Ravinia 2021 - Issue 2

FIRE AND LOVE, ITALIAN STYLE In Venice, there is an old saying: L’italiano è la lingua della musica, degli angeli, e dell’ Amore —Italian is the language of music, of the angels, and of Love. Italians are passionate about art and love. In a piazza in Tuscany on a hot summer night, it is not unusual to see two young men get into a fistfight over a girl. The Italian language is particularly emotional, being full of strong inflections and accents. Did the language develop in this way because of the emotion- al temperament of its people? Or vice versa? Whichever is the case, it’s clear that compos- ers from Monteverdi to Vivaldi and beyond have always been aware of their language’s particular ability to convey feelings of love— not to mention the jealousy and despair that often goes along with amorous adventures. The beautiful palazzi that line the Grand Ca- nal in Venice were the scenes of lively music parties for hundreds of years. In the 17th cen- tury, CLAUDIO MONTEVERDI (1567– 1643) was the music director at the great ba- silica of San Marco, but he also provided the aristocrats of Venice with plenty of love songs and party music. About 100 years later, ANTONIO VIVALDI (1678–1741) walked those same streets and provided the Vene- tians with passionate operas as well as lively instrumental concertos for the city’s famous orchestra of young ladies. One of the themes that runs through this pro- gram is the use of popular Renaissance dance tunes that became ground basses , or simple re- peating bass lines and chord patterns. During the period around 1590–1630, these ground bass tunes were the pop music of Italy and Spain. But they also inspired great composers such as Monteverdi, Strozzi, Corelli, and, lat- er, Vivaldi to write virtuoso instrumental and vocal variations over the repeating bass lines. Popular ground basses included the ciaccona , the passacaglia , the Romanesca (a dance from Rome), the Bergamasca (a dance from Berga- mo), and the folia (meaning “madness”). You will hear some of these tonight. Portrait of an Actor (1621–22) by Domenico Fetti, presumed to be Claudio Monteverdi The program opens with two examples of the lively ciaccona ground bass, with its dance- like and syncopated rhythms. Monteverdi’s Zefiro torna (“Spring breezes return”) makes delightful use of the ciaccona as a setting for a poem by the prominent Italian poet Rinuc- cini. The lyrics celebrate the return of spring and the joys and sorrows of love that tend to come with it. Vivaldi’s Ciaccona in C gives violinists a playful chance to play lively varia- tions over the bass. Monteverdi’s younger colleague, BARBARA STROZZI (1619–77) , also provided the Ve- netian aristocrats with music for their salons. She was a fascinating figure—one of the many illegitimate daughters of Venetian nobility. Her father is thought to have been Giulio Strozzi, an aristocratic poet and librettist who helped Barbara in her career as a singer and composer. As a woman in the 17th century, Barbara had very few rights, no support from the church, and no consistent patronage from the nobility. Nevertheless, she became one of the most published composers of her time, with eight volumes of her own music in print. Strozzi’s many solo songs often evoke the an- guish of a lover mistreated. The haunting song, Che si può fare? ( What can one do? ) is based on the passacaglia ground bass—a re- peating pattern of four descending notes, of- ten used to express angst and despair. Monteverdi composed the Scherzi Musicali (Musical Jokes) in 1607 for the entertainment of the Duke of Mantua, his family, and friends. The texts of the Scherzi are flirtatious and play- ful, generally centering on the theme of carpe diem —elegant attempts to convince young la- dies to bestow their romantic favors now and not wait till they are too old to enjoy it. Monteverdi’s great opera L’incoronazione di Poppea concerns the Emperor Nero—an evil madman—and his mistress Poppea. Poppea is darkly driven by ambitions to push Nero’s wife Ottavia out of the picture (even if this means exile or death for the innocent Otta- via). In the final scene, Ottavia has been got- ten rid of and Poppea triumphantly prepares to be crowned Empress of Rome. She and Nero sing of their love for each other in the The Viola da Gamba Player (c.1630–40) by Bernardo Strozzi, presumed to be Barbara Strozzi famous duet “Pur ti miro” (“I Adore You”). Here, Monteverdi masterfully draws us into the joys of love, forcing us to consider that, even when love exists between evil people, it is still a miraculous thing. Venice was filled with illegitimate children. This led to many orphanages, including one that became very famous: the Ospedale del- la Pietà. This large home for the illegitimate daughters of the nobility provided an elite ar- tistic and musical education for many bright and talented girls. When the church leaders decided in 1704 that a certain priest named Vivaldi was not actually suited for the priest- hood, they sent him to become the music teacher at the Ospedale. For the next 30 years, Vivaldi served as mu- sic master to the elite top-level orchestra of the orphanage—the showcase ensemble. In this role, he composed about 500 concertos for his young female protégées. Since Vival- di’s concertos were written primarily to be played by teenage girls, he infused them with youthful energy and a kind of rhythmic drive that, in my opinion, often resembles rock and roll. Vivaldi had a meteoric career, achieving Beatles-level popularity. It is not surprising that his concertos are by far the most popular pieces in the classical repertoire. Vivaldi was the great developer of ritornello form—the form that became the model for concerto-writing by all European composers of the century, including J.S. Bach. The Italian word “ritornello” means something that re- turns . The same word is used to mean the re- frain in pop music—and indeed, Vivaldi’s ri- tornellos convey the bold and driving sense of rhythm and melody that is more commonly associated with pop music. After all, he was writing for teenagers. One of Vivaldi’s colleagues at the Pietà was NICOLA PORPORA (1686–1768) , a singing teacher and opera composer. His aria “Alto Giove” from the opera Polifemo is so beautiful that I felt compelled to arrange it as an instru- mental piece. Polyphemus, the giant son of Poseidon, loved the sea-nymph Galatea, and wooed her with no success. A sense of love and longing rings through Porpora’s beautiful Nicola Porpora harmonies. In my arrangement, the vocal line is given to a solo violinist, who is eventually answered by a companion violinist in a possi- bly flirtatious encounter. In 1725, Vivaldi published a collection of 12 concertos titled Il cimento dell’Armonia e dell’Inventione —“The Contest between Har- mony and Invention.” With this curious title, he unleashed a revolutionary question: Should music simply be about harmony, or could it serve to illustrate inventive ideas, events, moods, natural scenes, etc.? Vivaldi set out to prove that it could do both. The first four concertos of the collection, titled Le quattro stagioni ( The Four Seasons ), are virtu- oso demonstrations of music in the service of storytelling —in this case, the story of Nature and her various moods. The “Summer” Concerto is a brilliant evoca- tion of those hot summer days in Italy, when young men get into fights over a beautiful girl—we hear the sighing in the heat, the lazy buzzing of flies and wasps, and a stunning depiction of a thunderstorm. Anyone who has been in Italy during a summer storm will appreciate how the torrent of cascading violin scales evokes the onslaught of rain when the clouds burst. The great Follia or folia tune and dance served as inspiration for Vivaldi as well as several other Baroque composers (Corelli, Marias, Geminiani, and C.P.E. Bach). Schol- ars believe that the dance originated in Por- tugal, where young girls would engage in the “folly” or “madness” of a wild dance around the fire. The folia is a triple-meter ground bass, beginning in a haughty sarabande-like rhythm, and traditionally growing faster and faster toward the end. The tune is full of the dramatic tension of courtship and seduction. Vivaldi’s version was originally a trio sonata; I arranged it as a concerto grosso so that all of us could join in the fray. We hope this evening of Italian romance sends you home inspired. –Program notes © 2021 Jeannette Sorrell Anonymous portrait of Antonio Vivaldi (c.1723) RAVINIA MAGAZINE • JULY 24 – AUGUST 15, 2021 46