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Mediterranean Holiday Program Notes During this 2014 – 2015 iteration of Piffaro’s concert series, which is taking a musical journey through Spain and Italy, a holiday concert that is localized in the fabled city of Naples seems most fitting. It served as the nexus of commercial, political and cultural interaction between the two countries from the mid 15th century on through at least the early 19th, and still reflects that interconnection to the present day. Situated on the south west coast of Italy across the Tyrhennian Sea from the island of Sardinia to the west, Naples (or Napoli in Italian, from the Greek Neapolis, meaning “New City”) is ironically one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in Europe. Settled by Greek migrants at the end of the 2nd millennium BC and refounded as Neapolis in the 6th century BC, Naples held a key position in Magna Graeca and played a pivotal role in the infusion of Greek culture into Roman society, eventually becoming a major cultural center in the Roman Republic and subsequent Empire. The city maintained its prominent position through the “dark ages” following Rome’s demise, allying itself at first with Byzantium to the East, but eventually becoming the capital of the independent Kingdom of Naples by the early 13th century. The city’s connection with Spain began in earnest when Alfonso V defeated the French Renè of Anjou in 1442, bringing the Neapolitan Kingdom under the rule of the Aragon dynasty. That marked the beginning of a new and more luxuriant cultural blossoming, while the city’s new relations with the Iberian peninsula enhanced its commercial standing as well. During this Spanish period, which lasted until 1816, Naples became a major urban center of the Renaissance, emerging at the beginning of the 17th century as the second largest city in Europe – second only to Paris – with a population of roughly 250,000 people, and the largest Mediterranean port. Naples’ reputation for arts and culture reaches back at least as far as the Imperial period when the city served as a resort for wealthy Roman patricians, even emperors. Nero is said to have visited there to sing in one of the two Roman theaters that served the thriving dramatic arts of the city at the time. Architectural achievements of note dot the city from the Roman period onward, and the literary and fine arts flourished from at least as early as the medieval period. Scant evidence exists, however, for the musical culture of the city until the very beginnings of the Spanish period. The second half of the 15th century witnessed a burgeoning of musical activity, largely due to the patronage of Alfonso V (I of Naples), called èl magnánimo, and his son Ferrante who together brought about a “golden age” of arts and culture in the city. Three institutions occupied the center of musical activity in Naples in the main renaissance period and beyond, namely the royal chapel, the Chiesa dell’ Annunziata and from 1586 the Oratory of San Filippo. The chapel was dominated by Spanish and Flemish elements. The maestri di capella, musical directors of the chapel, included the Spaniards Diego Ortiz (1555 – 1570) and Francisco Martinez de Lorcos (1570 – 1583) and the Flemings Bartolomeo Le Roy (1583 – 1598) and Giovanni de Macque (1599 – 1614). In contrast, the Oratory brought the influence of the Roman polyphonic school, represented by the works of Giovanni Pierluigi de Palestrina and Giovanni da Nanino, to bear on musical practices in Naples at the time. All three institutions maintained organ positions and boasted a series of organist/composers who made the city among the most important centers for the development of keyboard music in Europe. Two of these organists, Giovanni de Macque and especially Giovanni Maria Trabaci, have contributed significantly to this concert’s musical selections. However, the program begins not in the midst of these august institutions but out on the streets of the city with a peasant’s dance and a traditional tune that has had a long and varied history. Sometimes called the Pastorale de Zampognari, the latter tune is one of those small rural hymns, which the zampognari or pipers from the Abruzzi and Calabrian mountains sing before the images of the Virgin at the corners of the streets in Rome and Naples at this season of Advent, accompanied by the sound of their rustic bagpipes, the zampogni, sporting two drones and two chanters, and the ciaramella, a type of rustic, folk shawm. The tune subsequently took on a life of its own; text was added by the local priest Alfonso Maria de’ Liguori in the 18th century in the Neapolitan dialect, the first such religious text to be written in dialect, so that they might be understood by the local peasants. Now often referred to as the “Neapolitan bagpiper’s carol”, perhaps the most notable use of the tune is that by Georg Frederic Handel in his oratory, Messiah, for the aria “And He shall feed his flock”, capitalizing on the pastoral origins of the tune. From the city streets the program enters the royal chapel where the confluence of Spanish, Flemish and Italian elements must surely have produced musical events of truly international scope. First, the traditional Hodie Christus natus est (“Today Christ is born”) by Giovanni Maria Nanino provides an example of the international style of polyphony as brought to Naples from Rome. Nanino was a Roman singer, composer and teacher who studied with Palestrina and eventually joined the papal choir as a tenor. Highly regarded as an educator, he and his brother established what is thought to be the first Italian-­‐run public music school in Rome, and many future composers studied with him and sang in his choirs. The composer and musicologist Diego Ortiz, whose tenure as maestro di capella in the royal chapel occupied the third quarter of the 16th century, is believed to have been born in Toledo, Spain, but spent the better part of his career in service to the viceroy of Naples, the third duke of Alba, Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, who latter became King Philip III of Spain. Little else is known about his life. His few publications are well known, however, especially the Trattado de glosas (1553), a treatise on ornamentation and solo performance intended for viola da gamba. The two recercada on this program are drawn from this work and scored instead for cornetto and sackbut with vihuela accompaniment, in typical renaissance practice. The Magnificat quinti toni, a work customarily heard in Marian feasts during Advent, is drawn from Ortiz’ publication of polyphonic sacred music, the Musices liber primus, published in Venice in 1565. What would Christmas be without a hearing of at least one setting of O magnum mysterium? The work has its origins as a responsorial chant assigned to Matins, the morning service, on Christmas day. Numerous composers from the Renaissance have written polyphonic settings of the chant, and this program presents two, one of Italian origin and one Spanish. The setting by the Spaniard Christóbal de Morales has a 4-­‐voice texture written for tenors and basses underscoring the contemplative nature of the work. Morales was born and educated in Seville, Spain, but by 1535 he had moved to Rome, where he was a singer in the papal choir, evidently due to the interest of Pope Paul III who was partial to Spanish singers. He remained in Rome until 1545, in the employ of the Vatican, but returned to Seville where he served as maestro di capella, and an educator of significant note, boasting the great Francisco Guerrero and Alonso Lobo as his students. He was and is considered to be the most influential Spanish composer before Victoria. The setting by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina takes a completely different course. Set for 6 voices, two distinct soprano lines provide a very different sound scape from the Morales setting for low, men’s voices. He also alters the mode of the piece from the straightforward F major of Morales’ setting to an A/E tonality with Am and the Phrygian mode on E dominating the texture. He also alters the text of the traditional versicle and response to include the address to the shepherds, “Quem pastores vidistis?”. The composer was born in the small town of Palestrina outside of Rome, was given musical instruction from an early age and spent the better part of his illustrious career in various institutions in Rome itself. A prolific composer, singer and organist, Palestrina was almost wholly dedicated to music for the Roman church (though he did produce two volumes of secular madrigals), and showed complete mastery of the genre. In fact, he is considered by most musicologists to have brought the renaissance polyphonic style of sacred composition to its culmination. From the royal chapel the program settles in the Chiesa dell’ Annunziata, or the Church of the Annunciation, to listen to three instrumental works by the two aforementioned Neapolitan composers, Macque and Trabaci. These works are preserved to the present in organ score format, though they reflect the same compositional style associated with ensemble writing prevalent in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. These pieces serve liturgical functions in the Roman services, just as organists today might improvise in moments that call for musical adornment in some form, and may in fact be written out improvisations. Giovanni de Macque was born in the low countries, but spent the better part of his career in Italy. He served as choir boy for a time in Vienna before traveling to Rome where he worked as organist and composer. By 1585 he had moved to Naples and worked under the employ of the patrician Gesualdo family, associated closely with Carlo Gesualdo himself, from whom he may well have learned his tendencies toward chromaticism. Once in Naples, Macque became one of the most famous composers of 16th century Naples and served both the royal chapel and the Chiesa dell’ Annunziata, acquiring the post of maeatro di capella at the royal chapel by 1599. In 1614 Giovanni Maria Trabaci succeeded Macque , after the latter’s death, as maetro di capella of the royal chapel, a position he held until his own death in 1647, the first Italian born musician to secure that post. A prolific composer, he was more reputed as an exceptionally skilled organist. Trabaci was born in Monte Pelusio (now Irsina, near Matera), though nothing more is known about his early life. A veritable “wunderkind” on the organ, he was called upon at the young age of 20 to test and evaluate the organ at the Oratorio dei Filippini. That reputation secured for him the prestigious post of first organist in the viceroyal chapel in Naples in 1601, at a time when foreign-­‐born musicians were otherwise all the rage. Though he published sacred vocal compositions as well, Trabaci was most noted for his keyboard works, which include ricercari, canzonas, capriccios and toccatas collected in two publications. The bold harmonic language in these instrumental pieces, with unexpected modulations to distant keys, and experiments with structure had a marked influence on both his now more well-­‐
known contemporaries and colleagues, Carlo Gesualdo and Girolamo Frescobaldi. In sharp contrast to these instrumental works of particularly Italian character – nothing like them exist in the surviving Spanish repertoire of the time – lie the next five vocal works drawn from three principal Iberian sources spanning a century, as listed on the program. These pieces represent the flip side of the coin in Neapolitan musical life, each one taking the form either of the cançion or the villancico. The latter, with its characteristic ABBA structure, including Angeles del Zielo, Un niño es nasçido, Verbum caro factum est and Riu, riu, chiu, were distinctly popular in origin and character. The villancico, translated as “song of the people”, displayed a particular rhyme scheme and a verse/refrain pattern that marked its uniqueness in the vocal repertoire. They were very popular around Christmas time and many carried texts appropriate to the season, as in the case of these on this program. Often earthy and sometimes fanciful in character, the texts depict events like the angels turning cartwheels in the sky (Angeles del zielo), the rusticity of the manger scene contrasting with the divine, the shepherds’ visit, the response of wild and domestic beasts, and the like. The hauntingly beautiful Que bonito niño chiquito, on the other hand, qualifies as a cançion. Strophic and through composed, it too carries a characteristically Spanish interpretation of the Christmas story and takes the form of a gentle lullaby. In both Spain and Italy of the renaissance and early baro que periods, devotion to the Roman Church was a particularly powerful influence on all aspects of life, impacting politics, social organization, commerce and cultural identities. Both Spanish and Italian composers found their principal employ in the lap of mother church, and thus wrote to satisfy the specific needs of the many masses and lesser liturgical events, such as matins and vespers, that occurred daily, a sometimes daunting task. The Church’s traditions even dictated the texts to be set to music and the overall doctrinal perspectives and emphases. In these two western Mediterranean countries one such perspective was what has been called the “cult of the Virgin”. Given the number of polyphonic settings of Marian antiphons written by Spanish and Italian composers, it appears that southern European Catholicism venerated the virgin mother rather more than in the North. The set of pieces opening the second half of the concert has at its center one such Marian motet, the Ave dulcissima Maria, composed by one of the most famous, and infamous, Neapolitan composers, Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa and Count of Conza. The Gesualdo family was invested with the principality of Venosa by Philip II of Spain in 1560 and so enjoyed patrician status of considerable wealth. As such, they proved notable patrons of the arts, especially music. Giovanni de Macque was one such recipient of the family’s largess in Neapolitan society. Carlo achieved considerable success as a composer himself, traveling widely to visit and learn from other renowned composers, but also to display his own musical erudition. An extended visit to Ferrara put him in close contact with the famous Luzzasco Luzzaschi, for example. He was versatile in every type of musical style and widely and extensively published. His Ave dulcissima Maria displays his mastery of the style, as well as his love of chromaticism, and a careful attention to textual detail. Surrounding this Marian motet, instrumental pieces by Trabaci emphasize the new practice, the ‘stile moderno’ that took Italy by storm at the end of the 16th century. His output was large and varied. Interestingly, he dedicated no fewer than five volumes of works to the Virgin Mary, the others to Neapolitan nobility and the Spanish viceroys. These keyboard works, suitable for instrumental ensemble and transcribed for such in this program, especially the Consonanza Stravagante and the Durrezze et Ligatura, act as prelude and postlude to Gesualdo’s paean to Mary, underscoring in their progressive style and chromatic exploration the mystery of the immaculate birth and incarnation. Mystery gives way to merriment, however, as the set concludes with two dances, one by each of the two composers, Gesualdo’s stressing extrovert tonal color and Trabaci’s polyphonic invention and rhythmic vitality. Celestial imagery serves as a reigning metaphor in many of the texts set to music during this season, the star of Bethlehem a principal progenitor of such. Trabaci’s Capriccio sopra un soggetto solo that begins this next set, played on a consort of high recorders, veritably sparkles like the twinkling of the stars in the heavens, with a lone shooting star hurtling across the sky in a sudden flurry of fast notes in three of the parts. The two vocal works by the Italians Biagio Marini and Marco da Gagliano that follow are clear examples of the use of this imagery, the latter even punning on the notion of ‘Sun’ and ‘Son’. Marini was a virtuoso violinist and composer of the first half of the seventeenth century. Born in Brescia, he may have studied with his uncle Giacinto Bondioli. His works were printed and influential throughout the European musical world. He traveled throughout his life, and occupied posts in Brussels, Neuburg an der Donau and Düsseldorf, Venice joining Monteverdi at St. Mark's Cathedral, Padua, Parma, Ferrara, Milan, Bergamo, and Brescia in Italy. Gagliano, on the other hand, was born in Florence and spent most of his life there. A prolific composer of considerable renown, he was chosen to head the esteemed musical establishment of the Medici family, after serving the Gonzagas for a time in Mantua. He wrote in both the older renaissance style, the ‘prima prattica’, and the emerging modern fashion of monody with continuo accompaniment, of which the O Meraviglie belle is a charming example. The concert moves outside of Naples for the last piece on the program and visits Sicily. The two cities shared a close relationship for a time, being part of a united ‘Kingdom of Sicily’ prior to the beginning of Spanish rule. Both cities, being centers of maritime activity, shared also a strong connection to the sea and maritime commerce, benefitting from concomitant and inevitable cultural interactions. So, a tune with ostensibly Sicilian origins would likely be quite at home and well known to Neapolitans as well. The Roman church adopted the tune, giving it text in praise of the blessed Virgin Mary, since known as the “Sicilian Mariner’s hymn”. According to tradition, Sicilian seamen ended each day on their ships by singing this hymn in unison. The tune probably traveled from Italy to Germany and England, where it was also made into a Christmas carol with English words not relating to the Virgin Mary, but rather to Jesus himself. Ludwig van Beethoven arranged the tune as No. 4 in his "Verschiedene Volkslieder" (“Various folksongs”), and the German version with the text "O du fröhliche” remains a well-­‐
known and loved Christmas carol to this day. The Latin version with the text “O sanctissima, o piissima”, however, is not typically heard at Christmas, but more often sung in Catholic churches on Marian feast days, such as the Feast of the Annunciation that occurs during this season of Advent. Bringing this concert to a close, it helps to evoke a seasonal sentiment of exuberant joy, as it surely has done in many lands for several centuries. Bob Wiemken