare la difficultà allo scolare e forse (1577-1630) establishes with his Regole uti- alcuni lo fanno per ignoranza. E che sia la lissime per li scolari che desiderano impa- verità si vede in molte compositioni d’alcuni rare a cantare (1606): che hanno stampato non essere osservata la

14 regola di detti Tempi. Perché sanno bene i clear from his argumentation that minor periti che il Tempo minore tanto imperfetto tempus was sung as major (Semibreve = tac- quanto perfetto si deve comporre sempre tus) but with a faster speed, not necessarily di numero impari acciò si possi cantare per twice as much. metà, come per essempio se fate cinque Semibhrevi, mettendone una in terra & una Il Tempo maggiore perfetto va cantato nel in aria la quinta verrà in terra e terminerà la medesimo modo, che il maggiore imper- battuta & se fossero quattro, mettendone fetto, postposta la differenza che è in alcune una interra & una in aria la quarta nota pause & alcune note che alle volte sono per- finirebbe in aria, però detto Tempo si deve fette & altre volte alterate.17 cantare per metà. È ben vero che si può The perfect Tempus major should be sung in cantare come sopra mandando una Semi- the same way as the imperfect major, beside breve a battuta, ma questo si fa per levare the difference in some rests and some notes la difficultà al cantare, non già che sia suo that are sometimes perfect and sometimes proprio.16 altered. The imperfect Tempus minor [cut C] can be regulated in two ways, the first is singing it as imperfect major, the second is singing The two mensural signs of tempus perfec- all his notes in half of their time, as well as tum [O and cut O] rarely appear in XVII- rests that will count for half of their value century compositions, except when they and if some masters teach it as imperfect are followed by proportions’ values. Brunelli major. They do it to help students and per- explains this as follows: haps some of them do it through ignorance. Moreover, that to be the true is clear in il Tempo minore perfetto [O sbarrato] si many compositions of some who did not ob- dovrebbe cantare nel medesimo modo del serve the rule of these Tempi. Since profes- minore imperfetto cioè per metà e questo è sionals know very well that either imperfect il suo proprio, & anco si può cantare ordinar- or perfect minor Tempus always has to in- iamente come il Tempo maggiore imperfetto clude odd numbers so that it could be sung postposto le perfezioni & alterazioni che vi for the half of its length. Furthermore, if you sono quale sono queste. Le battute che toc- execute five Semibreves, one in downbeat cano due righe e quelle che ne toccano tre and the other in upbeat, the fifth will fall in downbeat and end the measure, and if there 17 The rules of perfection, imperfection and alteration of figures are four, one in downbeat and the other in popular in the sixteenth century are similar to those applied in the upbeat, the fourth will end in upbeat, but XVI century and since the time of Franco of Cologne, the first theo- this Tempus should be sung in half time. It rist who wrote about them in his treatise Ars cantus mensurabilis (half of the XIII century). is true that it is possible to sing by ending The only difference is that Brunelli relates figures’ value to tac- the measure with a Semibreve but it aims to tus and not to mensural signs. These rules can be summarized easy the singing, it is not the ordinary prac- as follows: a Breve followed by another Breve, a Longa or three Semibreve is perfect and counts for three tactus (similis ante sibi tice. similem, perfectum est). A Breve followed or preceded by a single Semibreve or by more than three Semibreve is imperfect and only counts for two tactus; when two Semibreve are between two Though Brunelli did not reveal the reason Breve, the second Semibreve is altered that is to say it doubles its why singers found it difficult to sing in a value and counts for two tactus. Breve rests, as well as the Breve figure, are perfect and can create perfection, but it is not possible minor tempus, by halving the values, it was to turn them into imperfect; Semibreve rests, as well as Semibreve figure, are imperfect and can create imperfection but their altera- tion is impossible. The dot is useful to establishalio modo the clus- 16 A. Brunelli, Regole utilissime per li scolari che desiderano im- ters of figures that create a perfection. parare a cantare sopra la pratica della musica, Firenze, Volemar Brunelli gives the following examples to illustrate what he wrote. Timan, 1606, p. 16 sgg. The numbers above the figures indicates the number of tactus.

15 & ancora le Note seguenti: Massima, Longa, TRANSCRIPTION Breve & Semibreve & per maggior brevità tutte le perfezioni & alterazioni, tanto nelle Note quanto nelle Pause & tutti gl’altri -ac cidenti che si trovano in detto Tempo tutti si regolano come nel Tempo maggiore per- fetto, s’è già detto di sopra, perché s’osserva la medesima regola […] ma se si canta per metà, tutte le Note varranno la metà manco tutte le perfette, quanto l’imperfette, come anco le Pause. The perfect Tempus minor [cut O] should be sung in the same way as the imperfect mi- nor or for the half of its value and it is also possible to ordinarily sing it as the imperfect Tempus major beside present perfections It is interesting to observe that Brunelli still and alterations. The bar lines that touch two inserts Maxim and Longa among the figures lines and those that touch three and also that could be perfect, testimony that, at the the following notes: Maxim, Longa, Breve, beginning of the seventeenth century, Mo- Semibreve and for brevity all perfections and alterations, both in Notes and Rests and dus minor or Modus Longarum and Modus everything this Tempus includes is regulated major or Maximodus with ternary mensura- as the perfect Tempus major. As mentioned tion were considered in theory, though they above, it occurs because they follow the were already obsolete in practice. same rule […] but if sung in half of the value, As with his contemporary colleagues, all Notes will count for half of their value, Brunelli makes no direct reference in his not just the perfect ones but the imperfect treatise to bar lines, though they had started as well as the Rests. to appear in practice, both in manuscripts and in music prints. The following example, drawn from the Putnam Aldrich informs us about this pro- Practica musicaeby Franchino Gaffurio,18 al- cedure when he affirms that “on rare occa- lows a verification of the effect of diminutio sions compositions with as many as six or on the integer valor of the cut O and C signs: seven parts are scored and therefore barred as in Lorenzo Allegri’s Primo Libro di Musi- ORIGINAL SPECIMEN che, 1618. Where the composer explains in a note: ‘I wanted to present the Symphonies divided by perfect instruments such as the Lute, Organ and in particular the double Harp”».19 Also Francesco Piovesana Sacilese (XVII century) in his treatise Misure harmoniche regolate (1627) openly talks about a four- pulse tactus:

la compositione della battuta è de due parti, la prima delle quali è il battere e la seconda l’elevar della mano: di piú, in cadauna di queste parti sono duoi tempi, di modo che in tutto sono quattro: in questi si distribuis- 18 F. Gaffurio, Practica musicae, Milano, Giovanni Pietro Lomazzo, 1496, liber secundus, caput quartumdecimum: “De Diminutione”, cc iiij. 19 P. Aldrich, op. cit., p. 28.

16 et non s’accorgono, che per questo molte volte si comettono gli errori nei pubblici Chori, con scemamento della devotione.20 the bar is composed of two parts, the first the downbeat and the second the upbeat: moreover, each part has two beats, for a total of four. These are distributed as fol- lows: at the same time, the first downward movement starts and the hand falls, the other rises, and the same occurs with the third and the fourth beat. This is the true and authentic way to perform them. Since these beats have the same value, but still have to be measured by the hand, it is worth saying that this practice, in choirs, applies to professionals, that is to say, to musicians not to singers as happens nowadays. The latter (I refer to non-professionals) who want to measure and govern music, since the notion of bar is fundamental to singing, perform the bar sometimes partially, sometimes distorting it. They do not realise it, and as a consequence, errors often occur in public choirs, causing a decrease in devotion.

Similar arguments are presented in Li primi albori musicali (1694) by Lorenzo Penna (1613-1693), who describes the four parts of tactus, adding a colourful “hand waving” in its rise and fall:

ha la Battuta quattro parti, la prima è -bat tere e la seconda è fermare in giú, la terza è alzare e la quarta è fermare in su. Nelle Note nere spiccano benissimo queste quat- tro parti di Battuta, perché la prima è nel cono in questo modo: cioè nell’istesso percuotere, la seconda è nel levare un poco tempo dell’abassat’uno e nel fermar la ondeggiando la mano, la terza è nell’alzata e mano a basso, un altro vien distribuito: la quarta è nel fermare in su.21 nell’elevar poi similmente si applica il terzo The bar has four parts, the first is down- e nel fermar la mano in alto, il quarto: il beat and the second stops down, the third qual modo di distribuir questi tempi è il is upbeat and the fourth stops up. In black vero e reale: avvertendo, che detti tempi notes, these four parts stand out very well, sono equali nella sua misura, et che però because the first is on the beat, the second anco tali devono esser misurati co’ la mano: in raising the hand a little and waving it, the aggiongendo, che questo misurare, parti- third is in the rise and the fourth in stopping colarmente s’appartiene nei Chori à Periti the raised hand. di questa scienza, cioè a Musici, et non à (to be continued) Cantori, come oggi si usa: i quali (parlo de’ poco pratici) volendo misurare, et governare 20 F. Piovesana, Misure harmoniche regolate, Venice, Gardano, la musica, il regimento del cui canto è il 1627, p. 60. batter bene, formano questa misura della 21 L. Penna, Li primi albori musicali per li principianti della musica battuta una volta gobba et una stropiata: figurata, Boulogne, Giacomo Monti, 1694, p. 36.

17 Piero Mioli STOOD THE MOURNFUL MOTHER WEEPING Stabat Mater from Jacopone to Caldara, Pergolesi and Rossini

1. A devotion, the lyric, much music tragic Friday when Christ died. He wrote it Stood the mournful Mother a dramatically between 1303, the year when his enemy sung ancient Christian song, one belonged Pope Boniface VIII, who excommunicated to the genre of the “sequence” (that was him, died and 1306, the year of his death. even more ancient, since it derived from Century after century, other congregations the typical melisma of the Gregorian Halle- arose and worked around the worship of the lujah). As a “moveable” part of the mass, it Virgin, and on 9 June 1668 the Sacred Con- appeared in honour of Our Lady of the Sev- gregation of Rites allowed the Servite Order en Sorrows on Good Friday or on the third to celebrate the Seven Sorrows votive mass Sunday after Easter, and later passed to the on 15 September. The centrality of the Ser- mass of the Sorrowful Mother celebrated vants of Mary is thus patent in Stabat Mater on 15 September. However, the chronicle history: from to the entire world, and of its origin and developments is even more of course with the participation, in 2013 as complex, due to the unreliability of testimo- in 1842, of the town of (perhaps nies and often conflicting documents. from the foundation of the church of Santa According to gospel narration, seven were Maria dei Servi, in 1346, forty years after Ja- the sorrows the Mother of Jesus suffered copone’s death). and the fifth, the most terrible one, was the The Latin lyric, actually attributed only to one she felt standing at the feet of the Cross, Jacopone (bar some less well known alter- before her Son’s death. The devotion to the natives) is composed of twenty stanzas of Sorrowful Mother started towards the end two trochaic tetrameter in rhyme, and one of the year 1000, but according to tradition, catalectic trochaic tetrameter each: in the it should be on 15 August 1233. On that day, AAb rhyme each Latin stanza counts as an in , seven young nobles belonging Italian stanza of two verses, one octonary to the Arte di Calimala circle, who played and the senarius. From a musical point of an active part in the Laudesi Company (re- view, the poetic lyric had a different intona- sponsorial singers of Laude) were gathered tion, one that dated back to the thirteenth before an image of the Virgin Mary in a lo- century, in order to become a sequence cal street, when they saw her move, come to sing during the mass: as monodic and to life and dress in mourning. They imme- anonymous as every Christian song, the diately ascribed the miracle to the new music flows on ten melodies, one for each sorrow the Virgin Mary felt because of the couplet belonging to the second mode. This fratricidal struggles that steeped the city mode, also called hypodorian, stretches with blood, and soon after they set up the from low A upwards (until F, according to Congregation of the Sorrowful Mother, later the hexachord) and as far as the melody is called Servants of Mary or of the Servite Or- concerned, it ends on D as dorian mode, the der. Thus, the specific Marian devotion grew former, on which it depends (the same is further until Jacopone da Todi, the passion- said about the plagal cadence, though only ate and bold Franciscan friar born in around different in part). 1236, wrote a lyric, the Stabat Mater, to Reached by the more majestic polyphony sing as sequence during the Holy Week, the of Josquin, Palestrina, Lasso and others, the

18 Stabat Mater sequence started to sound un- of humour and sentiment, at Teatro Nuovo familiar to the authentic Gregorian chant, of Naples. He had already performed a dra- as nearly all other sequences, and thus ma at S. Bartolomeo theatre in 1733, Il pri- the Trent Council (1563) decided to cancel gionier superbo, whose rhythm was marked it; however its beauty and popularity were by two dynamic intermezzos of the Serva so great that it was reintroduced in 1727. padrona in the intervals. Tired and increas- Then, it had the free modern, vocal and in- ingly sick (he suffered from consumption) he strumental intonations of Scarlatti (Domeni- took shelter at the Capuchin Monastery of co), Pergolesi, Caldara, Traetta, followed by Pozzuoli, to work less, be quiet, rest, and try Haydn, Boccherini, Salieri, and then Rossini, to treat his disease properly. Unfortunately, and onto Shubert, Verdi, Dvořák, Perosi, Szy- he received a new commission from the manovsky, Poulenc, Penderecki, and Pärt, Archconfraternity of the Knights of S. Luigi di often but not always written in Latin (in XXI Palazzo, which “under the title of the Virgin century seven intonations exist). Among of Sorrows” used to celebrate the specific a variety of translations and paraphrases, feast with the Stabat Mater by Alessandro Torquato Tasso’s version affirms “Stava ap- Scarlatti. In short, following a practice that presso la Croce/la Madre lagrimosa” (lit. still ignored the repertoire, they needed an- “Stood next to the Cross/the tearful Moth- other intonation (after nearly twenty years, er”) (Rime, 1704). the appreciated composition of the Neapoli- Eighteenth-century sacred music, at least tan school’s first master could even end his that widely and quantitatively understood, performance: o tempora!).1 boasts several pieces of music and authors, Doomed to die on 16 March 1736, Pergolesi and for its greater fortune it also boats two barely managed to finish his work, the man- supreme masters, are Händel in UK and uscript of which is dated 17 March. As with Bach in Germany. However, as the great city its author, who was of course talented but of Vienna, that exalts Mozart’s Requiem, so unlucky in life that he only truly became trembles at their presence, as well as gen- fortunate after his death, the work received erous Italy that cannot help drumming on immediate, broad and enduring apprecia- Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater. Truly speaking, tion, from the very first performance at the Austria also knew the vigorous masses by confraternity to its several rewritings (read Fux and Haydn and Venice, Bologna and predictable modernizations) by Paisiello, Sa- Rome, just to give three examples, knew lieri, Hiller, and even a parody by Bach. the works by Galuppi, Martini and Pitoni. Bach used its musical ensemble to compose Indeed Naples, queen of the opera, was also a German motet with other words (and with the queen of the mass, the motet, the litany, minor but numerous variants) in the years the sequence: Pergolesi’s intonation of Sta- 1745-47 in Leipzig. He created it quite soon bat Mater is one of those that reappeared indeed, and his writing showed the master- first after the Trent eclipse, and is probably piece nature and diffusion at its best. the most beautiful among many. Should it fear rivalry with regard to its beauty, this 2. The divine Pergolesi was with Rossini of course, who created his Born in the region of The Marches, but version between 1830 and 1842 and per- educated in Naples, author of sonatas and formed it first in , in 1842, and then in cantatas, skilled and successful opera com- Bologna. poser from Lo frate ‘nnamorato, a comedy In the autumn of 1735, the young Giambat- tista Pergolesi (Jesi 1710 – Pozzuoli 1736) 1 “O tempora o mores!” is a sentence by Cicero now used as an performed the Flaminio, a real comedy full exclamation to criticize present-day attitudes and trends.

19 in Neapolitan to the Olimpiade, a drama in arias in the first half, and the prevalence of Italian, Pergolesi ordered the twenty stan- duets or bicinia in the second, the score is zas of the venerable lyric in twelve parts remarkably homogeneous. In an always sim- (adding a final Amen) to be used as arias or ple and clear writing, likely to be pre-classic, duets. Efficient as well as author of sacred the minor mode is constant, from F that music, though always respectful of commis- starts and ends also reaching the sixth num- sion’s dictates, with a view to a performance ber, to G appearing three times, and C that neither public nor spectacular but private also appears three times, but rises once to and nearly for chamber music, the master the corresponding major. Slow high- excluded the choir and wind instruments ly outnumber fast ones, always performed and only wrote for voices and bowed string between Andante and Largo; the eleventh instruments with figured bass. According to number is rather agile and is one of the few a plausible hypothesis, there were two solo- upbeated to major mode (a unique B flat). In ists, and neither ordinary tenors or basses, this major mode, there are three cases of E the female sopranos or contraltos, the for- flat, one of them modulated by the relative mer well accepted and the latter forbid- minor (the fifth number). Often moderate, den, at least in theory, by the church. The the singing also opens to embellishments right solution consisted of a male soprano and melismas, preferring trills (frequently and contralto to wit, two musicians or cas- repeated) and vocalizing (especially on the tratos, one clear, the other dark. As far as final Amen). Homorhythm is frequent be- the bowed instruments are concerned, their tween the two vocal parts, often distant typical quartet extended from violins to from a third, though not to the detriment bass violins is excellent though never with- of certain efficient canonic movements. The out the bass. Should the church be the set- formal arrangement is peculiar: except the ting, the organ is an option (or rather a cym- fifth, the first eight numbers are all musi- bal, for less formal occasions) perhaps with cally bipartite on scores that repeat them- the accompaniment of a cello, and even a selves exactly. On the contrary, the numbers bassoon and a theorbo (and less probably a 5,10 and 11 are completely bipartite, which trombone). Here is the order: is to say, they are composed of two differ- ent parts both poetry and music; only one 1. “Stabat Mater”, soprano and contralto; section characterizes numbers 12 and 13, 2. “Cuius animam”, soprano; almost inevitable since it is a unique stanza 3. “O quam tristis”, soprano and contralto; in the first case and a unique word in the 4. “Quae moerebat”, contralto; second. Section number 9 is also unique, 5. “Quis est homo”, soprano and contralto; although it even includes five stanzas and 6. “Vidit suum dulcem Natum”, soprano; appears as the longest, most free and varied 7. “Eja Mater”, contralto; among others. 8. “Fac ut ardeat”, soprano and contralto; Is this work of divine Pergolesi sacred mu- 9. “Sancta Mater”, soprano and contralto; sic? Yes, absolutely. Just where the highest 10. “Fac ut portem”, contralto; inspiration wraps the word with intensively 11. “Inflammatus et accensus”, dramatic music but also where the voice soprano and contralto; moves according to that late-baroque ab- 12. “Quando corpus morietur”, straction that is also a part of operatic, pro- soprano and contralto; fane or devotional music, whatever it may 13. “Amen”, soprano and contralto. be; and, as sacred music, then, would excel- lently figure during the liturgy. However, if Despite the equal presence of monodies or La serva padrona, a score created as a cou-

20 ple of opera seria intermezzos, has become the first page of a very popular text (perhaps a small separate opera, a true and fortunate due to the papal readmission). Much short- small comedy, the Stabat Mater can also ap- er than Pergolesi’s version, and for this rea- pear as a blessed concert music. In this case, son rather compact, Caldara’s Stabat Mater it also exalts better its profound, distinctive draws a certain unit from the frequency of vagueness and deep expressiveness. the ternary rhythm, the constancy of the Tempo Lento (Largo, Adagio, Andante). Its 3. The fruitful Caldara tone is less sharp and more soft, typical of Some months after Pergolesi’s death, Calda- the eighteenth rather than the nineteenth ra also died; of course, the two representa- century (that is to say, not too sensitive to tives of Italian late Baroque were not peers, Rameau’s “naturalness” or Bach’s norm), since Giambattista died at age 26 and Anto- played around G minor. The division of text nio at age 66. After short working periods in often very short sections is possible thank in several Italian and foreign cities, in 1716 to the fast change of the performers, while Antonio Caldara (Venice 1670-Vienna 1736) the rhythms are unitary and lower in num- dwelled in Vienna, and worked there for ber (those indicated in n° 1,9,11 and 14 con- the following twenty years as imperial vice- tinue in the following numbers; only n° 8 is conductor under Fux, Emperor Charles VI’s separate): protégé. As opera composer, he first set to music dif- 1. “Stabat Mater”, Adagio, chorus; ferent texts such as those of Zeno or Metas- 2. “Cuius animam”, soprano, contralto, tasio, regularly staging Metastasio’s operas tenor, bass; for the Emperor or the Empress’ birthdays 3. “Quis est homo”, soprano; or name days. Despite his Venetian educa- 4. “Vidit suum dulce Natum”, contralto; tion, he also absorbed the Neapolitan vocal 5. “Eja Mater”, tenor and bass»; system and the instrumental tradition of 6. “Fac ut ardeat”, soprano and contralto; Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna. He pub- 7. “Sancta Mater”, chorus; lished a number of collections of masses, 8. “Tui Nati vulnerati”, Largo, tenor; motets, cantatas, sonatas, but wrote even 9. “Fac me tecum pie flere”, more, leaving about 3,400 works. Apart Andante, chorus; from love and celebrative cantatas, he com- 10. “Juxta Crucem”, soprano, contralto posed 42 oratorios and 78 melodramas, and bass; ever improving his relevance in instrumental 11. “Virgo virginum”, Largo-Adagio, chorus; and counterpoint technique on the base of 12. “Fac ut portem”, contralto; traditional melody and vocalization. He first 13. “Flammis ne urar”, soprano and bass; set to music the operas Demetrius, Hadrian 14. “Christe, cum sit hinc exire”, in Syria, Olympiade, Demofonte, The Clem- Adagio, chorus; ency of Titus, The Chinese Women, Achilles 15. “Quando corpus morietur – Amen”, on Skyros (in 1736, for the wedding of the Adagio-Andante, chorus. Archduchess Maria Theresa of Hapsburg, Emperor Charles’s daughter, with Francis I The text novelty of the penultimate verse is of Lorraine) and Metastasio’s Themistocles. evident, since, entirely, it sounds as follows: Among all these great works by Metastasio, “Christe, cum sit hinc exire, / Da per Matrem as music poet he also embraced the ancient venire / Ad palmam victoriae” (Lit. “Christ, Jacopone da Todi, who at that time was when it comes [the time] to exit from here, nothing but a name (neither certain as au- let me achieve the palm of victory through thor of the sequence) though it stood up on the Virgin Mother”). Here is another textual

21 variant: “fac me Cruce inebriari” becomes don Magnifico and don Profondo, he was a “et cruore inebriari” and “Inflammatus et controversial artist, an anxious and desper- accensus” becomes “flammis ne urar - ac ate man, a figure pitifully suited his world census”. and its aesthetic. Born in Pesaro in 1792, In Caldara, brevity does not mean simplic- he died in 1869 in Paris, and was active in ity, nor of course oversimplification: there theatre only from 1810 to 1829, author of are four soloists and the chorus intervenes some forty operas both comic and serious, repeatedly, inter alia to open and close. Be- as well as semi-serious among the most sides the strings, the instruments employed proficient and durable in the history of this also include trombones, leaving the bass to genre. Still popular today, and extraordinary the keyboard, to the cello, of course and popular at that time, apart from his most freely to the bassoon. Vocal writing is a core important opera, Rossini also tested himself element, often syllabic, even if incline to the with church and chamber music. If the late style of melisma with regard to contralto Péchés de vieillesse are whimsical music for (for instance, on the word “cruore”, the voice or voice and piano, whose titles say it ever flowing blood). The initial imitation is all about certain brilliant bourgeois trend perfect, passing the two key words from so- but also about his human and creativedeca - prano to four-voice bass in the time of four dence, the major sacred, mature, late mu- measures; the examples of perfect chord sic, or however successive to his theatrical are multiple, especially at the level of those triumphs, reveals as well a troubled and of- “tutti” that almost appear to be the refrains ten tormented soul. A personality piercingly of a concerto grosso (until the final Amen). split between old and new, in a nutshell, an The way the singing shapes the word is actu- insecure, nervous, usually even contradic- ally sensitive: “o quam tristis et afflicta” is a tory man. verse that starts with an augmented octave When he was well into his seventies (unex- and ends with a diminished octave, though pectedly also for him) he started work on inside this interval falls with semitones in the Petite messe solennelle (another strange order to express accurately the sadness and title, with a nice oxymoron between the two the sorrow. Nor among several examples, it adjectives), composed for soloists, chorus, can help standing out just at the beginning, two pianos, a harmonium and demanded where the stillness of the Mother next to for a private performance, a chamber one, the Cross is depicted with a quick descend- in the house of a Parisian noblewoman ing rhythm, as if the eye fell on the Mother before few guests. It was 1864 and he did from above the Cross, and intervals are not hesitate to forbid other executions but unfortunately less or even painfully dimin- when, some years later, feeling death ap- ished. proaching and afraid that, sooner or later, some “modern” colleague would arrange 4. Gioachino towards the sacred it for great romantic orchestra, perhaps Rossini has never set a Requiem to music, in Berlioz style, he arranged his beautiful hence he never obliged himself to sing “Tre- obsolete mass (one of the twenty rich and mens factus sum ego, et timeo”, but many varied masses on the catalogue) himself. He times, in his long life, he felt those sensa- did it in the old-fashioned way, and how- tions, and lived those emotions. The author ever, he forbade even one unique execution of the funniest and most extravagant mu- (after his death, on 13 November, the opera sic one could ever imagine, from the con- finally appeared on the following 24 Febru- certato of the Italian Girl in Algiers to the ary, posthumous, and received immediate rhymes of opera buffa characters such as appreciation).

22 Once he gave up the stage after the William ous comparison. However, the Archdeacon Tell in 1829 (though without too much con- of Madrid insisted and he, besides being a viction), Rossini, barely forty, accepted to very good man incapable of saying no, was set a Stabat Mater to music, but between perhaps a little crazy as well. Eventually he a first (though partial) and a second version accepted, on condition that only the client he waited about ten years. Was it down to had access to the work, he returned to Paris, lumbago? Did he have other personal, mari- worked hard and felt pleased of the gener- tal or economic problems? Other operative ous idea to prefer this Mother and this Son and organizational commitments? Not at all. to any other noblewoman or heroic knight Rossini managed to work again on his for- typical of melodrama (of course he remem- gotten opera sooner after he had accepted bered his beloved mother, Anna Guidarini, the onerous direction of the Bologna Phil- who died four years before). He arranged harmonic high school. Was he actually a some pieces of Jacopone da Todi’s vener- director? Never. He was only a “perpetual able sequence (probably numbers 1 and 5-9 advisor”, one more play on words by the out of the total ten) then he felt tired and one who arranged onomatopoeias as “in my left his sleeves rolling down to his hands, head a bell is ringing with a maddening din which were already immobile and useless. din” and then tac tac, cra cra, boom boom However, Madrid was impatient so the mas- (as in cited in the finale of the Italian Girl in ter, gathering his courage, resorted to the Algiers). Nevertheless, here is the prehis- practice of “pastiche”, more or less as old as tory of Stabat Mater (according to tradi- the genre of the opera: another composer tion, the title is meant to be masculine, as would arrange the remaining parts, for ex- every “piece” of music, though sometimes ample, his friend of a similar age, and fel- it is read as feminine, giving for granted its low disciple Giovanni Tadolini set to work affinity to the genre of the sequence, as you eagerly with decently results. will see). So he did, to Varela’s partial satisfaction The rather long genetic chronicle of the score (first in Madrid, in the Chapel of S. Felipe confirms it all (when the specific bibliogra- el Real on Good Friday 1833) and with an phy, quite brief today, will be long as well, inevitable artistic gap, though less evident all the vicissitudes will be easier to under- stylistic difference. This situation went on stand). In 1831, Rossini followed his friend for several years. For Rossini, these were Jorge de Aguado, banker and Marquess of marked by the Soirées musicales, his stable las Marismas, to Spain and in Madrid, where return to Bologna (where he studied and his operas had been popular since at least lived many years), the divorce from his wife 1816, receiving a triumphal welcome (as Isabella Colbran, his father’s death and the elsewhere, indeed). Apart from being highly news that, after Varela’s death, his noble praised, he also had a concrete offer: Don heirs sold the Stabat Mater to someone Manuel Fernández Varela asked him to ar- who had an even more noble intention to range the ancient text of Stabat Mater. transform the manuscript in a tempting Gioachino knew it, especially the Pergolesi music printing. Hence, in 1839, just after version (that Paisiello had updated since accepting the office at the Bologna high 1810 for the feast of the Mother of Sorrows school, and feeling his health getting worse, in Naples cathedral) since he worked on it he wanted to roll up those blessed sleeves in 1736 (shortly before he died at the age and compose the remaining music, substi- of 26), and of course, he remembered won- tuted it for Tadolini’s, and while Troupenas dering about who would be fool enough to was publishing it, he required the entire arrange it again, thus standing the ardu- score to be performed in public in 1842.

23 The performance took place in Paris at the lustrious fellow (as he had been since 1806) Théâtre Italien on 7 January, in Bologna at in music. the Archiginnasio on 21 March (one of the 5. An overview of Rossini’s work two previous Italian performances, in Milan, Some influential propaedeutic remarks: had no female chorus and the other, in Flor- “Premendo a fondo l’acceleratore, aggiun- ence, was private), in Vienna on 3 May. At geremmo non conoscere altro lavoro ros- the age of 50, Rossini completed the first of siniano del pari invaso di una tale ansia his major sacred works that often excellent incontenibile di comunicazione espressiva, singers performed: Giulia Grisi, Emma How- riversata in un’invenzione corrusca e com- son, Giovanni Matteo de Candia, known as patta come lava vulcanica. […] Mai come in Mario, and Antonio Tamburini (the first and questa pagina [Quando corpus morietur], the fourth voice already committed to Bell- che suona come vivo brandello palpitante ini’s Puritani and both, with the third, near strappato dai precordii del suo artefice, ci to performing Donizetti’s Don Pasquale) in è forse dato di attingere all’enigma profon- Paris. Clara Novello, Clementina degli Anto- do della sua creatività” (Carli Ballola).2 Did ni, Nicola Ivanov, Pompeo Belgioioso in Bo- Wagner such profane censure sacred mu- logna. The Archiginnasio choir also featured sic? Heine defended it with the usual irony Carlo Zucchelli, the famous singing bass, against real and third-rate critics. Nor did one of the best interpreters of The Barber Verdi have any doubts about Stabat Mater of Seville and Marietta Alboni, sixteen-year and Petite messe solennelle: “io […] credo old contralto with a bright Rossinian future. nel valor musicale di quei due componi- Over ten years had passed since his last the- menti, e specialmente nei pezzi a voci sole atrical work, apart from isolated fragments, nella cui distribuzione e collocazione Rossini but before that formidable composer start- è tanto grande da superare forse perfino gli ed to write again, at least another fifteen Italiani antichi”.3 years should pass. Meanwhile, the path of Created for two sopranos (first and second, Italian music move forward: in Bologna the the latter surely equivalent to mezzo-so- Stabat Mater was conducted by Donizetti, prano, and of course also contralto), tenor, who in Milan had just attended a much bass, 4 mixed-voice chorus and orchestra appreciate Nabucco by a certain Giuseppe (2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, Verdi, at the Scala theatre. When Rossini 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, timpani died, on the above-mentioned 13 Novem- and strings), the Rossini Stabat Mater devel- ber 1868, Verdi himself promoted a great ops in ten numbers as follows: Requiem in his memory. It actually should appear as a collaboration between several 1. Introduction, Stabat Mater dolorosa authors, a sort of “pastiche”, and though be- (chorus, tenor and orch.); ing composed it never saw the light in those 2. Aria, Cuius animam gementem years (later Verdi, fed up, held his part and (tenor and orch.); included it in his Manzonian Requiem) and had to wait over a century, until 1988 (in 2 Lit. “Flooring the accelerator, we should add that we do not Stuttgart and Parma). The town of Bologna know another Rossinian work so overwhelmed with uncontrol- lable anxiety of expressive communication, poured over an inven- wanted to compose another Requiem Mass tion as blazing and compact as volcanic lava. […] nowhere as in this in Rossini’s memory thanks to its Philhar- page [quando corpus morietur], that sounds as lively, palpitating shreds torn from its creator’s chest, we are allowed to draw from monic Academy, and managed to do it in a the profound enigma of his creativity” (Carli Ballola). very short time: on 9 December 1868, less 3 Lit.”I […] believe in the musical value of those two compositions than a month after his death, the church of and especially in the parts for solo voices, whose distribution and collocation Rossini is so good at that perhaps he even outdoes an- S. Giovanni in Monte celebrated its most il- cient Italian writers”.

24 3. Duet, Quis est homo, qui non fleret not to contradict. The instrumental part is (soprano I and II and orch.); typical of Rossini’s operas, for instance Ve- 4. Aria, Pro peccatis suae gentis netian operas such as Tancredi (2 horns and (bass and orch.); no trombones) Roman operas such as Cin- 5. Chorus and recitative,Eja Mater fons derella (idem), Parisian ones as Le siege de amoris (a cappella chorus and bass); Corinthe (drum, bass drum and snare drum 6. Quartet, Sancta Mater, istud agas in addition). Bellini’sNorma , considering the (soprano I and II, tenor, bass and orch); date of the first edition, shares the same -or 7. Cavatina, Fa cut portem Christi mortem chestra with Stabat Mater, and in addition, (soprano II and orch); bass drum, cymbal and harp, while Verdi’s 8. Aria and chorus, Inflammatus and Nabucco, considering the date of the sec- accensus (soprano I, chorus and orch.); ond version, only adds a cymbal. 9. Quartet, Quando corpus morietur (soprano I and II, a cappella 6. For a partial reading tenor and bass); The introduction starts with some thirty 10. Final, In sempiterna saecula. Amen instrumental measures, a long Andantino (soprano I and II, tenor, bass, chorus moderato in G minor and 6/8 time: almost and orch.). imperceptible, the theme originates from cellos and bassoons that rise and harp in Some basic element of cohesion and charac- Pianissimo, to be soon joined by the oboe, terization should be presented before draw- clarinet and flute. Here it comes, the cho- ing an interpretation. With regard to voices, rus, sotto voce and in fake canon singing each soloist has his own solo, the only duet the first stanza from the bottom to the top, involving the ladies, the gentlemen re- Stabat Mater, immediately insisting on the gain the tenor with a solo in the introduc- adjective “grieving”, then opening up in tion and the bass with a recitative, atrio Fortissimo, with even seven D in unison on is lacking but there are two quartets (one the dramatic words “on which her Son was a cappella). Choral parts are frequent (one hanging” (the catalectic trochaic tetrameter, a cappella) enough to demarcate the solo seven syllables worthy of seven notes). Gen- part worthily, in the beginning and in the erally, it has a style that is indeed polyphon- end, until ascending to a level of centrality ic, but remains homorhythmic and equal, perfectly plausible with a religious composi- though marked with variations. Conse- tion. Among the tempos, there are a Largo, quently, the tenor takes the stage, singing a an Adagio, an Allegro (in the end), four cases sort of arietta on a rhythm already heard in of Allegretto (two maestosi and two mode- the orchestral introduction, but the conclu- rati), an Andantino moderato and four cases sion pertains to the chorus that, by repeat- of Andante (especially in the second half, ing the world “Son”, cannot help embitter- two mossi, one maestoso and one grazioso) ing it with strong dissonance, and in the end with the prevalence of a poised medietas also performs a quick crescendo. Essentially, of ensemble between slow and rarely fast it is a subdued, doleful, dismayed introduc- parts. As for tonalities, there is a prevalence tion worthy of the comparison with the fa- of minor (A flat), flat minor (in particular mous and upsetting “scene of the darkness” G flat minor opening and closing, C minor that insinuates in the biblical grandeur and D minor) and flats in general (three A of Moses in Egypt (and the French-styled flat major and one F major) with an arioso Moïse et Pharaon). effect and intense lyricism that certain dra- The tenor’s aria, that lasts three stanzas, is matic parts have the power to change but sinuous and cabalistic, vibrating with the-

25 atrical features. And indeed, this Allegretto and Tancredi for instance, or Semiramide maestoso in A flat major bemoaning Cuius and Arsace; the female duet, who wonder animam, was and still is the target, the won- Quis est homo, boats a liquid, cantabile derful target of a reasonable purist critic melody that flows on the agitated rhythm who knows very well and claims the distinc- of a particularly dense orchestra with short tions between sacred and profane music, sounds, though syllabic, composed, nobly church and stage (as well as chamber) style, as well. Where the beginning Largo in E ma- religious and operatic melody. Despite the jor for four horns and bowed instruments frequent verbal and sound repetitions, it sounds first asa “moment of contemplation, consists of three parts where the two be- instant of transcendence from the earthly” ginnings of a new verse (Cuius animam and and then as “awakening to the human real- Quae morebat in major) develops around a ity of tragedy, starting from the very strong central verse (O quam tristis in minor). How- fit of the entire orchestra in a sudden as- ever, the pressure that the signs of sforzando cending chromatic cadence” (Rognoni). operate in Forte on the word “gladius”, the The final cadence trills twice for two voices final word of the first stanza and on its syn- that relate to the most typical composition tactic subject, should be sufficient to reveal of belcanto, but at the end the part of the or at least suggest the presence of a general second voice is a little denser than the first. dramatic feeling, not necessarily theatrical, As had already happened in the eighteenth to the rest of the number as well. Is this Cui- century, between Francesca Cuzzoni clear us animam a Cabaletta? Is it perhaps a du- tone and Faustina Bordoni low one, there is plicate of “Corriam, voliam”, the cabaletta no reason to “maintain” or emphasize more for tenor of William Tell? On condition that, the highest voice and, undoubtedly (even if the tempo does not become Allegro, the not only for this of course) Rossini here pre- phrasing remains that of “piano legato” and fers to evoke Händel, the famous patron of the hammering accent avoids any tone of the two mentioned divas and rivals, rather superficial exuberance, so that the piece than anticipate Verdi. would still belong to a specific expressive Once the Ladies have poured out, here musicality, of religious as well. Or is it not comes another Gentleman. The aria of the true that the ascendant, sharp puntato, also bass cries Pro peccatis with a majestic Al- for octaves, has a sort of illustrative feature, legretto in A minor and major starting on a lust like a sword that hits and hits again, roll of timpani alternated to bowed instru- deeply wounding a poor body? If the sword, ments, and rises to a tenuto chord of wood- the famous gladius, then, comes later, actu- winds and brasses. Since a certain baroque ally at the end, better so, since its lethal ac- rhythmic still persists, that of Händel for ex- tion is described first by music and then by ample, the two stanzas enlarge in four small words. On the contrary, at the opera’s court, parts, where each second part repeats the a prosecutor who perhaps wears blinkers text of the first, only changing mode and could vehemently recall the names of the melody, while the meter is very similar to first tenors who sang theStabat Mater. Two that of Cuius Animam (though remarkably high note masters as Mario, the Sardinian passing to 4/4 and 3/4). Moreover, each first and Ivanov, the Russian to whom is destined stanza, so stubbornly dotted, has something a sudden high D flat (by the way after the of the tenor’s aria, as quick and augmented affectation of a small group), on the word as it is (though also descending, later). “incliti” at the end of the lyric. Since it is not The fifth compositional number is particu- possible to forget about some leading-ladies larly original. Opening on a minor and clos- who often sing in duet, such as Amenaide ing on a major, Eja Mater is considered as

26 a chorus for solo voices and recitative for This is a unique pride of the eternal, inde- bass, but in the meantime the soloist is care- structible Italian ability to sing. ful not to “act” and rather tends to phrase After a long wait, the second or mezzo-so- and declaim in arioso. In addition, the en- prano claims two stanzas, Fa cut portem and semble is so good at changing and altering Fac me plagis singing nothing less than a Ca- tempos, rhythm and tones with remarkable vatina, an Andante grazioso in 6/8 modulat- ease. Here they come: Andante mosso in D ed from the minor (C#) to the corresponding minor and tempo perfetto, Allegretto mod- major (E). It is still composed of three parts, erato in C major and 6/8 (with regular in- and the theme is doubled but when the very tervals of seventh, octave and tenth down- ancient aba scheme is confirmed, it occurs wards). Andante again, Adagio in F major on that the second a has the words of b and the final “ut sibi complaceam” (“sibi” a Da- the melody of the first a. The iambic pace tive of third person pronoun that in classic is then remarkable, “fac út portém” and so Latin would be “ei”, Allegretto, Andante and it be at the cost of overwhelming the poor Adagio again. The expressivity of the words Latin; the scansion is characteristic because “in á-/-mandó / Chri-stúm / De-úm” is also it also enjoys a ninth or a twelfth; the - ex worth mentioning, with sudden and iambic tension is classic, from low B to high G flat octave diminutions. (except the pre final corona and its ability to improvise). The caption? Cavatina, this 7. Santa Madre so be it time, should only mean little cavata, a short The Sancta Mater quartet stretches over five piece highlighting the solo virtues of a voice stanzas, to give each voice the chance to ex- already heard in ensemble. press itself without sacrifice. In order, there The antepenultimate and penultimate are the tenor, the first soprano, the bass, the stanza of this Stabat Mater belong to the second soprano (only the tenor sings as so- soprano (with chorus), who on a still dotted loist, however, the successive voices follow a trill of brass starts with Inflammatus et ac- previous one that is never silent), and when census in alto and Forte with full emphasis, the bass resumes the first theme solo, then the sturdiness premise to a firm Andante the real quartet begins, a voice overlap- maestoso teso soloists-choral, while the ping, sometimes quite animated sometimes tempo ascends from the minor (c) to its ma- disciplined in harmonious verticality. Nei- jor counterpart (C). If the chorus repeats the ther is this theme beyond reproach for its varied and compact chord until it reaches operatic fluency, and of course, the severe the unison, though through instable triplets, counterpoint of Father Martini, master of the soprano vibrates on the augmented trill Mattei who was Rossini’s master, has disap- (four trills repeated twice) and rises to the peared somewhere in this centrifugal text. very high C. Is all this theatre, scene, music In general, it is true that the author’s classic and drama, melodrama? Since the text al- vein never complies with a materially real- ready prays to the Virgin for all humanity, istic dramatic style, but it is not impossible asking her to exercise her Son’s death as that once again the author was conquered pledge for absolution on doomsday. Hence, by the lyric’s continuation, that talks about trumpets are needed from the ancient Ca- flere, condolere and plangere (to tear, moan rissimi to every possible Requiem. together, cry loud). He reacted to all this Perhaps the tradition of a cappella sing- melting his heart in the touching, gentle, ing is doomed to end, the stylus antiquus melodious fluency of an authentic, -restor exalted by Renaissance, Baroque and Clas- ative belcanto, also thank to the round A flat sicism masters (here, Carli Ballola quotes major that initiates the Allegretto moderato. some “evil spirits” such as Monteverdi and

27 Cherubini). The second quartet, Andante in end a piece. In sempiterna saecula sings the G minor Quando corpus morietur, sings a final chorus, great Allegro in G minor (as the chromatic, uneven, sharp melody and- tra initial Andante) which orders the four voices ditionally develops isolating the bass, cou- and moves, urges, intersects, literally sets pling the mezzo-soprano and tenor to the them in “fuga” on a stream of eight notes bass then adding the soprano and eventu- and sometimes central, uniform, vocalized ally gathering all four parts in the central and almost medieval semiquavers. The An- registers. Then, the first soprano, who has dante moderato of the true Amen in 6/8 is been the last voice to intervene, will also more careful, while the first tempo floridly be the last to pronounce the text, and for resumed is in Animato. Nevertheless, the this reason, she rushes to pronounce every- richness of writing never establishes major thing over the mezzo-soprano and tenor’s mode to augment: absolutely, besides let- slow vocalizations, while the bass holds ting some initial thematic cues emerge, Ros- dominant for almost seven measures. In sini’s Stabat Mater ends in the classic mea- the meantime, the text has reached “a pu- sure of minor mode and counterpoint style, rity that goes beyond any model and idea of in the same sense of character and level of style and taste” and has become “one of the writing in which it had begun. Praise to clear deepest openings of Rossini’s soul, after the these shadows with a great soloist, rhyth- operatic renounciation” (Rognoni). mic and melodic liveliness, and, why not, In sacred music, only an Amen can actually even melodramatic in some middle parts.

Appendix Score and volgarizzamento

On 1 February 1843, Rossini performed the Stabat Mater in his native Pesaro for a charity event, as had already taken place in Bologna. On that occasion, Giovanni Marchetti’s Score and Volgarizzamento, to wit the Latin text divided in all its parts, and Marchetti’s Italian translation were printed. Here, they were printed again to ease the reading and the hearing (in Bologna, a first edition of the brochure in 1100 copies sold out).

I. Introduction Stabat Mater dolorosa Stava immersa in doglia e in pianto Juxta Crucem lacrymosa La pia Madre al Figlio accanto Dum pendebat Filius. Mentre il Figlio agonizzò.

II. Aria for tenor Cujus animam gementem, Di Maria l’anima afflitta, Contristatam et dolentem Gemebonda, derelitta, Pertransivit gladius. Una spada trapassò.

O quam tristis et afflicta Come trista ed infelice Fuit illa benedicta Fu la santa Genitrice Mater unigeniti! Dell’unìgeno Figliuol!

28 Quae moerebat et dolebat, Oh quai gemiti traea Et tremebat dum videbat Quando aggiunta in Lui vedea Nati poenas inclyti. Pena a pena, e duolo a duol!

III. Duet for soprano and contralto Quis est homo, qui non fleret, Qual crudel mirar potria Matrem Christi si videret Tanta ambascia di Maria In tanto supplicio? Senza lagrime e sospir? Quis non posset contristari Chi potria con fermo ciglio Piam Matrem contemplari Contemplar la Madre e il Figlio Dolentem cum Filio? A un medesimo martir?

IV. Aria for bass Pro peccatis suae gentis Per gli error di noi rubelli Vidit Jesum in tormentis, Star Gesù sotto i flagelli, Et flagellis subditum. Fra’ tormenti vide star.

Vidit suum dulcem natum Vide il Figlio suo diletto, Moriendo desolatum, Lacerato il molle petto, Dum emisit spiritum. L’egro spirito esalar.

V. Chorus for solo voices and recitative for bass Eja Mater fons amoris, O Maria, fonte d’amore, Me sentire vim doloris Provar fammi il tuo dolore, Fac, un tecum lugeam. Fammi piangere con te.

Fac, ut ardeat cor meum Fa che accendasi il cor mio, In amando Christum Deum, Ch’arda tutto dell’Uom Dio, Ut sibi complaceam. Tal che pago Ei sia di me.

VI. Quartet Sancta Mater, istud agas, Delle man, del sen, de’ piedi Crucifixi fige plagas Tu le piaghe a me concedi, Cordi meo valide. Tu le stampa in questo cor.

Tui nati vulnerati, Del tuo figlio, che il mio bene Tam dignati pro me pati Ricomprò per tante pene, Poenas mecum divide. Fammi parte nel dolor.

Fac ut tecum pie flere, Io sia teco, o Madre, afflitto, Crucifixo condolere Io con Cristo sia trafitto Donec ego vixero. Sino all’ultimo mio dì.

Juxta Crucem tecum stare, Starmi sempre io con te voglio, Et me tibi sociare Tuo compagno nel cordoglio, In planctu desidero. Presso al tronco ov’Ei morì.

29 Virgo Virginum praeclara, Fra le Vergini o preclara, Mihi jam non sis amara, Non mostrarti al prego avara, Fac me tecum plangere. Fammi teco lacrimar.

VII. Cavatina for contralto Fac ut portem Christi mortem, Di Gesù fa mia la sorte, Passionis fac consortem, Fa ch’io senta in me sua morte, Et plagas recolere. Di sua morte al rimembrar.

Fac me plagis vulnerari, Dona a me lo strazio atroce, Fac me Cruce inebriari, M’innamora della Croce Ob amorem Filii. E del sangue di Gesù.

VIII. Aria for soprano and chorus Inflammatus et accensus, Come a noi verrà l’Eterno Per te, Virgo, sim defensus Giudicante, dell’inferno In die Judicii. Scampo al foco mi sii Tu.

Fac me Cruce custodiri, Sieno a me custodi e scorte Morte Christi praemuniri, Quella Croce e quella Morte, Confoveri gratia. Porga man la Grazia a me.

IX. Quartet for solo voices Quando corpus morietur, Quando il corpo egro si muoja, Fac, ut animae donetur Nella gloria nella gioia Paradisi gloria. Venga l’anima con Te.

X. Final chorus In sempiterna saecula Amen.

30 Simone Zacchini The choral music of Friedrich Nietzsche. The cultural environment and the Christmas Oratorio (1860-1861)

1. The University of Halle the creation of the absolute monarchy by Research into the choral and religious mu- Frederick William I who, fascinated and sic composed by Friedrich Nietzsche during impressed by the strictness of pietist edu- his youth, as essential as it might be, must cation, would not only grant them several necessarily face some wider issues such as privileges but also favour their admission the Christian education he received, the to key state positions.3 Only with Frederick Prussian romantic pietism, persistent - ele II would the Great pietism primacy be miti- ments of the late Enlightenment, and the gated thanks to an enlightened and Franco- relationship between music and Lutheran- phile cultural policy. ism. Moreover, any reconstruction, though At the time of Carl Ludwig Nietzsche in rough, should start from the University 1830s, the faculty of Theology was still di- of Halle and from that faculty of Theology vided in these two currents: a persistent where Carl Ludwig Nietzsche, Friedrich’s fa- enlightened rationalism, really weakened ther, studied. As well as Carl Moritz Weber, by that time, and the nineteenth-century the dean of a private institute Nietzsche at- pietism represented by the figure of Fried- tended in Naumburg; Robert Buddensieg, rich August Tholuck, pivotal character in his tutor at the time he attended Pforta high the Prussian academic context. Friedrich school, and many other friends, masters Nietzsche’s education came from the latter, and acquaintances who belonged to the from an idea of Christianity as a “matter of circle of his childhood. heart”, from a primacy of the inwardness When Carl Ludwig Nietzsche arrives at Hal- over any rationalisation, from an absolute le, the cultural situation was very lively and value of music practice. complex, focused on the endless debate 2. The discovery of music between rationalists and pietists. Since its As a child, Nietzsche met music through foundation (1694) by Phillip Jacob Spener, educational frames typical of the Haus- Pietism’s Father, the contrast between faith musik tradition, when his father Carl Ludwig and reason had always been a central topic, Nietzsche sat at the piano and improvised. already animated by the two main pro- This is an element that seems to give an al- tagonists: Hermann Francke, directly called most religious sense to music: for Nietzsche by Spener to teach Theology and Christian it will always be related to important, nearly Wolff, prominent exponent of the German sacred, life experiences. Though self-taught, enlightened rationalism.1 at the end of 1856 he was already able to What happened between Franke and Wolff play Beethoven’s op.79 and several tran- summarises the history of the University scriptions of Haydn symphonies. In 1858, he and the cultural seasons in Prussia.2 Until asked for “extracts for piano of the Requi- the mid 18th century, Pietism was the lead- em [by Mozart] and Haydn’s Creation”4 for ing current, politically intertwined with Christmas, while shortly after he sent off for “Cramer’s studies. Otherwise I forget every-

1 Cfr. H. Freydank, Die Universität Halle, Ihre Anstalten, Institute 3 Cfr. M. Fulbrook, Piety and Politics. Religion and the Rise of Ab- und Kliniken, Stadt und Umgebung, Linder, Düsseldorf 1928, p. 10. solutism in England, Württemberg and Prussia, Cambridge Univer- sity Press, Cambridge 1983, p. 168 and ff. 2 Cfr. W. Schrader, Geschichte der Friedrichs-Universität zu Halle, 2 voll., Ferd. Dümmlers Verlagsbuchhandlung, Berlin 1894. 4 F. Nietzsche, Letters, No.38, p. 33 (letter of 28 November 1858).

31 thing I’ve learnt and lose practice”.5 He will write obscurely” are to be banned. Then if also later recommend an advanced book on Beethoven, Bach, Schubert, Mendelssohn, piano technique to his sister: “once learnt, Haydn and Mozart are the “only pillars” of although they are not easy especially for music, the negative reference for the young beginners, they reward your efforts much Nietzsche is “above all this so called ‘music more than Czerny studies”.6 of the future’ by a Liszt or a Berlioz [that] The idea to compose came to Nietzsche on plans to propose pieces of music that are as a precise date, the 25 May 1854, Ascension eccentric as possible”.9 Day.7 Little Fritz, as he was confidently called In order to completely understand these at home, was not ten yet and is attending early reflections and underline the role -re the celebrations at St. Wenzel church where ligious music played in the first years of his he heard the Hallelujah from Händel’s Mes- life, it is necessary to make a short over- siah. Later he would remember: view of the nineteenth-century heritage I felt myself moved to join the singing, which of pietism, to wit the so-called awakening appeared to me as the Angels choir of joy movements (Erweckungsbewegung). They who accompanied the rise of Jesus Christ arose in central and northern Germany (Sax- to Heaven with their voices. I immediately ony, Thuringia, Silesia, East and West Prus- took the firm decision to compose - some sia) during the Napoleonic occupation and thing similar. When I returned from church, thrived in the aftermath of the expulsion I started working right away and with every of the French invader. The Lutheran awak- new chord I played I felt a childish joy.8 ening in particular, in this area of Germany, By following this story it is also easier to was inseparably joined to music, which thus understand the sense of a brief Nietzsche’s became the vehicle of a new renaissance of consideration written in 1858 and entitled spirituality. These are the first years of ro- Sulla musica (About music) whose main manticism and of the age of several music belief is that “God gave us music firstly to “renaissances” that animated it, especially lead us upwards”. Music, while also having Händel and Palestrina, far before Johann secondary effects, can actually “elevate, Sebastian Bach: music and religion cannot joke, it can amuse us and soften the rud- therefore be separate from this season. est soul with the sweetness of its melan- It is important to say a few words on the cholic notes”, however its “main task is […] first two names since they are crucial in to guide our thoughts upwards, in order to Nietzsche’s music education. Halle, again, elevate us, to touch us in the deep”. From is the city symbol of Nietzsche’s childhood this premise also directly derives the need because Halle, apart from being the place of intelligibility and clarity in music that where all his tutors studied, is also the cen- finds, especially in singing, the most- suit tre of Händel’s renaissance. Concerts dedi- able means to elevate the soul “towards cated to Händel’s music were promoted by the Good and the Truth”. For this reason, all Daniel Gottlob Turk (1750-1813), chorister those “modern composers [that] strive to at the Ulrichskirche of Halle, organist at the Marktkirche, also in Halle and eventually music professor at the university from 1779. 5 F. Nietzsche, Letters, No.50, p. 43 (letter written shortly before 27 January 1859). As a professor, from the early nineteenth

6 F. Nietzsche, Letters, No.63, p. 57 (letter probably written on 3 century, he organized musical entertain- April 1859). ments and the first regular performances of 7 All Nietzsche’s compositions have been edited by C.P. Janz in a critical edition, in F. Nietzsche, Der Musikalische Nachlaß, Bären- reiter, Basel 1977. 9 All the quotes are taken from: Complete Works. Vol. I, t. I, p. 41- 8 Complete Works, vol. I, t. I, p. 32. 42.

32 Händel’s Oratorios,10 really influencing the 1859 to July 1860. The current version of pietist reference par excellence of that time, the fragments of the Mass, as affirmed by that is to say the previously cited theologian Janz himself who edited it, is an assump- Tholuck. tion based on the references that gradually Palestrina’s renaissance, on the contrary, emerge from the diary and letters; its draft- started in Berlin but at the same time fol- ing, in fact, apart from being controversial, lows the path of the awakening movements also lacks a unique and organic work plan. in the Prussian area. In Berlin worked Jo- It consists of 23 pieces among solo, choral hann Friedrich Reichardt (1752-1814), born and orchestral moments. After a long intro- in Königsberg from a family of musicians duction for orchestra, the chorus performs and initially directed towards philosophy a hint of Kyrie, later repeated with a varied by Kant himself. What is interesting about theme as well. Then comes the Gloria and him, here, is a trip to Italy in 1783 where other fragments for orchestra: an Ouverture he discovered Palestrina and brought his for orchestra with an intentional entrance masses to Germany. With reference to of the chorus, the uncompleted Agnus Dei, Bach’s renaissance, the most famous and again a fragment of Kyrie, a short instru- important among romantic renaissances, mental episode at the piano and the only it is necessary to always bear in mind this completed piece of the Mass, the Requiem. lively cultural background and the religious As solo quartet, the Lacrimosa closes the context within which it occurs,11 a context performance, although without the two that would not only influence Nietzsche male voices. The Christmas Oratorio is, on himself but, as said, German romanticism in the other hand, more complete and inter- its entirity. esting. Devised during the summer of 1860, Nietzsche wrote the first two parts between 2. The religious compositions and the Christ- August and October.12 Christmas is the topic mas Oratorio and Haydn’s oratorios are the model. We are Nietzsche’s first experiment of choral music still, at least in the intentions, in the centre composition dates back to years 1858-59. of a world that, despite many more or less It was a fragment in four parts, Es zieht ein critical phases, stands on the tracks of fam- stiller Engel; there follows an attempt of ily and religious tradition. When Nietzsche motet on the melody Jesu meine Zuversicht starts to compose his Oratorio, he is confi- and a further draft entitled Aus der Tiefe dent that “in its genre the Oratorio holds a rufe ich. More refined, on the contrary, was higher place than the opera”. The oratorio the Miserere, an a cappella vocal quintet has “a magnificent simplicity, and it should dated 4 July 1860. be so in fact, as music that elevates the spirit The attention to the forms of religious mu- and elevates it precisely in a strictly religious sic finds its climax in the project and drafts sense”.13 for a Mass. A broad program of composi- From the letters of this period it is clear tions occupied the young Nietzsche for several months, probably from December 12 The first part, according to Janz reconstruction, is Einleitung und Chor “Hüter ist die Nacht bald hin”. “It starts with nostalgic, 10 Cfr. W. Serauky, Musikgeschichte der Stadt Halle, Max Nie- obscure and mysterious sonority at the piano, that in the absence meyer, Halle 1942. of a real narrator (the historicus), connects the different vocal

11 parts of the Oratorio, evoking, commenting and symbolizing the It was Zelter to create the prerequisites along with Mendels- events that take place in it”, M. Berrini, The Weihnachtsoratorium sohn, of the Bach Renaissance. They were also assisted by Adolf by Friedrich Nietzsche, in “Civiltà musicale” (2000), 41, XV, p. 108; Marx, a music critic, editor of the Allgemeine Musikalische the second is composed by Hirtenchor, Sternerwartung, Gesang Zeitung. The Passion according to Matthew was executed by des Mohren, Instrumentalstück. Mendelssohn (11 and 21 March 1829), who had already known the score since 1823, thanks to his grandmother who used to 13 F. Nietzsche, Letters, n. 203, pp. 136-139 (letter of 14 January collect Bach’s manuscripts. 1861).

33 that J. S. Bach’s Weihnachtoratorium is not perfection of sixteenth-century Catholic po- among Nietzsche’s early inspirational mod- lyphony. Nietzsche considers them as an ab- els. In fact, Gustav Krug, a musician friend, solute sonorous mirror of a divine thought recommends the renowned Bach’s piece of beyond every confession. music to Nietzsche in a letter of the end of However, something was changing in the November 1860, after he listened to it dur- existence of this tormented young man. A ing a concert in Leipzig. Krug actually sug- certain anxiety arose during the Easter holi- gested he draw inspiration from Bach for the days (March 1861). Some argument with his score, whose choice should have been not a mother were likely to happen if he writes: small problem. Moreover, it was bound to “I also have the impression that Easter holi- be so, since the oratorio is open and narra- days, usually so beautiful, have been ruined tively structured, without the liturgical obli- and overshadowed by those unpleasant gations of the mass. On 3 December 1860, incidents and, every time I think about it, he asked his mother for the Song of Songs as I deeply suffer for making you so sad.16 He gift for Christmas, “where all the songs are continues, though without much conviction, collected with their original form” and he to compose parts of the Oratorio, more and emphasizes: “furthermore I absolutely need more disconnected. A Mariae Verkündi- it also for another reason, I can’t reveal you gung he resumed and edited many times, in now”;14 between the lines it is possible to several versions, one of which with a final understand the above mentioned difficulty fugue, kept him busy between January and regarding the drafting of the composition. May 1861. The third part composed by Chorsätze “Ge- Other signs of an interest that starts to benedeit” und “Einen Propheten” dates grow out of the German religious world back to December. can be seen in a work that dates back to Between January and March 1861 some rel- 24 March of that year, entitled Die Kinder- evant events occur, crucial if read in the light hait der Völker, and, about a month later, of his following biography. As seen, religious the translation of Sechs serbische Volkslie- music for Nietzsche is not mere accompa- der. Shortly after, he would abandon the niment to the score, and its development Oratorio to dedicate himself completely to definitely sets it apart from the opera, which a vast project of a symphonic poem on the on the contrary follows the inverse path. Es- sequence of events, mythical more than his- pecially to safeguard the narrative unity, the torical, of the saga of Ermanaric, the Goth Oratorio did not have to be fragmented in king and hero who would rather kill himself small parts, as happens with the arias in the than succumb to Attila, and on the music opera: “I am confident that the entire work model of the Hungaria by the same Listz he should be divided in few parts, although had banned from music a few years before. longer, linked to the course of the events Hence, a sudden entry in the pagan and bar- and with an absolutely united character”.15 baric world of the German Middle Ages, and This unity, linguistic simplicity and intelligi- an almost complete change of music tastes bility, more programmatic than actually de- that takes Nietzsche from the renaissance veloped by Nietzsche in his Oratorio, form polyphony to the obscure symbolic forest of part of a religious aesthetic that recalls Pal- romanticism. estrina and evokes the stylistic and formal Indeed, something really had happened: Nietzsche had listened to Wagner’s music 14 F. Nietzsche, Letters, n. 197, pp. 132-133 (letter of 3 December for the first time. A listening to the Tristan 1860).

15 F. Nietzsche, Letters, n. 203, pp. 136-139 (letter of 14 January 1861). 16 F. Nietzsche, Letters, n. 230, pp. 153-154 (letter of April 1861).

34 and Iseult piano reduction dates back to March of that year, a work that would im- mediately project him in another cultural background, thus separating his music and religious experiences forever. From this mo- ment on the religious music gives way to ro- mantic compositions, and his spiritual world would change forever; but this is a chapter of a very different story. To conclude this es- say it is possible to quote an extract from Ecce homo of 1888, 27 years later, when he writes: “the moment when a transcription for piano of the Tristan appeared – congrat- ulations, Mr Bülow! – I became an admirer of Wagner”.17

17 F. Nietzsche, Ecce homo, Adelphi, Milan 1994, p. 46.

35 SUNDAY 24 AUGUST 2014 - AREZZO ROUND TABLE “Thirty Years of FENIARCO”

Speeches by Carlo Pedini - President of Guido d’Arezzo Foundation, Piero Caraba Art Director of Guido d’Arezzo Foundation, Sante Fornasier - President of FENIARCO, Mauro Chiocci - former Vice President of FENIARCO, Fernando Catacchini President of Tuscan Choirs Association (ACT). Moderator: Claudio Santori

SANTORI – Good evening everybody, I am to recall that thanks to FENIARCO, which if very pleased to open a round table that I remember well also counts Luciano Chilly is the first official event of the 62nd Guido among its Presidents, choral activity has d’Arezzo Polyphonic Contest. This round made great strides. Before giving the floor table is important since it celebrates thirty to Fernando Catacchini, President of the years of the FENIARCO foundation, the Na- Tuscan Choirs Association, I would like to tional Federation of the Regional Choral -As invite the director Piero Caraba to say a few sociation. So, I’ll immediately give the floor word as choirmaster and art director of the to the Director Carlo Pedini, President of the Guido d’Arezzo Foundation, as well as newly Guido d’Arezzo Foundation. appointed director of the Conservatory of PEDINI – Since this is a round table, the idea Perugia. is to listen not to the reports, but to the sto- CARABA – On this occasion, I would like to ries of those who took part in the constitu- speak not as artistic director of the Foun- tion of FENIARCO and carried out their activ- dation, but as a choirmaster. If there is one ities for almost thirty years. People who visit thing I would like to underline about the rel- Arezzo know very well the importance of evance of FENIARCO, one I often repeat to the Federation in the life and development choristers, it is that the Federation makes us of the entire Italian amateur choral activity, feel less alone. The moment when you feel and how it has become home to all those you can share intentions, efforts, and that who work with choirs. The fact that FENI- there is a regional choirs association, and a ARCO has been administratively established national association that includes it, we are in Arezzo gives us an additional reason to aware that we are not alone in a passion to remember this event: I have intentionally which we dedicate our time and energy. This used the word “administratively” because sense of belonging to FENIARCO creates a the notarial deed was signed thirty years shared enthusiasm where common aims be- ago, right here in Arezzo, in January 1984. come further grounds for enthusiasm. For This is the reason why I kindly welcome our this reason, I see in FENIARCO, apart from guests who will help us to tell this story. an important instrument both for directors SANTORI – As President Pedini said, FENI- who improve their knowledge and for choirs ARCO was founded in Arezzo. It is no secret that receive information, an effective engine that, in the past years, Italian choral activ- of passion and collective sharing. In times ity has not improved as in other countries when sharing is sometimes a critical aspect less developed than ours. The importance of communication, I believe an organization of the presence of such an organization is that helps to share and increase this passion therefore immediately clear. I would like is a pivotal element.

36 Professor Santori then gives the floor to this protocol, the Tuscan Choirs Association Fernando Catacchini, President of Tuscan could proudly reach schools, add its own Choirs Association. teaching activities to the POF (teaching -ac CATACCHINI – My first contact with FENI- tivities plan), and manages to carry out most ARCO occurred here in , during the of them in several Tuscan schools. More- National Assembly our Regional Association over, Tuscany is implementing a specific hosted in Siena in the year 2000 where the collaboration with its national federation then President Alfredo Palmieri invited me, to promote choral activities in schools, and as Regional Councilor, to participate in the for young people: the Spring Festival. This organization. Beside the great success of the national event, unique in this sector, takes meeting, where we perfectly played our role place here in Tuscany (originally in Folloni- as hosts providing an excellent welcome ca, and today in Montecatini) on two April (also favoured by the beauty of the town), I weekends, and is the result of a collabora- was impressed by the works of the Assembly tion between ACT and FENIARCO. The per- that I carefully followed while sitting by the fect organization, both artistic and logistic secretary’s desk. What impressed me most, of which FENIARCO is certainly the most im- apart from the number of topics, events and portant actor, together with the well-known meetings under discussion, was the level of Tuscan welcome and the beauty of our ter- these topics and the professional behavior ritory, have determined a steady increase of shown in dealing with them. participations (1500 students/choristers), a Personally, I was used (but maybe all of us warm appreciation of the event, and also a were) to something quite different. In that bit of envy from others. moment, apart from the President Fornasi- I want to close these brief remarks, other- er, I met many fine people and among them, wise it would sound like we are blowing our I especially remember the directors Aldo own trumpet, since I do not consider myself Cicconofri and Domenico Cieri. and the whole of Tuscany as “partners of Since 2005, when I was elected President FENIARCO”, but I identify both of us with of Tuscany, it has been an honour for me to it. For this reason, I would like to conclude be a member of FENIARCO National Assem- by highly praising Tuscany and the vision of bly, in which I have actively and constantly the formers Presidents of the regional asso- participated for about 10 years. I must ad- ciation. Not by chance, we celebrate these mit that, from that time, among the several thirty years here in Arezzo. In fact, I want to regional activities carried out, the majority recall and testify how much Tuscany, then of them arose from similar experiences de- guided by the President Vittorino Moratti veloped in “FENIARCO world”, or driven and who was supported by a group whose favoured by some acknowledgement or nor- members numbered Giancarlo Pagni, Pro- mative concession I personally obtained, for fessor Giovanni Guazzone and the direc- the activity of the single regions. tors Fosco Corti and Piero Rossi, has given An example of this is the Memorandum of and pushed so that the national federation Understanding that FENIARCO signed as could start and take its own shape. Actually, member of the Third Sector Forum with the first meeting that took place in Trento the MIUR (Italian Ministry of University and on 24 and 25 April 1982, where the seven Research), through which the teaching ac- original associations gathered in a Perma- tivities related to choral experimentation nent Conference, was followed by two more our organizations presented to Education meetings, again in Tuscany: the first in Fiviz- Institutions have been eventually -recog zano (MS) on 4/5 June 1983 and the second nized, legitimated and favoured. Thank to in Arezzo on 24 August 1983. The latter that

37 took place in the Provincial Council hall dur- education. In my school, I tried at least three ing the days of the International Polyphonic times to set up a choir, but I could never pay Contest, determined the foundation of a director. Despite this, I have never man- FIARCO, whose president was Giorgio Co- aged to convince the other colleagues to goli. Eventually, during a following meeting use part of the few resources we had to of the newly established FIARCO in Verona create a school choir. Perhaps because few (hosted by ASAC) the Charter was approved people still understand its importance and, and registered thus modifying the name in I dare to say, necessity. FENIARCO. However, I would now give the floor to the I have collected all these pieces of informa- director Mauro Chiocci. When FENIARCO tion in the historical archive of our regional was founded, here in AREZZO, few regions magazine Diapason that in its first issues were represented. Among the first to join 0, 1, 2 and 3 broadly and meticulously re- our association was Umbria, with ARCUM ported everything I have said so far. In that (the Choral Association of Umbrian Choirs), time, I was just a chorister of that awesome whose founder and President for twenty male choir, as was Coradini, and singing was years was Mauro Chiocci. my only concern, in fact I ignored every- CHIOCCI – Mine will be a chronological re- thing else. Here, let me just add one more construction of what happened from 1984 little remark that apart from being a very onwards as far as my direct experience as sweet memory, is also a cue to remember FENIARCO Vice President is concerned, an two people really close to me who are no office that I have held for 12 years in two sep- longer with us. In my research, I found out arate terms. I entered FENIARCO in the 80s that on 5 June 1983 I was also in Fivizzano when those who attended the Polyphonic because the “Coradini” Polyphonic Group, of Arezzo and the Seghizzi di Gorizia Contest Fosco Corti and Arnoldo Foa’ performed for could easily meet personalities, musicians, the public the “Passion of the Christ accord- directors, choirs and different organizers ing to John” by Francesco Corteccia, a score who of course were involved with these that was object of a historic recording by two big music events of late summer (be- Deutsche Grammophone. Having said that: tween August and September). Every time Happy Birthday FENIARCO, I wish you an ad- you met with this forge of ideas, visionary ditional thirty years of success. minds, also in music and wine joyrides orga- SANTORI – I had no doubt Catacchini would nized by Collio or in Tuscan hills, they gave reveal so many details. You were right to life to intense pages of the history of Italian remember personalities such as Piero Ros- choral field, an activity that finally started si, and especially the unforgettable Fosco to bear its well-deserved fruits. FENIARCO Corti who was a “volcano”, an engine of the entered this panorama in the years 1983-84 musical activity. His early and unexpected and gathered the regional groups that had death was a great loss, not only for the “Co- already been established. Just think of the radini” choral activity but also for the entire USCI (Union of the Italian Choral Societies) town. Moreover, you have broached a topic that derived from the ENAL (a body abol- I would like to say a few word about: the ished in 1978) and of the first regional as- school. Unfortunately, the match the music sociative realities: Lombardy (Franco Mon- plays with schools is very tough (I can affirm ego), Veneto (Efrem Casagrande and Gianni this because I have been in the frontline for Colussi), Friuli-Venezia Giulia (Luigi Paolin), twenty years as head of a high school), if not Trentino (Giorgio Cogoli), Tuscany (Giancarlo even lost because, it appears that teachers Pagni), Abruzzo (EnricoSummonte), Emilia- also do not consider it relevant to students’ Romagna (Giovanni Torre), Lazio (Domenico

38 Cieri). In Gorizia, I received the first proposal and with ENPALS (Artists social Security In- to set up a regional association in Umbria, stitute) about the well-known “permanent first from Dino Stella (who would later be- certificate of occupancy”. This first phase come the President of FENIARCO from 1987 was difficult indeed, because aid granted to 1999) and then from Giorgio Cogoli (pres- was not sufficient. After this period (1987- ident from 1985 to 1987) in Arezzo. That 1996) I left FENIARCO’s Board of Directors. was the 1984. In October 1985, I hosted the In 1999, Sante Fornasier, the current Presi- Assembly of FENIARCO in Perugia, and on dent took over from Dino Stella. I would that occasion, when the Charter (registered return to FENIARCO for a term, from 2005 in Arezzo in 1984) was amended in the pres- to 2008, with interesting projects dedicated ence of the notary Giuseppe Brunelli, Luigi to Italian choral activity. The Italian Youth Paolin and Giorgio Cogoli were elected Vice Choir, from 2004 to 2007 in Rome, Florence, Presidents and Luciano Chailly, as a well- Assisi, Perugia, Turin, Fano, Pescara, Ma- known musician, President. However, this tera (with the directors Filippo Maria Bres- brave composition did not work well, unfor- san, Stojan Kuret, Nicola Conci) and then, tunately, because no one held the office of the APS Projects, Coralmente, Cori Solidali, President. In the meantime, in November Musamichevolmente, Bilancio Sociale, InDi- 1985 in Perugia, the ARCUM, Regional Asso- rection, Spring Festival, Riva del Garda 2005, ciation of Umbrian Choirs, was founded, and Follonica 2006 and 2007, Arezzo and Gorizia in July 1986 in Clusone it had already joined Contests. During this term, my partner was FENIARCO. In January 1987, at the assem- Pierfranco Semeraro. bly of Boulogne, FENIARCO’s main offices, I close this brief list of events, facts, and in which had to demonstrate real organiza- particular personalities, I had the pleasure tional and operative skills were reconfirmed to meet and appreciate (Efrem Casagrande, as follows: Dino Stella, President; Vittorino Luigi Paolin, Domenico Cieri and many oth- Moratti, Vice President; Mauro Chiocci, Vice ers), confident that from its origins FENI- President; Gianni Colussi, National Secre- ARCO has represented the regional entities tary. The head office was in Venice/Mestre, or respective Regional Associations which in Via Castellana 44. are themselves the expression of the choral Throughout its term, this operative team activity of their own territory. I kindly thank managed to carry out some initiatives, and those who have hosted me in this meeting in particular increase the regions involved. and in the concert that will later follow at As for me, the term was renewed twice until the San Domenico Church, content to have 1996; meanwhile, Giovanni Torre took over made my humble contribution to this event. from Vittorino Moratti, who passed away SANTORI – As you have just heard, the di- young. I remember the trips to Campania, rector Chiocci is a kind historical memory Basilicata and Apulia: the countless events of FENIARCO. We have now arrived at the I took part in all over Italy, from north to moment to close this event with the speech south. I also remember when FENIARCO by the current President, the director Sante joined EUROPA CANTAT in 1988, which Lu- Fornasier. Sante Fornasier is an absolute igi Paolin represented until the election of leading figure in the choir sector, not only in Giorgio Cogoli. The latter, then, would- re Italy but also internationally. Until 2012, he main inside the European Federation as has been President of Europa Cantat, an As- representative of Trentino Choirs. Neverthe- sociation that includes the entire continen- less, I could not forget a number of strug- tal choral world. This is the reason why we gles, both with SIAE (Italian Authors and Edi- ask Sante Fornasier to outline the current tors Society) to reach a national convention situation of FENIARCO.

39 FORNASIER – First of all, I would like to have 2700 choirs, not that bad actually. In thank you for your kind interest about FENI- this world of crisis, I think that choral activ- ARCO which after all represents our choral ity gets by very well. Let’s put the economic sector: all of us in short! Hence I want to ex- aspect aside for a moment and not consider press not only my personal thanks, but I also only negative things. When I deal with pub- think I can speak for all the choirs when I re- lic institutions, I present our representation member here, in this city of art, the official of 2700 choirs as a priceless basic cultural foundation that occurred in 1984 at the Ho- heritage, which begins with choristers, from tel Veltroni in Arezzo, which was registered the people who create a story. We also have on 23 January of that year. Last 23 January stories arriving from small villages, which we celebrated the “FENIARCO Day”, also are important because they spread our val- borrowing a bit of modernity that young ues in places where official culture often members required, and so the celebrations does not arrive. I, as a Friulian, always think for these thirty years have started. We be- of a remote village in the Carnia region that lieved it was a good thing to retrace a bit of has 500 souls, and yet has a choir! This is a history: Mauro Chiocci has reminded us of cultural protection. This is not just making many things, Nando Catacchini others, just music, this is culture actually: it is a good cell to remember our origins, the processes that of the society we live in. It is a remarkable brought us here, positive things as well as cultural and social presence. For this reason, our efforts. For this reason, I decided to read I say to politicians: take care of this heritage. our history again. I pulled out the minutes to Because it is something that this world find the Regions that gave origin to the proj- managed to create with passion, commit- ect in 1984. To be precise, they were eight: ment, cooperation, and learning how to Abruzzo, Emilia, Friuli, Lazio, Lombardy, create a “system”. Little by little, FENIARCO Tuscany, Trentino and Veneto. Those were has grown and traced several paths: artistic the founding Regions and then, over time, performances, big events, training courses others have joined until Basilicata and Valle for directors, the world of young people, d’Aosta closed the circle in 1999. Hence, in schools, agreements, our delegations. We 1999 we completed our “network”, a buzz- have accreditations at MIUR, MIBAC (Min- word today that however describes the right istry of Cultural Heritage, Activities and concept of a functional way to create a “sys- Tourism), the Ministry of Labour and Social tem”, bringing experiences and synergies Policies. We have agreements with the SIAE together. Today when we talk about “crisis”, and insurance policies with ENPALS. It is a not only a financial “crisis”, but also crisis of systemic work whose benefits arrive directly perspective, we should ask ourselves where to its associates. In addition to this, we are we want to go, where we want to conduct involved in musicology research and music ourselves. This is the reason why a debate publishing. Fifteen years ago, we said to is necessary, even intense but lively, vigor- each other: in our sector, there are no more ous, and oriented to the future. Hence, in publishers. Publishers have no convenience: 1999 the Federation revealed its character. Ricordi had quit, as well as Curci. Hence, FE- From that moment, forth it developed its NIARCO has in some way tried to compen- shape, thanks to those who came before us, sate for this, and today produces excellent Cogoli, Paolin, and Dino Stella, who had the publications. Especially with “Girocanto”, intuition to set up a Federation in order to we have provided schools with a new rep- create a sense of belonging. I appreciate this ertoire. It was a great success: we ranked idea in the things you said. I always say that fifth and we still want to continue.- More FENIARCO is a common heritage: today we over, there is the safeguard of traditions, not

40 only popular but also those of music as art. we also managed to carry out important Who would ever save the great renaissance economic processes, and we were worthy polyphony? Of course, not the institutional of the European presidency, even if it was choirs committed only to lyric opera. We do not something we aimed at. Europe sup- not have a professional polyphonic choir ported our presidency and I believe we did a supported by the Government. However, very good job that people appreciated. We we have been home to polyphony. In some said to Europe: are you willing to undertake way, FENIARCO compensates it and defends an important project? Moreover, we filed a the values of this heritage. Naturally, your project of 2.4 million euros together with contest was one of the first examples, fol- ten European partners. We filed it twice and lowed by Gorizia. These people were vision- the second time we were successful. For the ary in taking care of those intuitions about first time we have obtained 1,100,000- eu a heritage that needed a boost. However, ros of which – I must admit– 200,000 were there was the need to give them a frame- for the Turin Festival. We exported the idea work and an organization: FENIARCO tried of a “network” that took shape inside our to provide this. For this reason, activities organization to Europe where it received are coordinated: there are 22 regional as- positive remarks, thus obtaining an historic sociations, we need to think with different result. This is what Italian choral field has mentalities, from Bolzano to Palermo. Think demonstrated at the European level and it concretely about the reality: actually, it is was worthy of the attention: today Carlo not easy to put these “distances” together. Pavese is the first Vice President - I had to This is a patient, meticulous work where in quit as my terms expired. However, do not the end one achieves an overall view. I must forget: when we affirm that in Europe, for- admit that we have always managed to ar- eign countries rule, we are saying that it was rive at this view, especially when we look the consequence of our absence. Hence, we forward. are either present, qualified and trained, or Moreover, we also want to count in Europe. other will decide for us. Catacchini spoke For this reason, quality is always the basic about quality. In this regard, we set up an principle. We are amateurs, but with profes- efficient structure of qualified young people sional quality. Otherwise, our destiny will in several areas of expertise: musicians, ad- be to be “complementarity”. If this is the ministrators, communication experts, musi- premise, others will give us tips, but I do cologists. Only by bringing all these things not want tips for FENIARCO. I desire an ac- together can we face a comprehensive knowledgement for what we can do, for our management framework. Chiocci reminded values and for what we give. Hence, quality us all of we have done: the European proj- is fundamental. ects, the APS projects. With the resources of Then, we have organized the great Turin APS projects, we have created our website: Festival, a huge challenge but the results 2700 choirs on line. Go to our website, click were excellent, let’s face it. I hope this is to on a certain choir and the corresponding be a glory for our community, from the first information appears. Everybody, with their to the last chorister of these 2700 choirs. password, can update their data in every We must be proud of this. Many good peo- moment. Moreover, there is also the gen- ple with significant ability to plan and- re eral calendar that details all the initiatives markable organizational skills have worked and concerts around Italy. All this thank to on this project. Including a certain financial the APS projects to which Mauro Chiocci risk: we had a budget of 2.8 million euro, collaborated actively. In addition, there are just to give you a sense of its size. Therefore, the Academy of Fano and the workshops

41 of Aosta. The Aosta workshop for compos- report. I remember that when the director ers is unique in Europe and has boosted a Labroca announced the creation of the first new generation of composers (all those who Polyphonic of Arezzo he wrote that it “lit write for “Girocanto”). Then, there is our up the sparks of hope”. I see that, to quote magazine. We created it, and little by little, Baudelaire, these “sparks” have become we have improved it. We said to ourselves: beacons. However, we have still much work let’s make the “Amadeus” of choral music. A to do with schools: the forthcoming reforms comprehensive magazine, with good graph- aim at improving the study of the history of ics and articles not only about every-day art, but nobody talks about music history or news, but in particular substantial “con- music in general. It is not by chance that a tent”. From that moment on, the magazine professor not a teacher such as Mario Salmi has reached a level everybody is envious of, had the intuition to found the Polyphonic. also internationally. Today we can proudly It would be desirable that this enthusiasm affirm that it is the finest magazine among also arrived to those who work in schools. It those of the European Federation. seems that what we have heard so far, testi- Professor Santori wondered about our cur- fies that we are on the right path. I see that rent condition. It is good: we have 2700 director Pedini wants to add something… choirs, in schools there are numbers of PEDINI – With regard to what has been said school choirs, still not registered, that do so far, I would like to make a consideration much work. Such a reality did not existed that is even more relevant now. FENIARCO is ten years ago. This is why we can look to thirty years old. Many times people rhetori- the future with moderate optimism. The cally say that, after twenty years, an asso- presence of 1500 students, not associated ciation has become adult. Now, after thirty choirs, at the Spring Festival is testimony to years it should be more than mature… Actu- this. For this reason, we should encourage ally, these associations are already adult at investment, understand that the world has the moment of their foundation, and they changed, that the way we usually thought do not have a sort of childhood or adoles- about choir activity is old-fashioned. We cence. Then, thirty years are many, and need our system to be more efficient, and other speeches have allowed us to appreci- maximize resources, aiming at important ate how much work has been done so far. projects without forgetting the territory. An interesting fact about FENIARCO is that, Then, the association between chorister, contrary to other similar organizations that choir, regional association and federation is just add an acronym to a group of people a whole. There should not be contrast but who already work on their own, the foun- complementarity so that our world could dation of the choirs Federation occurred progress and be assertive. Finally, I cite the during fieldwork. As others have recalled, in Youth Choir that is gathering support. This those years only a few existing regional as- project required large scale commitment, sociations, that would later become feder- both financial and organizational – young ate, have spread the seed and made other people arrive from all over Italy, putting associations sprout up. Once this scenario them together is not easy – and on tour was completed and consolidated, they took their performance was so great that they another step forward, aware of their num- won two first prizes. This was another good bers, strength, relevance and consciousness challenge to face, and with this victory, I of leaving a mark in that world they oper- close my speech and thank you all for your ated in. They also bring forward initiatives attention. and proposals individually, where the Feder- SANTORI – Congratulations for your detailed ation is not only the sounding board of what

42 the territorial associations have carried out, The majority of choirs that take part in it are but a subject that plays a primary role as not an initiative of Local Education Authority a guide and example for its associates. A or the Ministry, but of those people working single association could not manage all the in schools who in a certain manner rectify initiatives the Federation directly develops, the system’s faults. Perhaps a moment will considering their dimension and complex- arrive when institutions realize the situa- ity. The force deriving from the sum of the tion and regulate through regulations what associations allows FENIARCO to comply people have carried out individually. In this with this role. The figures Fornasier gave us regard, all the people who have undertaken would not be possible for a single regional these paths with competence, skills and Association. Of course, this is the result of a commitment, are now sitting at this table: broad adhesion, indeed, but it also depends in the end, people will save the school, not on the skills, vision and expertise of those the Ministry. who worked on this project. Professor Santori takes the floor again to In order to understand some differences end the meeting. I would like to make a comparison with SANTORI – The words we have listened to another federation of which both Guido so far comfort us very much. Our great fa- d’Arezzo Foundation and FENIARCO are ther Dante said: “Poca favilla gran fiamma partners. This is ITALIAFESTIVAL whose Pres- seconda” (lit. “a small flame ignites a big ident is our Councillor Francesco Perrotta. fire”). I hope this flame could also grow In contrast with FENIARCO, ITALIAFESTIVAL where there is still resistance. I would like originates from something already existing to close with a consideration about the mu- – Festivals, of course. The effort of the new- sic high school of Arezzo. The fact that the elected President Perrotta should be that of institutions wanted this school is undoubt- imitating, someway, what FENIARCO is do- edly positive. When it was established, I ing, creating a Federation that is able to add struggled to include Latin, since it was the value to the specific “value” of each single language of the majority of music history associated festival. Just as when you start a vocal repertoire. Today they have excluded new business: you begin as an artisan, then, Latin. They have transformed the course of you set up a workshop with your apprentic- Theory and analysis into Theory, analysis es, and if you are successful the workshop and composition…that only lasts one hour. turns into a plant, and if the plant is very The positive fact of having a music high successful it is quoted on the stock market school has in reality implied a ghettoiza- and becomes a Public Limited Company. tion of music that does not occur in other This is parallel to the path FENIARCO under- schools. Once at Pedagogical high school took, where everybody made their contri- you had music. Today it has been abolished. bution of expertise and experience so that Therefore, on one hand, it is a good thing to the Federation could grow and become the have a music high school but on the other, point of reference for the entire choral sec- it would be better if music was part of ev- tor, as you have broadly said and underlined ery school’s cultural store of knowledge, as I so far. I would like to close with a hint of op- believe happens in many parts of the world. timism with regard to schools. Sometimes We close this meeting with Dante’s warning progress occurs in the most unpredictable and the hope that people would take care ways: most of the times the Spring Festival of this flame as these illustrious masters (he is not organized by schools, however, it ad- turns to the round table’s guests) do. dresses that world, and people who work in schools are those who participate the most. (Edited by Carlo Pedini)

43 44 POLIFONIEPOLIFONIE Storia e teoria della coralitàHistory - and theory of choral music ISSN 1593-8735