Download mario nardelli - Dubrovačke ljetne igre

54. dubrovačke ljetne igre
54th Dubrovnik Summer Festival
2003
Hrvatska Croatia
MARIO NARDELLI
gitara guitar
Atrij Kneževa dvora
Rector's Palace Atrium
13. srpnja 13th July
21.30 9.30 p.m.
Mario Nardelli st. sr.:
Dubrovački nocturno Dubrovnik Nocturne
Mario Nardelli st. sr.:
Omaggio a Boris Ulrich
Mario Nardelli st. sr.:
Tri folklorne impresije Three Folk Impressions
Allegro moderato
Moderato libero
Allegro
Mario Nardelli st. sr.:
Syncopato Suite
Lazy
Cool
Joke
****
Wolfgang Muthspiel:
Tonspiel
Dušan Bogdanović:
Jazz-sonata
Allegro
Moderato
Poco allegro
Vivo
Astor Piazzolla:
Verano Porteno
Astor Piazzolla:
La Muerte de Angel
Croatian guitar player Mario Nardelli (1961) born in Zagreb, started to play the guitar at a
very early age. Having completed the secondary music school in his homeland, he began to
study at the Music University in Graz with Leo Witoszynsky (as a holder of the scholarship
by the Austrian Ministry of Education and Culture), wherefrom he graduated with honours.
After graduation he launched into a remarkable concert career; he intensively performs
throughout Europe, North and South America, the Far East and works with the most
prestigious artists from the world of classical and jazz music such as Rafael Catala, Wolfgang
Muthspiel, Werner Tripp, Ernst Meyer, Markus Schrimer and others. Ever since the beginning
of his artistic career he has been trying to reconcile and unite various music genres, from
classical and jazz to pop and ethno music, which is precisely how the tonight’s programme is
composed. He is engaged in pedagogic work: he is a full time professor at guitar festivals in
Lockenhaus (Austria), Balatonalmádi (Hungary), Mikulov (Slovakia), Ankara, Donjeck
(Ucraine) etc. He is an honorary professor at the Hacetipe University in Ankara. Mario
Nardelli is also a successful producer: the Austrian Reiffeisen Bank entrusted him with
organization of the Reiffeisen Classics concerts.
Croatian composer, arranger and guitar player Mario Nardelli Sen., the artist’s father, was
born in Dubrovnik on 20th May 1927 and died in Zagreb, exactly ten years ago, on 13th July
1993. He graduated from the Zagreb Academy of Music. He was engaged at the Dubrovnik
National Theatre and since 1949 he lived in Zagreb, where, until 1982, he was engaged as a
music editor, producer, arranger, orchestra member and conductor at the Croatian Radio. For
many years he was a guitar player and artistic director of the Vocal-instrumental group
Dalmacija. His compositions, for which he himself wrote lyrics, won numerous awards at pop
music festivals and his works were published both in the country and abroad. Particularly
prominent are his orchestral, concert, vocal and solo compositions.
Dubrovnik Nocturne, dedicated to composer's native town, was composed in 1973 and
adapted in 1988. In this harmony-wise audaciously elaborated and free rhythm piece,
however, Dubrovnik is conjured up in darker colours; depressive mood of the piece is in
contrast with all known perceptions about the city. Omaggio a Boris Ulrich, composed in
1983, is dedicated to the author's friend, (who prematurely died of leukemia) the Croatian
composer and pianist Boris Ulrich (1931-1983), the winner of the prestigious UNESCO
International Composers Award in Paris (1972). A slow, melancholic melody runs and
gradually develops through the harmony-wise interestingly composed tone tissue, which in
some sections reminds of the blues. Regardless of the very slow tempo, one can feel a
dramatic beat pulse throughout the whole composition. The Three Folk Impressions,
composed in 1976 are based on irregular rhythms (5/8, 7/8 and 9/8) as well as on the Oriental
melos, therefore Nardelli can be claimed a predecessor of ethno-wave that spread to Europe in
late 90s. The harmony does not play a major role here, which is quite unlikely for the
composer, because what is essential here is the rhythm, which simply does not cease to
resound both in the first and final movement. Broken by cadenzas, the second movement has
a very free rhythm; it is based on the major second, the interval that is so typical for Eastern
music. Nardelli composed his Syncopato Suite in 1978 and dedicated it to his son. In the title
of this, at the time surprisingly brave, composition there is a witty play of words :syncopato =
in Croatian: suffer, my son! The piece is exclusively composed in a jazz-idiom, which is
evident in the titles of the movements. Namely, at that time it was unimaginable for a classical
music artist to perform in a jazz manner at a classical music concert. A very demanding
performing technique of the piece requires a special feeling for performing jazz from the
musician.
Austrian guitar player and composer Wolfgang Muthspiel (1965) was born in Judenburg,
Austria. He started to study the violin at an early age, believing at first his interest in the
guitar to be a hobby. In time the things changed and his love for the guitar grew stronger. He
therefore went to study jazz and classical music at the Music University in Graz. Still a
student, he arranged Bach's Goldberg Variations for two guitars together with the tonight's
soloist. The duo brilliantly world premièred the piece at the Bach Music Days festival in
Seckau, Austria. Having arrived to the Boston Jazz Academy, Muthspiel definitely turned to
jazz. He was there discovered by Garry Barton, with whose Quintet he went on a two years
world tour. After a tremendous success of the tour he dedicated himself solely to creating his
own music and projects. The members of his group were, among others, Chick Correa, Garry
Burton, Mick Goodrick and Garry Peacock. He makes many return visits to prestigious jazz
festivals (Montreux, New York, Toronto, Paris, San Francisco, etc.). Major music festivals
(such as Salzburg) commission his new orchestral works that are being performed with great
success. He is now based both in Vienna and New York. The Tonspiel (The Play of Tones)
was composed in 1986. A wide cadenza from the very beginning of the composition turns into
minimalism by a sudden contrast, and out of spite to stark academic composing rules. In the
moment when the harmonic and rhythmic tensions culminate, the composer-designer gives
the performer a complete freedom and an opportunity to improvise in the place of a nonexisting cadenza.
The guitar player and composer Dušan Bogdanović (1955) was born in Belgrade. He studied
the composition and the orchestration at the Geneva Conservatory (with P. Wissmer and A.
Ginastera) and his guitar teacher was the famous Maria Livia Sao Marcos. At a very early age
he won the International Guitar Competition in Geneva and his recital at the Carnegie Hall in
New York in 1977 was triumphantly received. He lectured at the Geneva Conservatory and
the South California University and presently teaches the guitar and composing at the Music
University in San Francisco. He performed in many European countries, as well as in the
USA and Japan. He also worked with renowned chamber ensembles (such as De Falla Trio,
the guitar and harpsichord duo with Elaine Comparone, etc.) and jazz musicians like James
Newton, Milcho Leviev, Charlie Haden, Miroslav Tadić, Mark Nauseef and Anthony Cox. He
has a huge discography both as a performer and composer. His extensive composing opus
ranges from simple solo forms to complex orchestral pieces, in which his interest for folk
music manifests always in a different way. Very interesting are his works in the field of the
theory of polyrhythm and polymetric, as well as his analysis of the three-voice counterpoint,
renaissance guitar improvisation and also a structural study of motive transformation in
composing and improvising regardless of the style. He also collaborated in multidisciplinary
projects including music, other arts, psychology and philosophy. Bogdanović composed his
Jazz-sonata in 1982 after one of his travels to the African Continent. Namely, on each of his
journeys he records and makes notes of the local music, which he later uses in his works in an
original way. A music critic of the American magazine Il fronimo wrote: ‘That what Dušan
Bogdanović composes can not be compared to anything in the 20th Century music’. The basis
of the Jazz-sonata is a distinctive rhythm; yet it is not a conventional jazz-rhythm, but an
irregular rhythm that is incomprehensible for an educated European mind. In this piece the
composer strives to reach the very roots of jazz that are implanted in the music of uncivilised
tribes which Bogdanović met during his travels. The composition style is therefore more
exotic and discovering in comparison to typical jazz sound. Technically very demanding, the
piece leaves many voids for performer’s free improvisation.
The great Argentinian tango master Astor Piazzolla (1921-1992) thus commented the
trademark of his art: ”Tango is not merely a dance but a story. This is where one dies and is
born, this is where crime and hate blend with love and passion. Tango knows no happy ending
... Tango is a life full of happiness and disappointment, filled with contrasts that hurt but also
heal...” Verano Porteno and la Muerte de Angel are compositions saturated with soft
harmonies and a constant lethal rhythm of tango which unnoticed runs through their tissue.
Applying almost all style directions of nowadays, Piazzolla managed to transform a relatively
simple form of this dance into a high and demanding music form that had been accepted by
the entire world a long time ago.
D. Detoni