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Program notes by Eric Bromberger

Sinfonia for Strings in G Major, RV 149
ANTONIO VIVALDI
Born March 4, 1678, Venice
Died July 26/7, 1741, Vienna

During the winter of 1739-40, Frederick Christian, son of the king of Poland and himself Prince Elector of Saxony, paid an official visit to Venice. Frederick was widely-known as a music-lover, so the civic authorities in Venice arranged a series of concerts to be given in his honor. One of these–the concert of March 21, 1740–was under the direction of Antonio Vivaldi, who led a program of his own music. The 62-year-old Vivaldi was at this time very near the end of his career (he would die the following year while on a visit to Vienna), and this concert found him at the height of his powers.

To lead off that program, Vivaldi composed a brief Sinfonia for Strings in G Major, cast in the three-movement form he used for orchestral works. It opens with a sizzling Allegro molto, and this gives way to an elegant Andante in which the melodic line sings ornately above pizzicato accompaniment; the Sinfonia concludes with a spirited Allegro.

This Sinfonia was composed by a master musician nearing the end of a long and distinguished career, and in its energy and bright sound it seems almost to stand outside time–this music is just as effective a curtain-raiser for this evening’s program as it was for that concert honoring a visiting dignitary 268 years ago.

Concerto in G Major for Strings and Continuo, Opus 7, No. 4
TOMASO ALBINONI
Born June 8, 1671, Venice
Died January 17, 1751, Venice

By a strange irony, Tomaso Albinoni remains most popular today for a piece he never wrote. His Adagio in G Minor is a reconstruction (actually, an entirely new composition) by the Italian musicologist Remo Giazotto, based on a six-bar fragment found in one of Albinoni’s manuscripts. Giazotto’s arrangement, published in 1958, helped contribute to the booming interest in baroque music in the years after World War II, and it has become one of the most popular of classical pieces–the current catalog lists over 35 different recordings.

Albinoni himself was a contemporary of Bach, who admired his music (and who paid Albinoni the subtle compliment of borrowing some of his themes to use as fugue subjects). The son of a wealthy family, Albinoni never had to take a court or church position to support himself as a musician, but he was far from being a dilettante, as he is sometimes characterized: he wrote over fifty operas, forty cantatas, and a vast amount of instrumental music that was widely published, and his name was–at the time of his death–known throughout Europe.

The Concerto in G Major for Strings and Continuo is one of a set of twelve concertos that Albinoni published in Amsterdam in 1715. These are sometimes referred to as Concerti a Cinque because the music consists of five parts: two for violin, two for viola, and a bass-line. The Concerto in G Major, which is in the three-movement sequence that Albinoni came to prefer, is quite brief, spanning only about eight minutes–it offers a stately opening Allegro, a slow movement that gives a prominent role to solo players, and a propulsive concluding Allegro.

Concerto in A Minor for Two Violins, Opus 3, No. 8, RV 522
ANTONIO VIVALDI

The Concerto in A Minor is from Vivaldi’s L’Estro armonico (“Harmonious Inspiration”), originally published in 1711. That was a collection of concerti grossi, but the Concerto in A Minor is known more simply as a concerto for two violins, and in fact it is one of the most distinguished of all two-violin concertos. Isaac Stern and David Oistrakh recorded it in 1955, when the baroque boom was still in its early years, and it has become a favorite of both professional and amateur musicians. This music fully deserves its popularity. It shows all the virtues of Vivaldi’s best concertos: virtuoso writing for the soloists, sharp contrast between the solo instruments and the larger orchestra, and an endless supply of rhythmic energy–this music seems to be constantly driving forward.

The concerto is in the fast-slow-fast sequence of movements that would become the pattern for the classical concerto. The first instants of the opening Allegro establish the character of this concerto–this will be music of sweep and brilliance. The writing for the solo violins is varied: sometimes they are in unison, sometimes in thirds, and throughout the movement they exchange roles, taking turns leading and accompanying (the second violin part, in fact, is often set above the first violin). Vivaldi moves to D minor for the Larghetto e spiritoso, and here the opening unison will serve as the ostinato bassline for the entire movement–it repeats solemnly as the two solo violins weave long melodic lines high above. At one point Vivaldi subtly varies this ostinato, inverting some of its phrases, before the movement concludes with a final unison restatement. The concluding Allegro returns to the virtuoso manner of the opening movement. The music is brilliant throughout, almost throwing off sparks as it goes, though there is one surprise: along the way, Vivaldi gives the second violin a theme all its own. The first violin never gets to play this melody, which soars with an aching expressiveness and then vanishes, never to return as the music powers its way to a fierce conclusion.

Concerto alla Rustica for Strings in G Major, RV 151

The title of this “rustic concerto” needs to be understood carefully. This is not a concerto that sets a solo instrument against an orchestra, but rather a work (without soloist) for string orchestra–it might be thought of as a sinfonia for string orchestra. And the description alla Rustica should be taken in a general sense: some have claimed to hear the sound of the drone common to folk music in this concerto, while others make out the shape of folk music in some of its themes, but perhaps it is best not to press that title too hard and instead enjoy the Concerto alla Rustica simply for its vigor and its attractive writing.

The most impressive aspect of the Concerto alla Rustica may be how concise it is: the entire work–in three fully-formed movements–gets past in less than four minutes. The opening Presto features a busy ritornello that drives powerfully along its 9/8 meter. This is daring music harmonically: it begins in the home key of G major, but quickly Vivaldi takes the ritornello through unexpected keys before finally bringing it back to G major. All seems set for the expected close when Vivaldi springs the real surprise, wrenching the music into G minor for its powerful concluding measures. This remains–three centuries later–an unexpected and unsettling close. The Adagio is simply a series of solemn chords, like the ground bass of a passacaglia. It is up to the performers to decide how to embellish these chords, which are almost stark in their simplicity; solutions have included having the continuo or a solo violin improvise a melody above the dark progression of these chords. This movement, which lasts only one minute, is enigmatic–it feels more like a somber interlude between the shining outer movements than a fully-developed movement of its own. The concluding Allegro goes back to the high energy level of the opening Presto–this exuberant music races along swaying accents to its vigorous close.

Concerto in A Minor for Violoncello, Strings, and Continuo, RV 419

Although he did not play the cello, Vivaldi wrote 27 concertos for that instrument. Even given Vivaldi’s prolific creativity, that number is surprising, for the cello had only recently begun to emerge from its subordinate role as part of the continuo line and to achieve the independence and identity of a distinct solo voice. It is clear that Vivaldi took great care with his cello concertos. A problem facing all who write for cello and orchestra is balance. While it is relatively easy to balance a violin–with its high, piercing sound–against an orchestra, it is a great deal more difficult to get the sound of the cello–a deep instrument–to emerge clearly when it is accompanied by an orchestra. Vivaldi addresses this problem by alternating passages for full orchestra with those for cello alone–essentially, he solves the problem of balance by avoiding it, and the sound of the cello emerges clearly in his concertos.

The Concerto in A Minor opens with a movement marked Allegro, but this music gives the impression not so much of speed as of dignity and nobility. In the Andante, the cello’s elaborate melodic line rides above the simplest of accompaniment, while the concluding Allegro is the most overtly virtuosic in the concerto.

Concerto Grosso in D Minor, “La Follia”
FRANCESCO GEMINIANI
Born December 5, 1687, Lucca
Died September 17, 1762, Dublin

Francesco Geminiani was one of the great violinists of the eighteenth century. He learned to play the violin as a boy, then went on to Rome, where he studied with Arcangelo Corelli and Allesandro Scarlatti. He was briefly a member of the Naples opera orchestra before moving to England in 1714 when he was 27. Geminiani quickly established himself in London: within two years of his arrival he performed before King George I, accompanied by Handel at the keyboard. Thereafter, Geminiani made his career in London, with extended periods spent in Dublin and Paris, and late in life he wrote several treatises on the art of playing the violin. Geminiani was also an art collector, and that proved an expensive hobby–he occasionally landed in financial difficulties as a result.

Geminiani discovered that the music of his teacher Corelli was wildly popular in London, and in the 1720s he arranged a number of Corelli’s works for string orchestra. The most famous of these arrangements is of Corelli’s Violin Sonata in D Minor, Opus 5, No. 12, which featured a set of variations on an old tune known as La Folia (or La Follia). The La Folia tune was already several hundred years old when Corelli used it for his variations. It appears to have originated in fifteenth-century Portugal, where it was originally a fast dance in triple time, performed so strenuously that the dancers seemed to have gone mad–the title folia meant “mad” or “empty-headed” (it survives in our usage as “folly”). Over time, this dance slowed down and became the famous theme we know today, and its solemn chordal progression and stately melody have made it irresistibly attractive as the basis for variations. Among the many other composers who have surrendered to its charm are Vivaldi, Marais, Bach, Lully, Liszt, Nielsen, and Rachmaninoff.

Geminiani’s arrangement, which may be understood as an act of homage to his old teacher, has become one of the most popular of his own works. He recasts the sonata as a concerto for three soloists–two violins and a cello–and accompanies them with string orchestra and continuo. Corelli’s variations are concise and sharply-contrasted, and Geminiani’s string-orchestra version highlights and intensifies the drama in his teacher’s famous music.

Concerto for Lute in D Major, RV 93
ANTONIO VIVALDI

Vivaldi spent nearly forty years (1704-1740) as music director of the Ospedale della Pietà, a home for illegitimate, abandoned, or orphaned girls in Venice. In that era (perhaps more progressive than our own), the Ospedale believed that teaching these girls to play an instrument would give them a useful skill, rescue them from a life of poverty, and keep them from becoming lifelong burdens on the state. At the Ospedale, Vivaldi’s responsibilities were to teach the violin and to write music for the girls to play, and it was for the use of these girls that he wrote most of his 450 concertos. The vast majority of them are for the composer’s own instrument, the violin, and he also wrote for other stringed instruments and for winds. But apparently some of the girls in the Ospedale played unusual instruments, and Vivaldi wrote for them too: among these works is the Concerto for Lute in D Major heard on this program.

Though it was conceived for an unusual instrument, this has become one of Vivaldi’s most popular concertos, and it exists in several forms–it is probably best known in its arrangement for guitar, but it has also been played on the mandolin and even the violin. This popularity is no surprise at all. Its pleasing melodies, rhythmic vitality, and infectious spirits have made this concerto a favorite with both audiences and performers.

Perhaps because he was writing for an instrument that is not very powerful, Vivaldi scored this concerto for the unusual orchestra of only two violin parts and a basso continuo line. Much of this music’s effectiveness comes from the deft interplay of soloist and orchestra, for the ritornello themes are full of snap and energy, and they contrast nicely with the delicate but agile sound of the lute. This concerto requires little description, and many listeners will discover they already know this pleasing music. Vivaldi launches the concerto with a firm Allegro giusto built on the orchestra’s rhythmic opening ritornello, and the soloist plays off the orchestra’s strong statements. This music feels constantly alive, from the snapped 32^nd-notes of the ritornello through the busy runs that are exchanged by soloist and orchestra. An expressive Largo is followed by a concluding Allegro that gallops happily along its 12/8 meter.

Concerto in G Major for Two Violins, Strings, and Continuo, RV 516

Vivaldi’s reputation rests largely on his approximately 220 concertos for violin, but he also wrote 27 concertos for two violins. Virtually all of these were composed for the use of his students during his forty-year tenure as music director at the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice. The Concerto in G Major is in the expected three movements. Vivaldi specifies that the opening movement should be Allegro molto, and it is very fast indeed, with a firm ritornello that makes unexpected excursions into minor keys; the two violin soloists emerge from this powerful orchestral frame. The Andante is essentially chamber music, with the two soloists singing above bare continuo accompaniment. The vigorous concluding Allegro returns to the manner of the opening movement, with the melodic line leaping between the soloists.

Concerto in B Minor for Four Violins and Strings, Opus 3, No. 10, RV 580

Like the Concerto in A Minor for Two Violins heard on the first half of this program, the Concerto in B Minor is from Vivaldi’s L’Estro armonico, a set of twelve concerti grossi. The intent in these concertos is not so much virtuoso display (though they are difficult enough, certainly) as in making contrast between the sound of the solo instruments and the main body of strings. The twelve concertos of L’Estro armonico quickly became popular and influential in northern Europe. Bach knew this music very well, and–if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery–paid Vivaldi the immense compliment of transcribing six of these concertos for different instruments and using them as his own (a practice that would be highly questionable today but which was viewed more generously three centuries ago): the present Concerto in B Minor for Four Violins became Bach’s Concerto in A Minor for Four Claviers, BWV1065.

Four of the concertos in L’Estro armonico are for four violins, and of these the Concerto in B Minor has become the best known. A concerto for four soloists, particularly for four soloists playing the same instrument, is a difficult matter: the composer must find enough for all four to do without burying anyone or allowing the same sonority to become tedious. Vivaldi brings this off with the rapid exchange of passages between soloists, an ingenious contrapuntal texture, and a great deal of rhythmic variety. In the opening Allegro the main theme is being varied and ornamented almost before it has been completely stated, and Vivaldi quickly has that vigorous main idea leaping between soloists. The slow movement opens with an even slower introduction; the main section has the four soloists playing over quiet continuo accompaniment–Vivaldi assigns an important part of the continuo to a solo cello throughout the concerto. The powerful ritornello that opens the last movement will return throughout; in this movement the soloists play in various combinations with the solo cello as the concerto drives to its close on an energetic tutti.

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