The spirit of improvisation – when addressing music from the Baroque era – is as important for a long-established artist on Glossa, such as violinist Enrico Gatti, as it is for new arrivals Fahmi Alqhai, Josetxu Obregón and Enrike Solinís. Gatti, who has recorded music by Vivaldi and Bach for the label with his Ensemble Aurora (as well as joining Emilio Moreno in music from the Age of Enlightenment from Spain), has a distinct predilection for Italian repertory from the 17th century (including music by his beloved Corelli).
His new disc, with the suggestive title, Mille consigli, explores the early part of that century – with sonatas, toccatas, chiaconas and canzonas by the likes of Castello, Fontana, Bertoli, Legrenzi, Merula, Uccellini. The choice of repertory allows Gatti’s violin to take flight and his artistry and experience add a crucial poetic, vocal element which brings the music fully alive for the 21st century.
However, there is a very different sense of sound to this recording, created by the principal continuo instrument being an organ. As Daniele Torelli explains in the disc’s booklet, much of this music was originally designed for performance in churches and with the distinctive colours of organ stops typical of the 17th century. Rather than an opt for a modern chamber organ (however much resembling original instruments), Enrico Gatti blends his sound with that of the 1647 Luca Neri organ in the church of San Niccolò, in Collescipoli in southern Umbria (in the centre of modern day Italy) and expertly played by Fabio Ciofini. As Torelli also identifies, such organs were at the centre of the development of the basso continuo to the point that the melodic and harmonic functions of that practice were closely allied to the sound world of the organ.
Joining Gatti and Ciofini on Mille consigli – and below the musician explains what this title means to him – are the complementary sounds of Elena Bianchi (dulcian) and Gabriele Palomba (theorbo) for a voiceless but eminently vocal exploration of the beginnings of the Baroque spirit.
What does the range and variety of Italian instrumental music from the first half of the 17th century express for you, and what in it makes you wish to return to this repertory again and again?
Italian music of the 17th century – especially that written in the first sixty years – represents a kaleidoscope of colours and emotions, and is assuredly what we can define as “Baroque”. Indeed, in the arts, starting in the time of Corelli, a kind of cultural reaction tends to replace asymmetry with symmetry, extravagant surprises with more harmonic and proportioned compositional procedures. For a performer immersing him or herself in the “real” Baroque world it is an extraordinary journey that – if made all the way through – requires from them to glean from all the most creative parts of their artistic experience.
How close was instrumental music to vocal music of this time in Italy? Were there shared poetic values?
The daily life of every 17th century instrumentalist was strictly connected to vocal music practice, especially for a violin player, who was always having to accompany singers both in church (sacred cantatas, vespers, oratorios, masses, motets, etc...) and in chamber, theatre or in open-air spaces (cantatas, serenatas, operas). We should remember that in all the treatise sources the violin was asked to imitate the human voice, and the one who was able to do it better was considered to be a better violinist. Of course, this affected instrumental music writing, which since the end of the 16th century, had already started to move away from the vocal music with purely idiomatic passages. However, particularly in Italy, the style remained in fact very close to the vocal language. This is an aspect that many modern-day players are now completely ignoring, isolating the instrumental repertory from its original context, forgetting, for example, that a solo sonata was in the main performed at vespers – therefore in church – and with organ.
Accompanying the recording, you have included an excerpt from Anton Giulio Brignole Sale’s Le instabilità dell’ingegno, which mentions the phrase “mille consigli” (from which the album takes its title). What does Sale’s work express for you and what does the idea of “mille consigli” conjure up in your mind and in your playing?
Brignole Sale’s text could actually be considered a “manifesto” for Baroque aesthetics, for the use of the language, of the colour research, of the metaphor and the sudden image changes, which correspond exactly to the contrasts that we admire in Italian music from the 17h century. The “Mille consigli” are not only the thousands of possible inspirations of the artist-performer, but achieve in music a series of different forms: the “sonatas” are still rhapsodic compositions, a little experimental and very free; in the “a solo” ones the stylus fantasticus is carried out to the best of one’s abilities, allowing large spaces in which the performer’s imagination can take hold, while in the sonatas a2 and a3 the writing is led by the research of contrapuntal dialogue. The early madrigals, the chansons and the motets are revisited by the improvisation of the virtuosos who with their “covers” add skilful ornamentation. Also the “ostinato” bass lines represent another test bed for amusing oneself in surprising the audience, varying and improvising in a thousand different ways. It is a continuous surprise: the listener can never know what will arrive in the next bar, and this is the true “Baroque” spirit.
What made you decide to use the organ as a continuo instrument for this recording? How widespread was the use of the organ as a continuo instrument across the Italian peninsula?
In the musical period that we are taking into consideration with Mille consigli, the organ was the “prince” of the instruments, bearing in mind also that music performed in churches constituted the greater part of the repertory played at that time; organs were additionally used in the private palaces of the nobles and in the theatres. The use of these instruments was widespread even in the smallest villages in the Italian territory, as one can see nowadays by touring around the peninsula. Unfortunately, many of these instruments have been destroyed or seriously damaged by wars, earthquakes or fires, and it is not easy to find organs that have been restored with historical criteria and brought back to their old splendour.
As a violinist how well do you feel that this music is served by the organ as a continuo instrument and how do the colours available on an Italian organ of the time match those of a violin? In what ways have you had to adapt your interpretative and technical approach for playing with an organ?
Generally-speaking, the modern player is not very accustomed to play with an Italian organ of the 17th century. The metal alloys for the organ pipes that were made in Italy in the 16th and 17th centuries produce a very impressive sound as a result of their beauty and their various colours. An organ of this type is a real “singing instrument” and is the ideal complement for human voices. In principle, therefore, it is perfect for dialoguing with a violin which should be imitating the human voice. A problem can arise from the fact that the organ’s principale register possesses an undoubtedly impressive sound: there is no comparison here with those small organs normally used nowadays by Baroque music players (even by those who are “historically-informed”).
The original organ leads us to quite different sonorities: the violinist needs to use his whole sound power in order to compete with the organ’s loudness, even if an informed and expert organ player can vary the power and the colours of his continuo playing. But what we also learn from this bond is – mainly – another form of interpreting this repertory, which is a consequence of these different conditions. In fact, both because of the different type of sound and because of the acoustics of the church, all the tempi need to be rethought: we are too used to standard tempi born in modern concert halls and to a percussive use of the harpsichord (which should also be a “singing” instrument, according to Italian aesthetics). However, reconsidering the tempi means also rethinking the way of playing the phrase lines, the dynamic and expressive contents, the ornamentation, all to the benefit of the richness typical of the Baroque, leaving aside those fast lines, which are so typical of modern aesthetics both in the fields of design and musical performance.
Do you think that this combination of instruments opens up a very different perception of this kind of early 17th century Italian music? What decisions did you take about choosing the dulcian and theorbo as other accompanying instruments on the recording?
I thought it was important to show a range of sounds which are different in their responses: this is useful for expressing the variety of colours typical of this repertory. The dulcian – in 17th century Italian, “fagoto” – was very much in use. In that period, when a wind instrument was placed in dialogue with a string instrument exciting results of timbre could be produced. In some important locations – such as Venice – the use of wind instruments was quite common. The theorbo is a delicate and sensitive instrument, which can also ensure a continuo part which is full, and at the same time transparent, as well as being an ideal complement for the organ. By having both instruments it is possible to choose various sonorities according to the character of the pieces.
Given the fact that Italian organs underwent little evolution until the 19th century, is there more music which responds to the combination of violin with organ continuo (or accompaniment)?
I believe that we really are in the centre of this repertory in the 17th century, but, certainly every time a solo violin sonata was played at vespers or in other church services – and additionally during the 18th century – an organ would be used to accompany it. We know, for example, that Tartini’s Violin Concertos were written for use within the liturgy at the Basilica di Sant’Antonio in Padua, where four organs made by Pietro Nacchini were initially put in use (and then reduced to two in order not to overwhelm the sound of the orchestra); in this context it is very illuminating to read the report made by Charles Burney of his tour to the basilica in 1770, when he was guided by the maestro di cappella Francesco Antonio Vallotti.
MARK WIGGINS© 2013 Note 1 Music / Glossa Music