String Extravaganza: About the Program
By Thomas Gerber
This afternoon’s program, chock full of concerti grossi, opens with music by Alessandro Stradella, the Italian composer believed to have written the first datable work featuring concerto grosso instrumentation, the 1674 serenata Il Duello. The most recognizable stylistic feature of the concerto grosso is alternation between a small group of solo instruments (the “concertino”) and the full ensemble (the “ripieno”). These alternating textures will be heard throughout today’s program. The concerto grosso genre swept Europe from the second half of the 17th century well into the 18th, developed first by Italian composers Arcangelo Corelli and Antonio Vivaldi, and later by G.F. Handel and J.S. Bach.
Alessandro Stradella is also the earliest composer represented this afternoon, born in either 1639 or 1643. He was active in Rome and Genua in the mid-17th century. His 27 instrumental works proved to be influential, though nearly 300 vocal works make up a significant percentage of his extant compositions. His list of known works, totaling 309, is impressive in number, especially for a composer who died relatively young. At age 42, he was stabbed to death by an unknown assassin. This may seem shocking at first glance, but Stradella’s life was replete with what many might consider unsavory affairs and dealings.
Stradella is thought to have known Arcangelo Corelli, who is generally considered the father of the concerto grosso. Like Stradella, Corelli enjoyed the patronage of one of history’s more colorful figures: Queen Christina, formerly Lutheran monarch of Sweden, then Catholic patron of the arts in Rome, and guest resident of five consecutive popes. Unlike Stradella, Corelli composed exclusively instrumental music and was one of the foremost violinists of the High Baroque, credited with advancing violin technique. The roster of distinguished violinist/composers who studied under Corelli attests to his impact as a teacher. After Christina’s death in 1689, Corelli’s patrons were powerful figures in the Church: Cardinal Pamphili and later the young Cardinal Ottoboni. It must be noted here that artists of all stripes, not just musicians, sought out and flourished under the patronage of wealthy, sometimes demanding, aristocrats and church leadership.
The Veronese-born Evaristo Felice Dall’Abaco, after a youthful stint in Modena, established himself further north, as a cellist in the court orchestra of Maximilian II Emmanuel, Elector of Bavaria. Various political vicissitudes forced Maximilian to relocate several times (Belgium, France), before returning to Munich in 1715, with the loyal Dall’Abaco in attendance. Dall’Abaco’s body of work is similar to Corelli’s in that it is both succinct and entirely instrumental. The “Concerto a piu istrumenti, No. 4” heard today is from his Opus 6, a set of 12 concertos from 1735 and Dall’Abaco’s last known published work.
Another composer with ties to Corelli, Francesco Geminiani left Italy and, like Dall’Abaco, found employment -- and, in his case, fame -- further north, principally in London, but with substantial work in Dublin, where he is buried. Like both Corelli and Dall’Abaco, Geminiani wrote (almost) exclusively instrumental music. He achieved celebrity status during his lifetime, to some extent via his compositional success, but more decidedly as a virtuoso violinist. The English thought him on a par with Handel and Corelli, but the ensuing musical time periods were not kind to Geminiani. He authored a number of treatises, including “A Treatise of Good Taste in the Art of Musick,” (1749) which is perhaps best known to us today. A couple of interesting marginal notes: In the mid-1730s, he seems to have developed what today might be called a side-hustle as an art dealer. And, his last public performance (March of 1760) was given in the Great Musick Hall in Fishamble Street, Dublin, the site of the 1742 premiere of Handel’s “Messiah.”
The only non-Italian on today’s program is Pieter Hellendaal, a Dutch violinist and organist who studied with the famed Giuseppe Tartini in his 20s. Unable to prosper at home in The Netherlands, he decamped at 30 to London, then Oxford, and finally Cambridge. His reputation as a violin virtuoso is confirmed by the written-out cadenzas he included with the autograph of his violin sonatas. His son Peter grew up to be a well-known player of a then relatively new instrument: the clarinet.
Undoubtedly the most recognizable name among this afternoon’s composers is that of Antonio Vivaldi, whose “L’estro armonico” (The Harmonic Inspiration) was the composer’s first music to appear in print (1711). Listed as his Opus 3, it contains 12 double-violin concertos dedicated to Ferdinando III de’ Medici, Grand Prince of Tuscany The music, some of it new, some recycled, was probably intended for the girls orchestra at the Ospedale della Pietà, the Venetian orphanage, convent, and music school where Vivaldi served as maestro di violino from age 24 - his first official post.
