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L’
IMMAGINARIO COLLETTIVO e una parte della storiografia musicale dipingono
il grande virtuoso di epoca romantica come un eroe solitario e isolato, in
conflitto con il consorzio umano: uno stereotipo che trova la sua perfetta
incarnazione nelle figure idealizzate di Paganini e Liszt, e che talvolta viene usato
impropriamente per inquadrare la schiera di quei solisti, da Kalkbrenner a Spohr,
da Cramer alla Catalani, che nei primi decenni del XIX secolo ridisegnano a colpi di
tastiera, corde vocali e archetto l’identità e le potenzialità dei loro strumenti.
Gli ultimi anni della vita di Giuliani, trascorsi tra Roma (1820-1823) e Napoli (1823-
1829), vedono un drastico rallentamento nella sua attività creativa, che porta di
riflesso a una riduzione delle opere pubblicate (meno di sessanta, contro le
centoquaranta degli anni 1807-1819). Pur tra crescenti difficoltà economiche e
personali, tuttavia, Giuliani non dimentica la lezione imparata a Vienna, e cerca di
venire incontro ai gusti dei suoi committenti, siano essi gli editori (Ricordi in testa)
o il pubblico romano e napoletano: abbondano dunque, in quest’ultima fase, i temi
e variazioni, le fantasie e i pot-pourris, di derivazione popolare e operistica.
Di origine popolare sono invece le “Sei arie nazionali scozzesi”, elaborate in forma
di tema con variazioni e pubblicate postume da Ricordi nel 1834. Queste arie,
basate su frammenti di canti ancora oggi piuttosto noti, sono un delizioso
miscuglio di stili diversi e danno all’ascoltatore la sensazione rassicurante di poter
osservare un mondo esotico e lontano dalla poltrona del proprio salotto. Colpisce,
soprattutto, la disinvoltura con cui Giuliani passa dal materiale tematico originale,
di sapore talora modale, alle proprie variazioni, dal carattere fortemente italiano.
Facendo un paragone letterario, le Arie scozzesi ricordano quei “Canti di Ossian”
di Macpherson con cui il pubblico europeo di fine Settecento apre una finestra
verso le atmosfere e i luoghi delle isole britanniche, e – più in generale – verso
l’universo pre-romantico.
Lorenzo Micheli
Carrara, agosto 2015
“Our expectations were high, thanks to the Artist’s reputation which
had preceded him; but it is impossible to deny that Mr. Giuliani’s
performance not only fulfilled but even exceeded them.”
T
HE COLLECTIVE IMAGINATION and a part of musical historiography would
paint the great virtuoso of the Romantic Era as a lonely, isolated hero, in conflict
with the rest of the world: a stereotype that finds its perfect incarnation in the
idealized figures of Paganini and Liszt. However it is often used improperly to
categorize the multitude of those soloists, from Kalkbrenner to Spohr, from Cramer
to Catalani, who in the first decade of the 19th Century redefined, through strokes
of the keyboard, vocal cords, and bows, the potentialities of their instruments.
To this chosen group belongs a young composer from Puglia, with high hopes and
a solid musical training. When Mauro Giuliani arrived in Vienna, toward the end of
1806, he was just twenty-five years old, and certainly could not imagine what destiny
had in store for him; he would redesign the identity, capability, and history of the
guitar, and for one happy and unique period, catapult the instrument into the center
of the musical heart of Europe.
As a brilliant innovator of unmistakable quality, Giuliani left a musical footprint in
history that went well beyond the geographical and chronological confines of the
Austrian Empire. According to statements from music critics of the time, he reached
an apex of artistry never before heard on six strings. And yet the Italian guitarist was
not only a formidable interpreter and composer, but also evidently possessed an
uncommon social and commercial intelligence. Indeed, he embodied the exact
opposite of the image of the Titan locked in perpetual battle against Olympus, or of
the gloomy, tormented artist. He was able to make himself known and adored by
critics and all other musical personalities on the scene (including Beethoven), he
knew how to capture the benevolence of the powerful (from Marie Louise, Duchess
of Parma, to the Archduke Rudolf of Austria), how to publish his works through the
most important editors of the city, and he built a network of prestigious
collaborations that included (just to name a few) the violinist Joseph Mayseder, the
flautist Johann Sedlatschek, and the pianists Johann Nepomuk Hummel and Ignaz
Moscheles. Giuliani and his eminent colleagues played frequently in collective
concerts, referred to as “Academies”. It was due to the synergy of two of the most
celebrated pianists of the time, Hummel and Moscheles, that Giuliani wrote most
of his pages for guitar and piano: the “Grand Pot-Pourri National” (1818), written
jointly with Hummel, and the monumental “Grand Duo Concertant”, composed
together with Moscheles and performed during an “Akademie” in May of 1813.
And, although they were written under Giuliani’s pen alone, even the elegant “2
Rondo” Op. 68 (1818) included in this CD could have been conceived in relation to
his public performances with Hummel or Moscheles.
Following an established and successful strategy, the programs of the concerts, which
were held in Vienna at houses of the aristocracy and bourgeois, in theatres and
concert halls (such as the kleiner Redoutensaal, one of Giuliani’s favorite stages),
presented a certain number of soloists on stage accompanied by an orchestral
company. In a single evening, one could hear an instrumental symphony, operatic
arias, a movement from a concerto for a solo instrument and orchestra, and vocal
pieces like the “Sechs Lieder” Op. 89. Published by Riedl in 1817, these songs
constitute Giuliani’s masterpiece in the genre of the Lied and testify to his ability to
assimilate the German musical culture. The most eagerly anticipated musical and
social “ritual” would be celebrated at the end of the concert, when the soloists find
themselves on stage to perform a piece together – often an aria with variations –
and put their talents on display.
It was during one of these collective concerts, on April 30, 1818, where Mauro
Giuliani, Ignaz Moscheles, and Joseph Mayseder enchanted the audience gathered
in the Landständicher Saal with their “Der Abschied der Troubadours” for voice,
piano, guitar, and violin, on a romance by Felice Blangini, a composer from Turin.
The piece opens with an expansive, solemn instrumental introduction in F major,
orchestrated with great balance, from which the violin’s dolcissimo cantabile in A
flat emerges. The guitar and piano bring the discourse back to the dominant of F
and to the secondary dominant. A soloistic piano episode, culminating in an agitated
series of octaves, heightens the tension to the highest degree; it is then that the
seventh dominant chord fades away and a dark descending minor second (D flat to
C) announces the entrance of the theme.
Blangini’s romance, provided here with a German text by the poet Ignaz Franz
Castelli, has a relaxed pace that lends itself admirably to the variations and
diminutions, which – from what is evident in the printed vocal part – were written
by Giuliani himself (“Romance von Blangini Mit Manieren von H. M. Giuliani”). The
three vocal strophes alternate with the three variations of the soloists (first Giuliani’s,
then Moscheles’, then Mayseder’s), with a small introduction of four measures to
be played as a connecting passage between the various sections. After the violin
variation, an overwhelming “più mosso” of 86 measures, rich with modulations,
progressions, chromaticisms, and extreme dynamic gestures closes the piece, but
not before the guitar and voice give the audience one last reminiscence – in an
abbreviated and further varied form – of the theme of the romance.
The success of “Der Abschied der Troubadours” was remarkable; the piece was
again performed in concert on May 10, 1818 and printed by Cappi & Diabelli in the
spring of the following year, in occasion, perhaps, of the concerts held on April 25
and May 25 of 1819. Then, during the course of the summer of 1819, something
happened which upset Giuliani’s very existence; at the height of a seemingly
relentless popularity, and for reasons which were never made clear by his
biographers, the composer was forced to urgently flee the country. In Beethoven’s
“Konversationshefte” of April 1820 it is written, “Giuliani is in Rome […]”. The
virtuoso who had bewitched the masses, definitively consecrating the guitar as a
soloistic instrument left Vienna towards the Italian peninsula, and would never again
return to the Austrian capital.
The last years of Giuliani’s life, spent between Rome (1820-1823) and Naples (1823-
1829), witnessed a drastic slowing down in his creative activity, and a reduction of his
published works (less than sixty, against the one hundred and forty between the years
of 1807-1819). Although he found himself amidst growing economic and personal
difficulties, Giuliani did not forget the lesson he had learned in Vienna and sought to
accommodate the tastes of his patrons, be they editors (most notably Ricordi) or
Roman and Neapolitan audiences. Therefore, this last phase is full of themes and
variations, fantasias, and potpourris, deriving from popular or operatic sources.
The “Gran Variazioni Op. 114,” composed in Rome in 1823, look towards the world
of opera (and its audience). They are based on the aria “Oh! cara memoria” from
the opera “Adele di Lusignano,” one of the many successful works by Neapolitan
opera composer Michele Enrico Carafa (1787-1872). In its intriguing simplicity, the
brief aria gave Giuliani the inspiration to create one of his most effective cycles of
variations of them all. The introduction, continually modulating, fully exploits for
dramatic purposes the bass’s descending chromaticism and all the colors of the
various inversions. The first two variations, in triplets and in quadruplets, make full
use of the extension of the instrument and demand very large, continuous leaps
along the fretboard. The third and fourth variations show true strokes of surprising
originality in a number of ways; first of all for their length (63 and 99 measures
respectively, compared to the 16 measures of the previous two), for the broad
spacing of the chords, for the digression into F major that suddenly suspends the
musical discourse and introduces completely new timbres, and finally for the
orchestral conception of the dynamics, made possible by the use of arpeggios which
best exploit the combination of slurs and open strings.
From popular origin, on the other hand, come the “Sei arie nazionali scozzesi”,
elaborated upon in theme and variations form and published posthumously by
Ricordi in 1834. These arias, based on fragments of songs which are still largely
known today, are a charming mix of diverse styles. They give the listener the
comforting sensation of observing an exotic world, far from the armchair in one’s
own living room. What impresses the most is the ease with which Giuliani passes
from the original thematic material, with an occasional modal flavor, to their
variations, which are strongly Italian in character. To make a literary comparison,
these Scottish Arias recall those “Works of Ossian” by James Macpherson, with
which the European public at the end of the 18th Century opened a window on the
places and atmospheres of the British Isles, and – more generally speaking – towards
a pre-romantic universe.
Lorenzo Micheli
Carrara, August 2015
MASSIMO FELICI
guitar (Anon. Germany, ca. 1830)
terz guitar (Anon. Wien after J. G. Stauffer, 1858)
DAMIANA MIZZI
soprano
ANTONIA VALENTE
fortepiano (M. Walker after N. Streicher)
FRIEDERIKE STARKLOFF
violin (J. M. Pasch after A. Stradivari)
Track 1-5 & 12-19 recorded in Hannover (Germany) on June 21, 2015
Recording engineer: Oliver Rogalla von Heyden
Track 6-11 & 20-25 recorded in Ivrea (Italy) on June 10, 2015
Recording production, editing, mix and mastering: Renato Campajola, Mario Bertodo
Thanks to:
Lorenzo Micheli for his invaluable support and contribution
Marco Riboni for the beautiful guitars from his collection
Renato Campajola & Mario Bertodo at SMC Records
Lena Kokkaliari at “Il Dialogo” editions
Assen Boyadjiev, Zvi Meniker, Gerrit Zitterbart,
Lera Myrosh & Oliver Rogalla von Heyden at Hannover HMTM
Ilaria Pavarani at Parma Conservatory
Andrea Padovani at Zoedesign
Antonio Princigalli and everyone at Puglia Sounds
Gioacchino De Padova, Piero Rotolo & Sabino Manzo at Orfeo Futuro Festival network
Pyramid strings
Oscar Ghiglia and Stefano Grondona for being the greatest source of inspiration;
Rino Carrieri, Stephanie Gurga, Roberto Mansueto, Diego Procoli, Markus Werba,
Leopoldo Saracino, Agostino Valente, Alessandro Paris, Goran Listes, Maurizio Grandinetti,
Frédéric Zigante, Carlo Lopresti, Walter Pezzali, Gabriele Panico, Pablo Montagne,
Alessandra Novaga, Johnny Trombetta, Stefano Recchioni, Massimo Santarelli,
Mariaclelia Labbate, Daniela Tedesco, Giulia Ichino for their friendship and support;
Giusi & Ciccio, Anna & Donato for their love and patience;
Emma, Letizia, Maria & Silverio
in loving memory of Ruggero Chiesa (1933-1993)
SMC-A1507