570146bk Lhoyer US 6/12/06 12:00 pm Page 4 Matteo Melo and Lorenzo Micheli Antoine de Matteo Mela and Lorenzo Micheli met in Texas, far away from their native Italy, in autumn 2000. Since then, they have shared a number of ideas, musical projects, and travels all over the world. In 2002, with the violinist Ivan Rabaglia and cellist Enrico Bronzi, they created a chamber music group devoted to nineteenth-century repertoire. A LHOYER year later they formed a duo that has already performed throughout Europe and North America, and has won unanimous acclaim. In addition to classical, romantic and modern repertoire, Matteo Mela and Lorenzo Micheli, (1768–1852) joined by the lutenist Massimo Lonardi, enjoy exploring the early literature for baroque guitar and theorbo. Their recordings include François de Fossa’s Three Quartets, Op. 19 (Stradivarius), a CD of Italian musicc from the eighteenth century for baroque guitar, archlute and theorbo (Stradivarius), an anthology of twentieth-century masterpieces for two guitars (Pomegranate), as well as a dozen solo recordings on the Naxos, Brilliant Records, Duos Concertants Kookaburra, Mel Bay, and Stradivarius labels. Matteo Mela and Lorenzo Micheli, Guitars For further information, please visit: www.soloduo.it www.matteomela.it www.lorenzomicheli.com 8.570146 4 570146bk Lhoyer US 6/12/06 12:00 pm Page 2 Antoine de Lhoyer (1768–1852) afforded in turn to both first and second guitar. The first The final movement of all these works is always a Duos Concertants theme, in all of the four Duos, is rhythmically vivid and Rondo. Here Lhoyer displays his remarkable ability in well carved, while the second theme has a more cantabile building a perfect musical mechanism, where strength Over the past ten years musicologists have finally begun France: almost at the same time he published his first character (and may be sometimes enriched by unusual and lightness, virtuosity and lyricism are maintained in to cast light upon the still somewhat enigmatic figure of works for six-string guitar. After the fall of Napoleon and tone colours, such as the campanelas in the Allegro constant balance. The Rondos in Op. 34, No. 2, and Op. Antoine de Lhoyer. Although Lhoyer’s biography and his subsequent exiles to Elba and Saint Helena, Lhoyer moderato Op. 31, No. 1). The end of the second thematic 31, No. 2, have a double exposition of the theme (in all his relations with the cultural life of his time have yet to was restored to his office in the army of the King. area leads us to a quite short development section, the ritornellos except the last one, which is performed be fully explored, the many travels throughout Europe of Nonetheless, this was the start of a long period of marked by a strong harmonic instability, although there solely by the first guitar). In the Duos Nos. 1 and 3, Op. the composer, born in Clermont-Ferrand in September uncertainty, isolation and dire financial straits due to the are sporadic episodes in which a key seems to manage to 31, on the contrary, the main theme is stated by the first 1768, are today well known: Versailles, Koblenz, frequent transfers from one remote and lonely place to establish itself: for instance, the G minor in Op. 34, No. guitar, while the second guitar has some important solo Austria, Hamburg, St Petersburg, Paris, the island of another. His condition of a stateless person, however, did 2, and the C major in Op. 31, No. 1); in the development episodes in the couplets. Oléron, Niort, Corsica, Aix-en-Provence, Algeria, and not prevent him from composing and publishing music: section, there can be found virtuosic passages (fast scales The tight texture of cross-references inside the pieces Paris again, are the stages of a tormented and restless most of his works for two guitars, among which we count with multiple slurs, broken thirds and octaves, detached reinforces the sensation of unity in Lhoyer’s music. The existence that was deeply affected by the events of some of his masterpieces, date back to these troubled arpeggios), contrapuntual fragments, imitations and even theme of the Rondo in D minor, Op. 34, No. 2, is based European history and irreparably upset by the end of the years. It is notably in the collections of Trois Duos canons. In the recapitulation, Lhoyer introduces an upon the opening notes of the first movement; in the Ancien Régime. Concertants Dédiés à Madame la Princesse De Croy innovative element that allows him to avoid the sensation Romance, Op. 31, No. 3, the rhythmic cell that will It was the French Revolution that caused the break- Solré, Op. 31 (Paris, Gaveaux 1814) and Trois Duos of redundance by having the first theme presented only generate the following rondo is fleetingly announced. up of the Gardes du Corps du Roi, in 1791, where Lhoyer Concertants Composés et Dédiés à Monsieur le Compte by the first guitar, whereas the second theme, stated in The web of inner quotations also establishes links had served for a few years. After leaving his native de Rochechouart, Op. 34 (Paris, Koliker 1819) that the the tonic key, is regularly repeated by the second guitar. between different works: this is the case of a short France, the composer embarked upon his wanderings, simplicity and consistency of each part, the melodic and The Duo in C major, Op. 31, No. 2, and the Duo in fragment of the Rondo, Op. 31, No. 2, which recurs in the supporting the counter-revolutionary cause and serving rhythmic incisiveness of the thematic material (packed D minor, Op. 34, No. 2, comprise four movements, with same movement as the Duo Op. 34, No. 2 (as well as in in such corps as the Armée des Princes, the Armée de with references to the music of Mozart), the formal the slow movement always being preceded by a Minuet. the Rondo, Op. 34, No. 3, in its turn akin to the Rondo, Condé and the Austrian army. There is evidence of his knowledge and the dramatic and almost theatrical The very short Minuet in A minor, Op. 31, No. 2, is in a Op. 31, No. 3); not to mention the imposing Fantaisie presence between 1800 and 1804 in Hamburg, where he dialogue between the two instruments blend and give three-phrase binary form: the first phrase ends on the Concertante, Op. 33, where Lhoyer summarises and temporarily cast off the military dress and devoted birth to a musical architecture of exceptional solidity and tonic, the second phrase establishes the relative major quotes many of the themes used in the Opp. 31 and 34. himself entirely to guitar teaching and composing. It was variety, that has very few equals in early nineteenth- with a double V-I cadence and the third phrase, starting The decade of 1816-1826, spent between the island there that he also published his earliest known works, century guitar repertoire. The notation adopted by the with the mediant of the relative major, returns to the A of Oléron and Niort, was a creative time for Lhoyer in such as the Sonate, Op. 12, and the Concerto, Op. 16, composer is a compromise between the so-called minor tonic, followed by a sixteen-measure Trio in A which several important works were conceived. Then both for five-string guitar. At present there are no precise “primitive” notation, borrowed from violin notation and major and the Minuet da capo. The nimble Minuet in F suddenly, to coincide with his transfer to the garrison of answers to the questions surrounding Lhoyer’s musical used by most French guitarists at the end of the major Op. 34, No. 2, with its Trio in the subdominant key St Florent, in Corsica, the curtain fell on the musical education, his first steps as a composer and professional eighteenth century, and the more evolved, precise and animated by lively passages of the guitars in unison, is activity of Antoine de Lhoyer. There is no record of a musician, and his relations with guitarists throughout analytical writing of Giuliani and other Viennese slighty longer and more structured. single publication after 1826. His catalogue, which Europe, but there is no doubt that, given Lhoyer’s guitarists. Nevertheless, thanks to its incomplete and The slow movements have mainly a ternary design, includes music for solo guitar, duets and chamber music, fondness for well-constructed formal structures (sonatas concise nature, this notation perfectly suits the eclectic with their themes being quiet and uneventful (as in the comes to an abrupt end with opus number 45. The last and ouvertures) rather than for the customary sets of style of Lhoyer, that easily shifts from a simple Adagio cantabile in D major, Op. 34, No. 2), or years of Lhoyer’s life are, once more, marked by his variations and collections of romances with guitar accompanied melody to a complex contrapuntual texture. sometimes yearning and pensive (as in the Adagio travels, first to Aix-en-Provence (1831) and eventually, accompaniment, we can suppose for him a serious and What does strike the listener’s attention in Lhoyer’s cantabile in C minor, Op. 31, No. 2). The middle very probably, to the new colony of Algeria, where the in-depth musical training. music is the utter equality of the two guitars. This perfect sections, rhapsodic and improvisatory, are rich in hopes of an easier life were attractive to many French As early as 1804 Lhoyer was eastbound again, balance, probably the most successful attempt to use a fioriture and diminutions. The Romance Op. 31, No.