Some Unknown Embellishments of Corelli's Violin Sonatas

Author(s): Hans Joachim Marx and Laurence Dana Dreyfus

Source: The Musical Quarterly, Vol. 61, No. 1 (Jan., 1975), pp. 65-76
Published by: Oxford University Press
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SOME UNKNOWN EMBELLISHMENTS
OF CORELLI'S VIOLIN SONATAS
By
HANS
JOACHIM
MARX
N the
early
and middle
years
of the
eighteenth century
discus-
sions
concerning
the state of music
continually emphasized
that
Italian music was differentiated from French music
essentially by
the
style
of its
performance. Quantz,
like Mattheson and Schiebe before
him,
recognized
and described this difference between the
divergent
conceptions
of the executio of music. In his Versuch einer An-
weisung
die Flote traversiere zu
spielen
he defines the "Italian man-
ner of
playing"
as
"capricious,
eccentric, affected,
and
obscure,
likewise oftentimes audacious and
bizarre,"
and he stresses this
music's
difficulty
in
performance;
it is music that
permits
"a con-
siderable addition of embellishments" and
thereby
necessitates "a
fair
knowledge
of
harmony."'
When
describing
the Italian
taste,
Quantz points
out the well-known fact that
during
the
performance
of a notated
piece
the instrumentalist embellishes the melodic line
with ornaments
("Manieren").
He classifies the ornaments as essen-
tial or fixed ornaments
("wesentliche Manieren")
and
arbitrary
or
extempore
variations
("willkiirliche
Veranderungen"),
the latter be-
longing
to the art of
improvisation
and in
principle lying beyond
what is established
by
notation.
Yet when
Quantz
talks about notated embellishments in the
chapter
on cadenzas and refers there to
Arcangelo
Corelli's violin
sonatas,
which he
possessed
in the ornamented
version,2
this
implies
a
changed
attitude in the
eighteenth century
toward the
impro-
1
(Berlin, 1752).
Facsim. of the
3rd,
1789 ed.
(Kassel, 1953), p.
323.
2
Quantz
referred here to the edition
by
Estienne
Roger,
which was
published
in
Amsterdam in 1710. Cf. the
particulars
in the
Appendix
to this
study.
65
The Musical
Quarterly
visational
practices
of the late Seicento. To musicians outside of
Italy
at
any
rate,
the "essential
ornaments,"
like the
"arbitrary
vari-
ations,"
were not self-evident.
Rather,
they
were
-
to borrow a term
from Fritz Rothschild
-
a lost tradition.
Therefore,
it is no wonder
that Corelli's sonatas are transmitted in some
handwritten,
orna-
mented versions that date from the first half of the
eighteenth
cen-
tury.
In a lecture at the
Bydgoszcz Congress
not
long ago
David D.
Boyden assayed
the five versions now known to be in existence.3 It
seems worth
pointing
out that the traditional embellishments were
notated
by composers (almost
without
exception Italians)
who lived
and worked in
England.
This is as much the case with Francesco
Geminiani and Matthew
Dubourg
as it is with the "Walsh Anon-
ymous"
discovered
by Boyden. Belonging
to this
English
tradition
of
ornamenting
in the
style
of the Italian
gusto
are the embellished
movements of the sonate de camera from Corelli's
Opus
5 that come
down to us in a Handel
manuscript
in Manchester. Since this manu-
script
has until now been inaccessible to
research,
let me describe
it
briefly.
The
manuscript
comes from the estate of the famous Handel
scholar Sir Newman Flower
(1879-1964)
and is
today
held
by
the
Henry
Watson Music
Library
in Manchester. The
sturdy 148-page
volume carries the call number MS 130 Hd 4 v.313. The format
(290
x 230
millimeters) corresponds
to
opera
and oratorio scores of
the time. The
pages
are ruled with ten staves. The format was
ap-
parently
chosen with a view to
writing
down the
orchestrally
ac-
companied
arias from Handel's
operas
that fill the
greater part
of
the volume.
Inside the front cover of the
manuscript
one finds a
penciled-in
note that
provides
an
important
clue as to the
provenance
of the
volume. It reads: "Musical MS of some
/
22
Compositions by
Handel
all
/
in the
handwriting
of his amanuensis
/ J.
C. Smith."4 This en-
try
makes it clear that Handel's
copyist, John Christopher
Smith
(1683-1763),
is the scribe of the volume and that the volume itself
is to be associated with Handel's circle.
According
to the most recent
3
"The Corelli 'Solo' Sonatas and Their Ornamental Additions
by
Corelli,
Gem-
iniani,
Dubourg,
Tartini,
and the 'Walsh
Anonymous,'"
Musica
Antiqua,
III,
Acta
scientifica
(Bydgoszcz, 1972), pp.
591-606.
4
A similar reference is on the end
paper,
across from the table of contents: "All
these
compositions by
Handel
/
are in the
autograph
of
/ John Christopher
Smith the
elder
/
amanuensis and
legatee
of Handel."
66
Embellishments of Corelli's Violin Sonatas
investigations,
Smith the elder was active as Handel's
copyist
from
1716 or 1717 until 1763.5 A
comparison
of the scribal hand of the
Manchester
manuscript
with that of Handel's so-called
conducting
scores,
now in the Staats- und Universitatsbibliothek in
Hamburg,
confirms that Smith was the scribe. In
addition,
since the watermarks
of the
comparable manuscripts
are in
part
identical,
one must as-
sume that the volume
kept today
in Manchester
belonged
to Han-
del's music
library.6
The Manchester
manuscript begins
with the
entry
of two move-
ments from Corelli's sonata
Opus
5, no. 2. Both movements are
unornamented,
though
the
compositional
structure has been tam-
pered
with. Without
entering
into the
problems
connected with
this,
it
may
be
pointed
out that this could be a
question
of "arbi-
trary
variations" in the widest sense. The
changed
melodic lines
and the altered
modulatory progress
of whole measures allow one
to surmise that the same effect was to be achieved with these devia-
tions from the musical structure as with the
performance
of em-
bellishments: the listener was
supposed
to have the thrill of the
new,
the not
yet experienced,
which he
expected
even from a
performance
of older music.
On
pages
9-21 of the
manuscript, following
these two move-
ments,
there next comes a series of ornamented versions of the
sonate da camera in
Opus
5,
which we shall deal with in
particular.
Just
as little is known about the
dating
of these ornamented versions
as is known about their
composer,
who
apparently played
these
versions in the concert hall.7 But on the basis of both the Handel
arias in the second
part
of the volume and the watermarks of the
single
sheets an
approximate
date of
origin
can be ascertained for
the
manuscript
and the ornaments it contains.
The second
part
of the volume contains arias from Handel's
operas
of the London
period
exclusively.
Viewed
chronologically,
they range
from Radimisto to
Alcina,
and thus from 1720 to 1735.
5
Hans-Dieter
Clausen,
"Handels
Direktionspartituren (Handexamplare)" (diss.,
Hamburg, 1969)
=
Hamburger Beitrage
zur
Musikwissenschaft,
No. 7
(Hamburg, 1972),
p.269.
6
The watermark of the Manchester
manuscript
is in accordance with that men-
tioned in
Clausen, op. cit.,
p.
268,
which is taken from a
Hamburg manuscript.
7
The
catalogue
of the Flower collection
(Arthur
D.
Walker,
George
Frederick
Handel: The Newman Flower Collection in the
Henry
Watson Music
Library
[Man-
chester, 1972],
p. 50), skips
the Corelli
sonatas,
presumably
because of their
anonymous
transmission.
67
The Musical
Quarterly
Consequently,
Smith could not have undertaken the
copying
of the
arias before the
year
1735. This
date, then,
seems to be the terminus
post quem
for our
manuscript.
This
dating
is also arrived at
by
an
inspection
of the watermarks. In several sheets in the volumes a
combination of the fleur-de-lis and the cross-beamed shield
appears
with the letters LVG,8 for which Heawood has established the date
1748.9
Accordingly,
it would not be incorrect to
place
the Man-
chester
manuscript
around 1750.
The
manuscript
offers no information
concerning
the
composer
of the ornamented versions of the Corelli sonatas. To
begin
with,
it
might
be
supposed
that here are the oft-cited and
long-sought
embellishments
by
Nicola Mattei to which
Quantz
alludes in his
Versuch. In footnote in the
chapter
on cadenzas
Quantz
remarks
that
shortly
after the
publication
of Corelli's
agrements
"the famous
violinist Nicola
Mattei,
formerly
in Austrian
employ,"
set down
"still other ornaments."
Quantz says
that these
embellishments,
like
those of
Corelli,
have been in his
possession
"for over
thirty years."10
It therefore follows
unequivocally
from the dates that in no case
could the
composer
of the Manchester versions of
Opus
5 be Mattei.
Furthermore,
it is
hardly necessary
to add that Mattei
(according
to
Quantz)
ornamented the slow movements of
only
the first
part
of
the solo
sonatas,
while our
manuscript
contains movements from the
second
part exclusively.
So the
question
of who
composed
these
"varied"
settings
still remains. In the absence of
specific proof
I
would like to advance the
conjecture
that the violinist Pietro
Castrucci
(1679-1752),
a
pupil
of
Arcangelo
Corelli,
"composed"
the embellishments.
Supporting
this
conjecture
is the fact that
Castrucci was for some time concertmaster of Handel's
opera
or-
chestra
and,
according
to
Burney,
also
appeared
as a violin vir-
tuoso.1l Yet,
so
long
as no verification can be
produced
for this
81 would like
sincerely
to thank Mr. L. W. Duck of the
Henry
Watson Music
Library
for
providing
me with a microfilm of the
manuscript,
as well as with the
tracing
of the watermarks.
9
Edward
Heawood,
Watermarks
Mainly of
the 17th and 18th Centuries,
Monu-
menta Chartae
papyriceae
historiam
illustrantia,
I
(Hilversum, 1950), p.
66,
and water-
marks,
no. 98. The watermark matches almost
exactly
that which Clausen calls
Type
Cml,
which can be dated "ca. 1748-50." Cf.
Clausen,
op.
cit., p.
250.
10
Quantz,
op. cit.,
p.
152
11
Cf. the article
"Castrucci,"
by Anthony
Ford in
MGG,
Vol. XV
(1973 supple-
ment),
col. 1374.
Concerning
Castrucci's
period spent
in
Rome,
I have
put
forth some
assertions in
my study
"Die Musik am Hofe Pietro Kardinal Ottobonis unter
Arcangelo
Corelli,"
Studien zur italienisch-deutschen
Musikgeschite,
V
(Cologne, 1968)),
165.
68
Embellishments of Corelli's Violin Sonatas
assumption,
we shall be
obliged
to refer to the author of the orna-
mented versions in our
manuscript
as the "Manchester
Anonymous."
In contrast to the sources
already
known,
the Manchester manu-
script
contains
only
the violin
parts
of Corelli's
sonatas;
the basso
continuo is
missing.
The fact that the melodic line alone exists
permits
the
conjecture
that we are here
dealing primarily
with some-
thing designed
to be used for
study purposes.
Besides,
the
pedagog-
ical character of the first
part
of this
manuscript
is evidenced in the
fact that four movements are written down in more than one ver-
sion,
with the versions
being
set down
directly
under one another.
The several versions seem to be
arranged according
to their level of
technical
difficulty.
From the nine movements the Manchester Anon-
ymous
offers fourteen versions in
toto,
as the
following
table makes
clear:
No. of
Sonata No. Movement Versions
Pages
7 Preludio
(Vivace)
2 9-10
Corrente
(Allegro)
11-13
Sarabanda
(Largo)
2 13
8 Preludio
(Largo)
14
Allemanda
(Allegro)
14-15
Sarabanda
(Largo)
3 16-17
9 Preludio
(Largo)12
2 18-19
10 Preludio
(Adagio)
20
11 Preludio
(Adagio)l3
21
From this table- in addition to its
indicating
that the
manuscript
was used for didactic ends -one
gathers
that sonatas No. 7 and
No. 8 were to be ornamented
completely, by way
of
example (ex-
cept
for their
gighe). Possibly
Geminiani's ornamentation
presented
itself as a
prototype
for this. In contradistinction to
Geminiani,
how-
ever,
the Manchester
Anonymous
offers no
"arbitrary
variations" of
the
gighe,
which
may
be connected with the fast
tempo
of this
stylized
dance.
In
describing
the
style
of embellishment of the Manchester
Anonymous,
one must
point
first of all to the abundance of orna-
ments indicated
by sign, supplementing
the written-out "arbitrary
12
"Adagio"
in the
original.
13"Largo"
in the
original.
Another ornamented movement in E-flat
major ap-
pears
on
page
22,
but does not
belong
to the Violin
Sonatas,
Opus
5.
69
-4
C)
Manchester,
Public
Libraries,
MS 130 HD 4
v.313,
page (9).
Page (16)
of the same
manuscript.
The Musical
Quarterly
variations." Like Corelli
and,
after
him,
the violin virtuosos
Geminiani and
Dubourg,
the Manchester
Anonymous
often makes
use of
(1)
trills,
which he indicates
by
the abbreviation tr or x. The
(2)
mordent,
likewise indicated
by
tr
appears
more often than the
trill in the narrow sense and as a rule is
played
on the
penultimate
note of the
cadence,
as is made clear
by
Ex. 1
(from
Sonata No.
9,
first
movement):
Ex. 1
(Largo)
The
(3) appoggiatura
is also
frequently
used,
is shown in notes of a
smaller
size,
and
appears
in various
forms,
most often the short
appoggiatura
from above.
(Nachschldge
do not
appear.)
Less often
one finds the
(4)
two- or three-note
Schteifer
or
"slide,"
which occurs
chiefly
before
long
notes and is
written,
like the
appoggiatura,
with
smaller notes.
Besides these
ornaments,
the Manchester
Anonymous
also
gives
several articulation
signs,
which seem
similarly
to have been in-
tended for
pedagogical purposes.
Thus he
consistently distinguishes
between two kinds of thrusts of the
bow,
the
(a)
staccato and the
(b) portato, by
means of small
strokes--slanting
and
horizontal,
respectively-as
Ex. 2
(from
Sonata No.
7,
first
movement) clearly
demonstrates: Ex. 2
(Allegro)
b.
i
I
\
. -
'
~f- - \ Dt (i)
b3,_.. f ,_
4,, .wili
I -
"
I
3-
In the slow movements as well as the fast,
the written-out "arbi-
trary
variations" are
clearly
different from the embellishments
of,
say, Dubourg. Although
both embellish in a
considerably
more
virtuosic
way
than does Corelli or even
Geminiani,
Dubourg only
hints at the
rhythmic configurations
of the
embellishments,
while
the Manchester
Anonymous
notates them
exactly.
The
problem
of
how to
interpret,
for
instance,
Dubourg's thirty-second-note pas-
sages,
the
problem
of which note in the violin
part
falls on which
beat of the basso continuo
-
this does not exist for the Manchester
72
Embellishments of Corelli's Violin Sonatas
Anonymous,
since the
rhythmic relationships
of the
upper
voice to
the lower are formulated
precisely.
But for both
settings, Dubourg's
and that
by
the Manchester
Anonymous,
the
question
of what
tempo
to use does arise. As the
following example
from the
begin-
ning
of the slow Preludio of Sonata No. 11
shows,
the
eighth-notes
in
Corelli's violin
part
are subdivided into
thirty-second-notes, replete
with trills on the second and fourth notes and similar
figuration:
Ex. 3
Adagio . --r.
'7 r
;i
a
f'-
r.
I
A 'wl
I
I'I
6 7 7
6
5
So that each and
every
ornament can be observed the
tempo
of
the embellished version
ought
to be taken somewhat more
slowly
than Corelli's
original
version.
Perhaps
this
explains why
the Man-
chester
Anonymous
marked the movement
"Adagio"
and not
"Largo,"
as Corelli had directed.
For the
performance
of the embellished fast movements the
question
of
tempo proves
to be even more
pressing. Strangely,
the
same
"arbitrary
variations" with the same
rhythmic
values are
pre-
scribed in the three fast movements in the
manuscript
as in the
slow movements. For
instance,
observe the
opening
Vivace of
Sonata No. 7:
Ex. 4
a.
Vivace 5 [L
A!
"
JkJ
'I'I
l-
lml1 I
I- ]
.(. .r
.......-
- -,
......... r_ e-
"P 8F "r
$
6 7
$
5
4
6 6 7 6
L
73
The Musical
Quarterly
In this connection a
single
violin
part
in the
University Library
in
Cambridge
must be mentioned. The
anonymous part
is found
in the
manuscript
Add.
7059,
folio 67.14 The sheet contains an orna-
mented version of the first movement of Corelli's Sonata No. 9. The
ornamentation
technique
of the
Cambridge Anonymous
resembles
Geminiani's
treatment,
as the
accompanying synoptic compilation
of the
opening
measures shows
(see
Ex.
5).
Both
clearly
evidence a
predilection
for
dallying
with a note
by using suspensions
and
adjoining
trills as well as for
quick
runs that fill in intervals.
In summation, we can establish that the hitherto unknown em-
bellishments of the Manchester
Anonymous belong
to the small
number of
English
sources that afford us a
glimpse
at the
way
Corelli's solo sonatas were
performed
in the mid
eighteenth century.
The excess of ornaments and "variations"
may
create the
impression
that the Manchester
Anonymous
was one whom Mattheson would
have characterized as a "Frenchified hairdresser" and that the classic
beauty
of Corelli's sonatas was obscured
by
him. But we must re-
member that the
eighteenth
century
had a different aesthetic
posi-
tion than ours toward music set down in notation. Around 1750
Friedrich Wilhelm Riedt defended the art of ornamentation in these
words: "The more
variety
the
performer brings
to a
melody,
the
more beautiful the
performance."'5
Corelli's violin sonatas ulti-
mately
owe their
popularity
and
unending vitality
to this aesthetic
dictum. The Manchester
Anonymous,
too,
properly belongs
to the
historical existence of
Arcangelo
Corelli's works.16
(Translated by
Laurence Dana
Dreyfus)
APPENDIX
Embellished Versions of Corelli's Violin
Sonatas,
Opus
5
1. ARCANGELO CORELLI: twelve slow movements from sonatas Nos. 1-6.
Source: Print
by
Estienne
Roger,
Amsterdam
(3rd
ed.,
1710).
In an advertise-
14
I would like to thank Prof. Edward Melkus
(Vienna)
most
cordially
for
pointing
out the
manuscript.
The
University Library kindly
allowed a microfilm to be
made,
and I am
greatly obliged
to them for
sending
this to me.
15
Cited
by
Hans-Peter
Schmitz,
Die Kunst der
Verzierung
in 18.
Jahrhundert:
Instrumentale und vokale
Musizierpraxis
in
Beispielen (Kassel, 1955), p.
26.
16
This
study
is an
expanded
version of a
paper
delivered at the Second Interna-
tional
Congress
for Corelli
Studies,
held at
Ravenna-Fusignano, September
5-8,
1974.
74
Ex.
non.
5
Sonata,
No. 9
Preludio
Lar
Ag t4
Geminianii
id
'
-
f_
-- .-
IY
"
V
Dubourg
J
A-i
PI
I
F|
tsv
I
Tartini
AV
Anon.
WalshiF-
J'- J |
Manchester
(1)*
b
t._
non. Manchester (2)
Anon.
Cambridge
[
I
-_ Al a
**
*
*.
1
*.1
^I
;
P r-
-
-I
,,,
._
II 1
.4
f I
V
Corelli
-
,
w
I
..
' g
J
$ .
^^l~
v
f
r
6
J
~~~$
1
2L=~
ly
-f r I
A
A
3
0-
CA
O
c'
rD
cn Pt
-.
O..
f
h:
." " .`4
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~--f
Jb k .-b4;
*.. ,
11
rt r
L-p /: i -- f
S^-r'3^
ir
_
!
e1
.
=
_-m
The Musical
Quarterly
ment
(Courant,
Amsterdam,
Vol. XXII
[May,
1710])a
it states: "Corelli
opera
quinta
met manieren hoe men
d'Adagio
moet
spelen
door Corelli
onlangs
gecomponeert
om
gedrukt
te werden."
Reprints
of the
Roger
edition
by
Pierre
Mortier,
Amsterdam
(ca. 1710),
and
by John
Walsh and
John
Hare,
London
(ca. 1711).
2. FRANCESCO GEMINIANI: Sonata No. 9,
complete.
Source:
John
Hawkins,
A General
History of
the Science and Practice
of
Music
(London, 1776),
II,
904-7
("copied
from a
manuscript
in his own
handwriting").
3. MATTHEW DUBOURG: nineteen fast and slow movements from sonatas
Nos.
5, 7, 8, 9, 10,
and 11.
Originating
ca. 1725.
Source:
Paris,
Library
of Marc Pincherle
(from
the collection of Alfred
Cortot).b
4. WALSH ANONYMOUS:
twenty
fast and slow movements from sonatas Nos.
3, 7, 8, 9, 10,
and 11.
Originating
ca. 1720.
Source:
Berkeley,
California,
Library
of David D.
Boyden.
5. GIUSEPPE TARTINI: five movements from sonatas Nos.
1, 7, 8,
and 9.
Orig-
inating
ca. 1730.
Source:
Padua,
Biblioteca
Antoniana,
MS 1896.
6. MANCHESTER ANONYMOUS
(Pietro Castrucci?):
fourteen versions of nine
movements from sonatas Nos. 7-11.
Originating
ca. 1750.
Source:
Manchester,
The Public
Libraries,
Henry
Watson Music
Library,
MS
130 Hd 4 v.313
(from
the collection of Newman
Flower).
7. CAMBRIDGE ANONYMOUS: one movement from Sonata No. 9.
Source:
Cambridge, University Library,
MS Add. 7059
(fol. 67).
a
Fran(ois
Lesure,
Bibliographie
des editions musicales
publiees par
Estienne
Roger
et Michel-Charles Le Cene
(Amsterdam, 1696-1743) (Paris, 1969), p.
48.
bMarc Pincherle was the first to
point
out this
manuscript
in his article "De
l'ornamentation des sonates de Corelli," Feuillets d'histoire du violon
(Paris, 1927),
pp.
137-43. David D.
Boyden
offers a detailed
description
in his
study
"Corelli's Solo
Violin Sonatas 'Grace'd'
by Dubourg," Festschrift Jens
Peter Larsen
(Copenhagen,
1972), pp.
113-25.
76