Download Myriam Zerbi – a Flow of Music

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Download Myriam Zerbi – a Flow of Music FONDAZIONE GIORGIO CINI ISTITUTO ITALIANO ANTONIO VIVALDI MYRIAM ZERBI A FLOW OF MUSIC ANTONIO VIVALDI AT THE ORIGINS OF A REDISCOVERY VENEZIA FONDAZIONE GIORGIO CINI 2020 This book recounts the circumstances leading up to the foundation of the Istituto Italiano Antonio Vivaldi, established by Antonio Fanna and Angelo Ephrikian on 23 January 1947. It retraces the sometimes surprising adventures in postwar Italy that took the two protagonists from the dream of reviving the Red Priest’s music to the publication of his complete instrumental works. Using the le琀ers of the leading players, contemporary press reports and the personal memories of one of the founders, the author reconstructs the Istituto’s vicissitudes focusing especially on its first years, full of high emotions, enterprise and tenacity, in a war-torn country where a desire for renewal was everywhere palpable, through to 1978 when it was donated by Antonio Fanna to become part of the Fondazione Giorgio Cini in Venice. The story, which is enlivened with a copious apparatus of images and documents, unfolds through the personal testimonies of those involved: Angelo Ephrikian, who dreamed the original dream, Antonio Fanna, who laid the practical foundations of the Istituto and ran it for 昀fty years, Alfredo Gallinari the enabling benefactor, who until now has remained, by his own wish, anonymous, Francesco Continetto, the copyist, who transcribed over 昀ve hundred of Vivaldi’s manuscripts, Gian Francesco Malipiero, the Istituto’s artistic director and editor of the greater part of the Venetian composer’s music, and Eugenio Clause琀i the enlightened head of the music publisher Casa Ricordi. Cover image: A Flow of Music Photograph by Arianna Monti SAGGI VIVALDIANI 3 FONDAZIONE GIORGIO CINI ISTITUTO ITALIANO ANTONIO VIVALDI MYRIAM ZERBI A FLOW OF MUSIC ANTONIO VIVALDI AT THE ORIGINS OF A REDISCOVERY VENEZIA FONDAZIONE GIORGIO CINI 2020 MYRIAM ZERBI, A Flow of Music. Antonio Vivaldi. At the Origins of a Rediscovery (“Saggi vivaldiani”, 3), Venice, Fondazione Giorgio Cini, 2020. All rights reserved © 2020 Fondazione Giorgio Cini Onlus Isola di San Giorgio Maggiore 30124 Venezia www.cini.it First english language edition: 2020 Translation: John Francis Phillimore Editing: Margherita Gianola Layout: Arianna Monti ISBN 9788896445181 FOREWORD This book intends to retrace the events that led to the setting up of the Istituto Italiano Antonio Vivaldi, founded by Antonio Fanna and Angelo Ephrikian on 23 January 1947, and piece together the story of its earliest years. To flesh out my account, I chose to journey again in person the highways and cross the bridges over which those events ran their course, digging out the sources, knocking on doors (which were opened), gathering, recasting, assembling the evidence of correspondence, fragments of news and reports from the newspapers of the time. I retraced the vicissitudes of the various stages, some extraordinary and, often enough, blessed by strokes of luck, the capricious goddess whose good auspices are vital in bringing any enterprise to port, as Fanna himself could attest: “If luck had not been on my side, on at least three occasions, I think that our edition of the instrumental music would hardly have seen the light of day”. That same Fortuna whom I saw along the way often arm‐in‐arm with Kairos who embodies, in Greek mythology “the right moment”. Some of the themes touched on in this volume have already been covered in other contexts, but I have chosen to rehearse them and bring them together to fill out the plot of the story, and then to weave into the structure what amount to the “stories behind the story” exploiting the opportunity of studying the protagonists’ own words from the private archive of Antonio Fanna and the possibility of listening to his own voice through his notes and memories; recollections that run through the narrative like veins in the marble, and will, I hope, add colour to the progress of the venture. I hope that a reading of this book will prove useful for the reconstruction of the circumstances that led to the founding of the Istituto Italiano Antonio Vivaldi and its first eventful years of life, trusting that the collage of documents and oral reminiscences will flow like a romance, whose principal actors I can identify in advance as Angelo Ephrikian, the instigator, Antonio Fanna, the realizer, Alfredo Gallinari, the benefactor, Gian Francesco Malipiero, the Artistic Director of the Istituto Vivaldi and editor of the majority of the instrumental works, Francesco Continetto, the copyist, Eugenio Clausetti, the publisher. Last, and by no means least, Fortuna and Kairos. Each of these protagonists contributed with their own rhythm and pitch to see through a choral adventure – sometimes extemporising, sometimes in harmony – which brought back to the light of day, after more than two hundred years of darkness, the music of this great Venetian composer. MYRIAM ZERBI – 5 – Fig. 1. GIROLAMO FORABOSCO, The Miraculous Rescue (detail). Venice, Church of Santa Maria Assunta (commonly “Gesuiti”). Fig. 2. ANTONIO LUCIO VIVALDI, baptismal record. Archivio Storico del Patriarcato di Venezia, Parish of San Giovanni in Bragora, Register of Baptisms, Reg. n. 10, 6 May 1678. VIVALDI EARTHQUAKE For a long time the accepted myth was that an earthquake had convulsed marshbanks and dry land, stirring up the waters of the lagoon to invade the city, shouldering through the canals and the rii with an impetus launched from the depths of the earth, ripping up the flagstones of calli and campi and shaking palaces and houses, while the bells of Venice rang out wildly, chimneys collapsed with a terrifying crash and everywhere the Venetians were running for their lives – all this on the day when Antonio Vivaldi was born. Extraordinary natural portents are cheerfully summoned by tellers‐of‐tales to lend a superhuman frame to the appearance of great men. Some stories, such as that of the raging elements that whipped up the waves and jounced the forest of sunken tree‐trunks underpinning the Serenissima, then zoom in to foreground a mother who offers, in the nightmare grip of her panic, her child to the Most High: “Save my child from the fury of the earth and the waters and I will consecrate him to You and make him Your priest.”1 In reality, no seismic event is recorded in Venice on 4 March 1678, in the dogeship of Alvise Contarini;2 whatever quake there was must have been in the breast of Antonio’s mother, Camilla Calicchio.3 Two years earlier, already pregnant by Giovanni Battista Vivaldi “barbier e sonador” (barber and musician), she had hastened to marry him in the church of San Giovanni Battista on the Giudecca, some way from the Castello sestiere and her own parish of San Giovanni in Bragora,4 perhaps in order to elude the 1 Among the many sources reporting this fanciful story, see: REMO GIAZOTTO, Vivaldi, Milan, Nuova Accademia, 1965; edition consulted: Turin, ERI, 1973, p. 12; VIRGILIO BOCCARDI, Vivaldi a Venezia, Treviso, Canova, 2003, p. 31; GIANFRANCO FORMICHETTI, Venezia e il prete col violino, Milan, Bompiani, 2006, p. 7; VIRGILIO BOCCARDI, Le origini lucane di Antonio Vivaldi, catalogue of the Pomarico Vivaldi Festival (August 2012), Pomarico, 2012, pp. 32‐33; DARIO PICCOTTI – ALVARO TORCHIO, Vivaldi e il segreto del Mondo Nuovo, Viterbo, Stampa alternativa/Nuovi Equilibri, 2013, p. 36. 2 A number of earthquakes have struck the Serenissima, one indeed on 4 March but in 1365. In Vivaldi’s own century shocks were felt on 16 July 1670, reaching the Lagoon from the epicentre in Verona; on 11 April 1688 (or possibly on 17 April according to GIAMBATTISTA GALLICCIOLLI, Delle memo‐ rie venete antiche, profane ed ecclesiastiche, Venice, Domenico Fracasso, 1795, vol. 2, p. 235): when a powerful quake in the Romagna was felt in the city; on 4 December 1690: an earthquake in Istria caused the big Bell of St‐Mark’s to toll and damaged the church of San Giovanni e Paolo; on 6 July 1693, a heavy tremor in Mantua registering in Venice; the Venetians were shaken again in 1695 when the earth moved in Asolo. In 1678 there was indeed a quake, but in Siena – and on 24 rather than 4 March – this is said to have caused all the bells of Monte Oliveto to ring, but was not in fact felt in Venice. See: MARIO BARATTA, I terremoti in Italia, Turin, Bocca, 1901, pp. 55, 147, 150, 154, 163,173, 181. 3 Camilla Calicchio, born on Christmas Eve 1653 of a Venetian mother and a father from Pomarico (Basilicata). On the Lucanian origins of the Calicchio family, see GASTONE VIO, Antonio Vivaldi e i Vivaldi, “Informazioni e studi vivaldiani”, 4, 1983, pp. 82‐96; Documenti sulle origini pomaricane di Antonio Vivaldi, ed. Pietro Varuolo, catalogue of the Pomarico Vivaldi Festival (August 2010), Pomarico, 2010; VIRGILIO BOCCARDI, Le origini lucane di Antonio Vivaldi, cit. 4 Camilla had been baptised in the church of Sant’Antonin. Archivio Storico Patriarcale di Venezia, Parish of Sant’Antonin, Baptismal Register, Reg. no. 3, 29 December 1653. This document is published and transcribed by MICKY WHITE in Antonio Vivaldi. A Life in Documents (“Quaderni vivaldiani”, 17), Florence, Olschki, 2013, pp. 3‐4. – 7 – MYRIAM ZERBI prying glances and ciacole5 of the neighbours. Her witness at the nuptials was a gondolier friend Andrea Vedova, coincidentally nicknamed “Trema‐ mondo” (earthshaker). The child that Camilla was then carrying, Gabriella Antonia, born five months later, was fated to have a short life.6 It may be supposed that on that day in early March the agitation in the heart of Camilla, as she brought her first son into the world, was an entirely intimate and personal upheaval. Still, if there was no actual earthquake to mark the advent of Antonio Vivaldi, the true seismic event was himself: baptised with all haste at home “for fear of his dying”7 he brought with him into the world an enthusiastic genius for experimentation that would revolutionise the instrumental music of the eighteenth century, opening it to new horizons.
Recommended publications
  • La Generazione Dell'ottanta and the Italian Sound
    LA GENERAZIONE DELL’OTTANTA AND THE ITALIAN SOUND A DISSERTATION IN Trumpet Performance Presented to the Faculty of the University of Missouri-Kansas City in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree DOCTOR OF MUSICAL ARTS by ALBERTO RACANATI M.M., Western Illinois University, 2016 B.A., Conservatorio Piccinni, 2010 Kansas City, Missouri 2021 LA GENERAZIONE DELL’OTTANTA AND THE ITALIAN SOUND Alberto Racanati, Candidate for the Doctor of Musical Arts Degree University of Missouri-Kansas City, 2021 ABSTRACT . La Generazione dell’Ottanta (The Generation of the Eighties) is a generation of Italian composers born in the 1880s, all of whom reached their artistic maturity between the two World Wars and who made it a point to part ways musically from the preceding generations that were rooted in operatic music, especially in the Verismo tradition. The names commonly associated with the Generazione are Alfredo Casella (1883-1947), Gian Francesco Malipiero (1882-1973), Ildebrando Pizzetti (1880-1968), and Ottorino Respighi (1879- 1936). In their efforts to create a new music that sounded unmistakingly Italian and fueled by the musical nationalism rampant throughout Europe at the time, the four composers took inspiration from the pre-Romantic music of their country. Individually and collectively, they embarked on a journey to bring back what they considered the golden age of Italian music, with each one yielding a different result. iii Through the creation of artistic associations facilitated by the fascist government, the musicians from the Generazione established themselves on the international scene and were involved with performances of their works around the world.
    [Show full text]
  • My Musical Lineage Since the 1600S
    Paris Smaragdis My musical lineage Richard Boulanger since the 1600s Barry Vercoe Names in bold are people you should recognize from music history class if you were not asleep. Malcolm Peyton Hugo Norden Joji Yuasa Alan Black Bernard Rands Jack Jarrett Roger Reynolds Irving Fine Edward Cone Edward Steuerman Wolfgang Fortner Felix Winternitz Sebastian Matthews Howard Thatcher Hugo Kontschak Michael Czajkowski Pierre Boulez Luciano Berio Bruno Maderna Boris Blacher Erich Peter Tibor Kozma Bernhard Heiden Aaron Copland Walter Piston Ross Lee Finney Jr Leo Sowerby Bernard Wagenaar René Leibowitz Vincent Persichetti Andrée Vaurabourg Olivier Messiaen Giulio Cesare Paribeni Giorgio Federico Ghedini Luigi Dallapiccola Hermann Scherchen Alessandro Bustini Antonio Guarnieri Gian Francesco Malipiero Friedrich Ernst Koch Paul Hindemith Sergei Koussevitzky Circa 20th century Leopold Wolfsohn Rubin Goldmark Archibald Davinson Clifford Heilman Edward Ballantine George Enescu Harris Shaw Edward Burlingame Hill Roger Sessions Nadia Boulanger Johan Wagenaar Maurice Ravel Anton Webern Paul Dukas Alban Berg Fritz Reiner Darius Milhaud Olga Samaroff Marcel Dupré Ernesto Consolo Vito Frazzi Marco Enrico Bossi Antonio Smareglia Arnold Mendelssohn Bernhard Sekles Maurice Emmanuel Antonín Dvořák Arthur Nikisch Robert Fuchs Sigismond Bachrich Jules Massenet Margaret Ruthven Lang Frederick Field Bullard George Elbridge Whiting Horatio Parker Ernest Bloch Raissa Myshetskaya Paul Vidal Gabriel Fauré André Gédalge Arnold Schoenberg Théodore Dubois Béla Bartók Vincent
    [Show full text]
  • ENDURO EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIP FIM 350Cc (1990-97); 400Cc (1998-2003) ENDURO WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP
    FIM 350cc/ 400cc ENDURO EUROPEAN/ WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS FIM 350 cc RELIABILITY (1968-80)/ 350cc 4-T (1987-89) ENDURO EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIP FIM 350cc (1990-97); 400cc (1998-2003) ENDURO WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP Year Posn Rider Nationality Bike Points Wins 1968 1. Květoslav Mašita (1st) Czechoslovakia Jawa 2. Klaus Teuchert East Germany 3. Miroslav Vytlačil Czechoslovakia Jawa 1969 1. Květoslav Mašita (2nd) Czechoslovakia Jawa 2. Herbert Scheck West Germany 3. Karl-Heinz Wagner East Germany 4. Klaus Teuchert East Germany 1970 1. Květoslav Mašita (3rd) Czechoslovakia Jawa 2. Zdeněk Češpiva Czechoslovakia Jawa 3. Peter Uhlig West Germany 4. ? 5. Klaus Teuchert East Germany 1971 1. Květoslav Mašita (4th) Czechoslovakia Jawa 2. Peter Uhlig West Germany 3. Jaroslav Břiza Czechoslovakia Jawa 1972 1. Květoslav Mašita (5th) Czechoslovakia Jawa 2. Jiří Cisař Czechoslovakia 3. Jaroslav Břiza Czechoslovakia 1973 1. Květoslav Mašita (6th) Czechoslovakia Jawa 2. Jiří Cisař Czechoslovakia Jawa 3. Manfred Jäger East Germany MZ 4. ? 5. Carl-Henry Johansson Sweden 1974 1. Květoslav Mašita (7th) Czechoslovakia Jawa 3.6 2. Jiří Cisař Czechoslovakia Jawa 8.5 3. Manfred Jäger East Germany MZ 81.6 4. Augusto Taiocchi Italy KTM 83.0 5. Egbert Haas West Germany Maico 249.9 6. Edvardas Ramonas USSR Jawa 622.0 7. Zenon Wieczorek Poland Jawa 771.5 8. - 1 FIM 350cc/ 400cc ENDURO EUROPEAN/ WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS 1975 1. Květoslav Mašita (8th) Czechoslovakia Jawa 2. Jiří Cisař Czechoslovakia Jawa 3. Uwe Köthe East Germany MZ 1976 1. Květoslav Mašita (9th) Czechoslovakia Jawa 60(84) 4 2. Jiří Cisař Czechoslovakia Jawa 51(61) 1 3. Jiří Pošik Czechoslovakia Jawa 38 1 4.
    [Show full text]
  • La Nuova Musica (1896-1919)
    La Nuova Musica (1896-1919) The music periodical La Nuova musica [NMU] was first published on 31 January 1896 by its founder, the pianist and composer Edgardo Del Valle de Paz (1861- 1920), a professor of piano at the Istituto Musicale in Florence, who directed and administered the journal without interruption until its final issue. NMU was published monthly from 1896 to 1907, fortnightly from 1908 to 1910, bimonthly during 1911 and fortnightly from 1912 to its cessation. Throughout the publication pages measuring 34 x 25 cm. are printed in three column format and are numbered beginning with number 1 for successive years. La Nuova musica documents Florentine music history and bridges a gap existing in Italian music periodical literature since 1882, when the earlier Florentine periodical Boccherini (1862-1882) ceased publication. The aim of the periodical is to diffuse by print the most notable music, to raise the musical level of the public by making it aware of the most excellent works of our masters, to give our young composers an opportunity to publicize in print their first compositions, [and] to express openly their opinions. Each issue of NMU contains two sections: testo, features articles about music events and music criticism, and constitutes the main six or eight page section of the periodical; and, musica, a supplement of eight pages consisting of two or three compositions for piano or for voice and piano. This two-fold structure is suspended beginning with the first issue of 1909. The first pages of each issue are generally reserved for a critical essay concerning contemporary topics, followed by an article of historical interest.
    [Show full text]
  • Piano Music in Italy During the Fascist Era
    PIANO MUSIC IN ITALY DURING THE FASCIST ERA by KARIN MARIA DI BELLA .Mus., The University of Western Ontario, 1994 Mus., Washington University in St. Louis, 1996 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF MUSICAL ARTS in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES (School of Music) We accept this thesis as conforming tp—^-fre-^required standard THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA January 2002 © Karin Maria Di Bella, 2002 In presenting this thesis in partial fulfilment of the requirements for an advanced degree at the University of British Columbia, I agree that the Library shall make it freely available for reference and study. I further agree that permission for extensive copying of this thesis for scholarly purposes may be granted by the head of my department or by his or her representatives. It is understood that copying or publication of this thesis for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Department The University of Vancouver, Canada Date DE-6 (2/88) Abstract This thesis investigates Italian instrumental music (specifically piano music) during the two decades between the two World Wars, the period of Italian fascism under Mussolini's rule. After two centuries of opera domination in that country, instrumental music, especially an up-to- date brand of it, was sorely lacking. A number of composers recognized this need and began to effect changes in the instrumental music scene, some with more success than others. Most of these composers are not well known to the general music public today. The pressing question is, to what extent the fascist government and its culture had an effect on the development of music during this period.
    [Show full text]
  • Alan Lomax: Selected Writings 1934-1997
    ALAN LOMAX ALAN LOMAX SELECTED WRITINGS 1934–1997 Edited by Ronald D.Cohen With Introductory Essays by Gage Averill, Matthew Barton, Ronald D.Cohen, Ed Kahn, and Andrew L.Kaye ROUTLEDGE NEW YORK • LONDON Published in 2003 by Routledge 29 West 35th Street New York, NY 10001 www.routledge-ny.com Published in Great Britain by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane London EC4P 4EE www.routledge.co.uk Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group. This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” All writings and photographs by Alan Lomax are copyright © 2003 by Alan Lomax estate. The material on “Sources and Permissions” on pp. 350–51 constitutes a continuation of this copyright page. All of the writings by Alan Lomax in this book are reprinted as they originally appeared, without emendation, except for small changes to regularize spelling. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Lomax, Alan, 1915–2002 [Selections] Alan Lomax : selected writings, 1934–1997 /edited by Ronald D.Cohen; with introductory essays by Gage Averill, Matthew Barton, Ronald D.Cohen, Ed Kahn, and Andrew Kaye.
    [Show full text]
  • Constructing the Archive: an Annotated Catalogue of the Deon Van Der Walt
    (De)constructing the archive: An annotated catalogue of the Deon van der Walt Collection in the NMMU Library Frederick Jacobus Buys January 2014 Submitted in partial fulfilment for the degree of Master of Music (Performing Arts) at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University Supervisor: Prof Zelda Potgieter TABLE OF CONTENTS Page DECLARATION i ABSTRACT ii OPSOMMING iii KEY WORDS iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS v CHAPTER 1 – INTRODUCTION TO THIS STUDY 1 1. Aim of the research 1 2. Context & Rationale 2 3. Outlay of Chapters 4 CHAPTER 2 - (DE)CONSTRUCTING THE ARCHIVE: A BRIEF LITERATURE REVIEW 5 CHAPTER 3 - DEON VAN DER WALT: A LIFE CUT SHORT 9 CHAPTER 4 - THE DEON VAN DER WALT COLLECTION: AN ANNOTATED CATALOGUE 12 CHAPTER 5 - CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 18 1. The current state of the Deon van der Walt Collection 18 2. Suggestions and recommendations for the future of the Deon van der Walt Collection 21 SOURCES 24 APPENDIX A PERFORMANCE AND RECORDING LIST 29 APPEDIX B ANNOTED CATALOGUE OF THE DEON VAN DER WALT COLLECTION 41 APPENDIX C NELSON MANDELA METROPOLITAN UNIVERSTITY LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SERVICES (NMMU LIS) - CIRCULATION OF THE DEON VAN DER WALT (DVW) COLLECTION (DONATION) 280 APPENDIX D PAPER DELIVERED BY ZELDA POTGIETER AT THE OFFICIAL OPENING OF THE DEON VAN DER WALT COLLECTION, SOUTH CAMPUS LIBRARY, NMMU, ON 20 SEPTEMBER 2007 282 i DECLARATION I, Frederick Jacobus Buys (student no. 211267325), hereby declare that this treatise, in partial fulfilment for the degree M.Mus (Performing Arts), is my own work and that it has not previously been submitted for assessment or completion of any postgraduate qualification to another University or for another qualification.
    [Show full text]
  • CENTRAL PAVILION, GIARDINI DELLA BIENNALE 29.08 — 8.12.2020 La Biennale Di Venezia La Biennale Di Venezia President Presents Roberto Cicutto
    LE MUSE INQUIETE WHEN LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA MEETS HISTORY CENTRAL PAVILION, GIARDINI DELLA BIENNALE 29.08 — 8.12.2020 La Biennale di Venezia La Biennale di Venezia President presents Roberto Cicutto Board The Disquieted Muses. Luigi Brugnaro Vicepresidente When La Biennale di Venezia Meets History Claudia Ferrazzi Luca Zaia Auditors’ Committee Jair Lorenco Presidente Stefania Bortoletti Anna Maria Como in collaboration with Director General Istituto Luce-Cinecittà e Rai Teche Andrea Del Mercato and with AAMOD-Fondazione Archivio Audiovisivo del Movimento Operaio e Democratico Archivio Centrale dello Stato Archivio Ugo Mulas Bianconero Archivio Cameraphoto Epoche Fondazione Modena Arti Visive Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea IVESER Istituto Veneziano per la Storia della Resistenza e della Società Contemporanea LIMA Amsterdam Peggy Guggenheim Collection Tate Modern THE DISQUIETED MUSES… The title of the exhibition The Disquieted Muses. When La Biennale di Venezia Meets History does not just convey the content that visitors to the Central Pavilion in the Giardini della Biennale will encounter, but also a vision. Disquiet serves as a driving force behind research, which requires dialogue to verify its theories and needs history to absorb knowledge. This is what La Biennale does and will continue to do as it seeks to reinforce a methodology that creates even stronger bonds between its own disciplines. There are six Muses at the Biennale: Art, Architecture, Cinema, Theatre, Music and Dance, given a voice through the great events that fill Venice and the world every year. There are the places that serve as venues for all of La Biennale’s activities: the Giardini, the Arsenale, the Palazzo del Cinema and other cinemas on the Lido, the theatres, the city of Venice itself.
    [Show full text]
  • Verdi's Rigoletto
    Verdi’s Rigoletto - A discographical conspectus by Ralph Moore It is hard if not impossible, to make a representative survey of recordings of Rigoletto, given that there are 200 in the catalogue; I can only compromise by compiling a somewhat arbitrary list comprising of a selection of the best-known and those which appeal to me. For a start, there are thirty or so studio recordings in Italian; I begin with one made in 1927 and 1930, as those made earlier than that are really only for the specialist. I then consider eighteen of the studio versions made since that one. I have not reviewed minor recordings or those which in my estimation do not reach the requisite standard; I freely admit that I cannot countenance those by Sinopoli in 1984, Chailly in 1988, Rahbari in 1991 or Rizzi in 1993 for a combination of reasons, including an aversion to certain singers – for example Gruberova’s shrill squeak of a soprano and what I hear as the bleat in Bruson’s baritone and the forced wobble in Nucci’s – and the existence of a better, earlier version by the same artists (as with the Rudel recording with Milnes, Kraus and Sills caught too late) or lacklustre singing in general from artists of insufficient calibre (Rahbari and Rizzi). Nor can I endorse Dmitri Hvorostovsky’s final recording; whether it was as a result of his sad, terminal illness or the vocal decline which had already set in I cannot say, but it does the memory of him in his prime no favours and he is in any case indifferently partnered.
    [Show full text]
  • Thesis Submission
    Rebuilding a Culture: Studies in Italian Music after Fascism, 1943-1953 Peter Roderick PhD Music Department of Music, University of York March 2010 Abstract The devastation enacted on the Italian nation by Mussolini’s ventennio and the Second World War had cultural as well as political effects. Combined with the fading careers of the leading generazione dell’ottanta composers (Alfredo Casella, Gian Francesco Malipiero and Ildebrando Pizzetti), it led to a historical moment of perceived crisis and artistic vulnerability within Italian contemporary music. Yet by 1953, dodecaphony had swept the artistic establishment, musical theatre was beginning a renaissance, Italian composers featured prominently at the Darmstadt Ferienkurse , Milan was a pioneering frontier for electronic composition, and contemporary music journals and concerts had become major cultural loci. What happened to effect these monumental stylistic and historical transitions? In addressing this question, this thesis provides a series of studies on music and the politics of musical culture in this ten-year period. It charts Italy’s musical journey from the cultural destruction of the post-war period to its role in the early fifties within the meteoric international rise of the avant-garde artist as institutionally and governmentally-endorsed superman. Integrating stylistic and aesthetic analysis within a historicist framework, its chapters deal with topics such as the collective memory of fascism, internationalism, anti- fascist reaction, the appropriation of serialist aesthetics, the nature of Italian modernism in the ‘aftermath’, the Italian realist/formalist debates, the contradictory politics of musical ‘commitment’, and the growth of a ‘new-music’ culture. In demonstrating how the conflict of the Second World War and its diverse aftermath precipitated a pluralistic and increasingly avant-garde musical society in Italy, this study offers new insights into the transition between pre- and post-war modernist aesthetics and brings musicological focus onto an important but little-studied era.
    [Show full text]
  • Il Recupero Dell'antico Nell'opera Di Ottorino
    SCUOLA DI DOTTORATO IN STORIA E CRITICA DEI BENI ARTISTICI , MUSICALI E DELLO SPETTACOLO XXII CICLO IL RECUPERO DELL’ANTICO NELL’OPERA DI OTTORINO RESPIGHI E L’ARCHIVIO DOCUMENTARIO ALLA FONDAZIONE “GIORGIO CINI” DI VENEZIA Coordinatore: prof. ALESSANDRO BALLARIN Supervisore: prof. ANTONIO LOVATO Dottoranda: MARTINA BURAN DATA CONSEGNA TESI 30 giugno 2010 2 A Riccardo e Veronica 3 4 INDICE PREMESSA ………………………………………..…………………………..……. p. 9 I. IL FONDO “OTTORINO RESPIGHI ” ………………………………………… » 13 1. Configurazione originaria del fondo ………………………………………… » 14 2. Interventi di riordino …………………………………………………………. » 16 3. Descrizione del contenuto ……………………………………………………. » 20 II. RITRATTO DI OTTORINO RESPIGHI ……………………………..……..... » 31 1. L’infanzia e le prime opere …………………………………………………... » 32 2. I primi passi verso il recupero dell’antico …………………………………… » 35 3. L’incontro con Elsa …………………………………………………………... » 38 4. Le trascrizioni di musiche antiche e Casa Ricordi …………………………... » 40 5. Il “periodo gregoriano” ……………………………………………………... » 42 6. L’incontro con Claudio Guastalla …………………………………………… » 44 7. Le opere ispirate al gregoriano ……………………………………………… » 46 8. La nomina all’Accademia d’Italia e il Manifesto…………………………….. » 48 9. La fiamma e l’elaborazione dell’Orfeo ………………………………………. » 53 10. Lucrezia ……………………………………………………………………... » 58 III. IL CONTESTO ………………………………………..………………...……… » 63 1. Il recupero dell’antico ………………………………………………………... » 63 1.1 La rinascita del gregoriano …………………………………………. » 64 1.2 Angelo De Santi, Giovanni Tebaldini e Lorenzo Perosi …………….
    [Show full text]
  • Song As the Memory of Language in the Arbëresh Community of Chieuti
    MY HEART SINGS TO ME: Song as the Memory of Language in the Arbëresh Community of Chieuti Sara Jane Bell A thesis submitted to the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Curriculum in Folklore. Chapel Hill 2011 Approved by: Dr. Robert Cantwell (Chair) Dr. William Ferris Dr. Louise Meintjes Dr. Patricia Sawin ABSTRACT SARA JANE BELL: My Heart Sings to Me: Song as the Memory of Language in the Arbëresh Community of Chieuti (Under the Direction of Robert Cantwell, Chair; William Ferris; Louise Meintjes; and Patricia Sawin) For the people of Chieuti who grew up speaking the Albanian dialect that the inhabitants of their Arbëresh town in the Italian province of Puglia have spoken for more than five centuries, the rapid decline of their mother tongue is a loss that is sorely felt. Musicians and cultural activists labor to negotiate new strategies for maintaining connections to their unique heritage and impart their traditions to young people who are raised speaking Italian in an increasingly interconnected world. As they perform, they are able to act out collective narratives of longing and belonging, history, nostalgia, and sense of place. Using the traditional song “Rine Rine” as a point of departure, this thesis examines how songs transmit linguistic and cultural markers of Arbëresh identity and serve to illuminate Chieuti’s position as a community poised in the moment of language shift. ii For my grandfather, Vincenzo Antonio Belpulso and for the children of Chieuti, at home and abroad, who carry on.
    [Show full text]