A COLLABORATIVE BAROQUE OPERA Giovanni Lorenzo Lulier, Alessandro Scarlatti, and Carlo Francesco Pollarolo La santa Genuinda Annette Ming MEZZO-SOPRANO Marie-Louise Catsalis HARPSICHORD Grant Parker DOUBLE BASS PRESENTED ONLINE: 31 MARCH 2021 – 1 MAY 2021 STANFORD UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC PROGRAM: LA SANTA GENUINDA GIOVANNI LORENZO LULIER ALESSANDRO SCARLATTI CARLO FRANCESCO POLLAROLO “Soffrirò la morte ancora” Giovanni Lorenzo Lulier (c. 1662–1700) Text: Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni “Benchè porti il seno adorno” Alessandro Scarlatti (1660–1725) Text: Ottoboni “Fondamenti son del soglio” Carlo Francesco Pollarolo (c. 1653–1723) Text: Ottoboni PROGRAM NOTES ABOUT LA SANTA GENUINDA La santa Genuinda is a collaborative Baroque opera by Giovanni Lorenzo Lulier, Pietro Alessandro Scarlatti, and Carlo Francesco Pollarolo and was first performed in Rome at the Palazzo Doria Pamphili in 1694. The libretto was written by Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni (of Venice), the nephew of the Pope, and this dramma sacro was dedicated to Ottoboni’s friend, Cardinal Pamphili. This edition features the unpublished manuscript MS 2985 from the Bayerische Staatsbiblio-thek (Munich, Germany). The manuscript itself includes a picture from each scene as a decorated letter at the beginning of each act, indicating that it is a presentation copy, and therefore possesses very few errors. My edition has made extracts of La santa Genuinda into a new cantata, consisting of an arrangement of three extracts, one from each act of this opera. Each selection is sung by the protagonist, Genuinda. In the first act, she expresses pain and sorrow at being falsely accused of infidelity in Lulier’s da capo aria, “Soffrirò la morte ancora”. This aria is meant to convey hopelessness and devastation. It is followed by a ritornello aria by Scarlatti from entitled “Benchè porte il seno adorno”, which refers to the budding spring in the month of April. Genuinda compares her goodness to the flowers hidden by the darkness of night. She knows that when the light comes, goodness, like the beautiful flowers, will be revealed. In this way, the blossoming of the month of April becomes a metaphor 2 15 for the perseverance of virtue, for evil can never triumph over righteousness. By Act Three, Genuinda is vindicated, and innocence is proven. She wins the day and celebrates her victory with another da capo aria, Pollarolo’s “Fondamenti son del soglio”. The full title given in the libretto is La santa Genuinda o vero l’innocenza difesa dall’inganno, which directly translates to “innocence defended by deception.” It reflects the moral of the story, that good will always prevail. COLLABORATIVE OPERA: THE GENRE Collaborative compositions involve a set of works written by at least two composers. This definition excludes instances of incomplete compositions that were completed by a separate hand or a piece that was reworked at a later date. Collaborative operas were the primary type of such compositions in the 17th and 18th centuries along with stage works and masques. In such operas, each composer was responsible for a portion of the text. At this time, there was evidence of several full-length Italian operas with three acts, each written by a different composer. Reasons for the existence of such operas varied from technicalities in production (such as the need for the quick completion of an opera) to a simple request from a patron. In 1694, Cardinal Ottoboni’s reason for making his libretto La santa Genuinda a collaborative opera was that he wanted to combine three great musical talents from Rome, Naples, and Venice. This opera was not called an “opera”; instead, it was called a dramma sacro per musica because, at that time, operas were forbidden by the Vatican. ABOUT THE COMPOSERS GIOVANNI LORENZO LULIER was a Roman composer, cellist, and trombonist from Rome. ‘Giovannino’ was the aiutante di camera for Cardinal Pamphili and was later employed by Cardinal Ottoboni and the Borghese family. He was often seen as a concertino cellist alongside violinist Arcangelo Corelli. He is best known for his brief but powerful da capo arias that were often adorned with four-part instrumental refrains, as seen is his famous oratorio S Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi (1687). ALESSANDRO ScaRLATTI was an Italian composer known for his work in Baroque operas, oratorios, serenatas, cantatas, and other sacred works. He is often called “The Founder of Neapolitan Opera,” with his opera Il trionfo dell’onore (1718) serving as the epitome of this style. He established his career as an opera composer with his work Gli equivoci nel sembiante, which enjoyed great success and acknowledgment from Queen Christina of Sweden. As maestro di cappella for the S Bartolomeo from 1684 to 1702, he wrote at least 32 operas and made adaptations of Venetian operas (the popular form in Naples at the time). In his second term in this position under Cardinal Grimani, he composed another 15 operas. 10 3 CARLO FRANCESCO POLLAROLO was a Venetian composer and organist. He studied music under his father, Orazio Pollarolo, who was an organist at the SS Nazaro e Celso. Carlo Pollarolo enjoyed a long and rewarding career. In 1678, his first opera, Venere travestita, was performed at the Accademia. Two years later, he was elected capo musico at Brescia Cathedral. In 1691, he assumed the position of vicemaestro di cappella at S Marco, and his operas were widely performed at Venetian theatres both in and surrounding Venice within a year’s time. From 1696 to around 1718, he enjoyed a tenure as the musical director of the Ospedale degli Incurabili, one of the four best known conservatories in Venice. — Notes by Annette Ming INSTRUCTOR’S NOTES ON THE PROCESS We thank Erin Baumann for the use of her edition of the aria from Act Two, which she produced in the class MUSIC 184A “Editing and Performing Early Music” in 2014. Annette Ming transcribed and edited the arias from Acts One and Three. We then rehearsed the recitatives and arias using JackTrip technology, setting tempi and rubato. A recording was made of the accompaniment that served as a template for creating backing tracks, at which point Grant Parker on double bass was added into the continuo. Annette then used these tracks to record her voice. As one can imagine, the recitatives, being non-metrical, were especially difficult to coordinate. The solution was to record a guiding track of the voice part with GarageBand and then remove it for the final version. I then mixed the sound and produced the videos using iMovie. I would like to thank Igor Ovchinnikov and Stanford University IT Technology Training for their summer iMovie course, funded by Stanford’s STAP. — Marie-Louise Catsalis 4 9 ABOUT THE ARTISTS ANNETTE MING is a freshman from New Jersey pursuing a double major in Music (Vocal Performance) and Management Science & Engineering at Stanford. She started singing at the age of 11, performed at Carnegie Hall at the age of 13, and received her Associate of the Royal Schools of Music diploma with Distinction at the age of 16. She has successfully auditioned for the American Choral Directors Association’s honor choirs on the state, eastern, and national levels for nearly a decade, and she holds the title of the Grand Winner in Voice of the 2019 International Young Artists Competition under the National League of Performing Arts. This summer, she will play the role of Arnalta in FIO ITALIA’s production of L’incoronazione di Poppea. Annette studies Baroque music under the guidance and instruction of Marie-Louise Catsalis. She is a voice student of Wendy Hillhouse and is coached by Laura Dahl and Steven Lightburn. MARIE-LOUISE CATSALIS is a conductor, vocal coach, and keyboard accompanist (piano and harpsichord). Trained as a pianist, she completed a graduate opera repetiteur’s course at the Sydney Conservatorium. Thereafter, she began to specialize in vocal music of the Italian Baroque, taking lessons in Italy and eventually completing the Master of Music degree at the University of New England, Australia. She went on to doctoral studies at the University of Newcastle, Australia, which focused on the serenatas or occasional vocal music of Alessandro Scarlatti. She has presented papers and lecture/recitals at the Society for Seventeenth-Century Music, the Society for Eighteenth-Century Music, the American Handel Society, the Musicological Society of Australia, and the American Musicological Society. Her critical editions have been published on the Web Library of Seventeenth-Century Music (http://aaswebsv.aas.duke. edu/wlscm/AboutWLSCM.html) and A-R Editions Recent Researches in the Music of the Baroque Era. GRANT PARKER (double bass) is Associate Professor and Chair, Department of Classics at Stanford by day, and a committed musician by night, whether singing tenor in choirs and Department of Music productions, playing double bass in the Peninsula Symphony, Stanford Pit Orchestra, and most recently, Stanford Symphony Orchestra via JackTrip, or accompanying his children at the piano. 8 5 TEXTS AND TRANSLATION CARLO FRANCESCO POLLAROLO: “Fondamenti son del soglio” Text: Ottoboni Translation: Annette Ming GIOVANNI LORENZO LULIER: “Soffrirò la morte ancora” Text: Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni Fondamenti son del soglio The foundations of the throne Translation: Annette Ming Domasti o Duce in campo Tame, o Lord, in the battlefield I ribelli del cielo, the enemies of heaven, Soffrirò la morte ancora I will still yet suffer in death E con battaglia breve sì, ma fiera, And with an indeed short but fierce battle, Pur troppo, oh Dio sospiro, Alas, oh God, I sigh In questo giorno solo, On this very day, Più le perdite altrui che le mie pene. More for the losses of others, Di nuove palme ti circondi il crine. You will crown yourself with palm wreaths. Ma pur soffrire e sospirar conviene.