Carcani, Venturi, Cavazzoni: Puer natus (Italian Baroque and Traditional Choral and Organ Music)

Composer(s)

Daniele Venturi was born in Porretta Terme (Bologna – Italy) in 1971. As a composer and choir director he is among the most established of his generation. He studied composition with Gérard Grisey, Giacomo Manzoni, Fabio Vacchi, Ivan Fedele and Luis de Pablo, and orchestral conducting with Piero Bellugi. He is the founder and director of “Coro Gaudium” (1992) (Italian folk songs) and “Arsarmonica Ensemble” (2006). Since 1987 he has done ethnomusicological research in the Bologna and Modena areas, finding interesting ideas for his original compositions. In 2000 he became the assistant director of Pier Paolo Scattolin’s “Choir Voices of Europe”, Bologna (European City of Culture).

He has to his credit numerous international composition prizes including: “Gino Contilli”, Messina 2003 (second prize ex-aequo, and honourable mention), “IAMIC”, Toronto 2009, (prize shared between the two Italian composers who participated), “JSCM”, Tokyo, 2010, (the only European finalist), “ISCM”, Belgium 2012, (only Italian composer selected), ISCM-WMD, Slovenia, 2015, (Italian selection SIMC), Soundscape, Maccagno, 2015, (composer in residence), ISCM-WMD, Sud Korea, 2016, (Italian selection SIMC), San Diego New Music, 2016, USA, (Italian composer selected), etc..
His works have been performed in Italy and abroad, and broadcast by several radio and television channels (“Rai Radio Tre”, “Radio Cemat”, “Concertzender Radio”, “Radio Klara”, “Radio France”, “Vatican Radio”, “RAI Italian Television”).He has received commissions from major organizations and concert seasons and his music has been performed in prestigious concert halls such as: Italy: Milan, “Royal Palace”, “Teatro Dal Verme”, “Aula Magna of the Università Bocconi”, Turin, “Gam”, “Lingotto Auditorium”, Genova,”Tursi Palace”, Padua, “Auditorium Altinate/San Gaetano”, Pescara, “Pescara Music Academy Auditorium”, Messina, “Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art” and abroad, Slovakia: “Church of St. Michael Archangel”, Bratislava-Cunovo. Belgium: “STUK Labozaal”, Leuven. Japan: “Bunka Kaikan Hall”, “Tokyo Opera City”, Tokyo. China: “Nie Er Concert Hall”, Chengdu. Thailand: “Chiang Mai Auditorium”. Canada: “Canadian Music Centre”, “Placebo Space”, Toronto, “McGill University”, “Tana Schulich Hall”, Montreal. USA, Columbia University, Auditorium of the Italian Academy, New York, St Botolph Building, Room 01 – New England Conservatory, Boston, EDT Concert Hall at the Haven, Charlottesville, Virginia, Concert Hall, The Arts at UMBC, Baltimora, The Athenaeum Music & Arts Library, San Diego. Estonia, “Peetri Kogudus”, Tartu. Argentina: “Sala La Vidriera the Direcion General de Ensenanza Art”, Buenos Aires, “Institute Superior de Musica”, Santa Fe, Argentina “J. Alvarez Library”, Rosario. Uruguay: “Escuela Universitaria Music”, “Universidad de la Republica”, Montevideo. Azerbaijan: “Fund Zibal Az”, Baku, etc.
He has collaborated with international artists, performers and ensembles such as: Dacia Maraini, Germano Sartelli, Irvine Arditti, Garth Knox, Lisa Cella, Mark Menzies, Arne Deforce, Paola Perrucci, Pier Damiano Peretti, Luisa Sello, Takashi Aoyama, Tadayuki Kawahara, Solomiya Moroz, Liu Kai, Elizabeth Farnum, Dan Lippel, William Anderson, Jeremy Bass, Carlos Aguilar, “Pomus Ensemble” from “I Pomeriggi Musicali” – Milan, “Eclectica choir” – Bologna, “Interensemble” – Padova, “Cygnus Ensemble” – New York, “Noise Ensemble” – San Diego, “Le Centre Henri Pousseur” – Brussels, Maria Felix Korporal -Amsterdam, Istvan Horkay – Budapest, etc..
In September 2009, he issued his first Compact-Disc by Bongiovanni (Bologna) entitled “Quattro lembi di cielo” (Four sky pieces) consisting of 12 chamber works, with a preface by the wellknown Italian composer and teacher Giacomo Manzoni, and programme notes by Sandro Cappelletto.
In 2010 he taught Choral Conducting and Choral Composition at the “F.Venezze” Conservatoire – Rovigo, Italy.
In march of 2013 he has been invited by the “Electronic Music department” of the “SCCM Conservatory” (Chengdu, China) to give a series of lectures on his music.
In July 2013 he was commissioned by the “Roger Shapiro Fund for New Music” of Washington and the “ISCM Mid-Atlantic” the composition “Alla luna” for soprano, mandolin and guitar on text by Giacomo Leopardi.
In the summer of 2013, the Association “Musica/Realtà” – Milan has commissioned the piece “NOGI” for three pianos, a tribute to Luigi Nono.
Among his most recent compositions are included “Achernar” (2014) for piano and orchestra, written at the request of the Venezuelan pianist and composer Marianela Arocha, former president of “SVMC” (“Sociedad Venezolana de Música Contemporánea”), “Aden” (2015) for strings chamber orchestra, written for the “Amadeus Chamber Orchestra” of the “Polish-Radio” directed by Agnieszka Duczmal, and “Nibiru” (2015) for marimba and electronics, piece written at the request of the French percussionist Laurent Mariusse, and will be performed as a world première in autumn 2016 in Argentina.
He has recently completed the compositions: “Circus sounds” (2016) for solo flute, dedicated to American flutist Lisa Cella, “Studio sulla lontananza” (2011-2016) for piano, and “11 Haiku” (2016) for coloratura soprano and piano, dedicated to French pianist Pascale Berthelot.
In May 2016 Daniele Venturi he was appointed Director responsible of Artistic Committee “AERCO” (“Associazione Emiliano-Romagnola Cori”) which is part of “Feniarco” (“National Federation of Italian Regional Choral Associations”).
His compositions have been published by “M.A.P.”, “Rugginenti”, “Sconfinarte”, “Taukay”, “Isuku” and “Da Vinci” Editions.
From the 1st of September 2013 his artistic activity is followed by the “Brennecke-Art Management” in Vienna.

Domenico Zipoli (b Prato, 16/17 Oct 1688; d Santa Catalina, nr Córdoba, Argentina, 2 Jan 1726). Italian organist and composer. He was the sixth child born to Sabatino Zipoli and Eugenia Varrochi. The Prato Cathedral organist-choirmasters in his youth were both Florentines: Ottavio Termini (from 1703) and Giovanni Francesco Beccatelli. On 12 September 1707 he petitioned Cosimo III, Grand Duke of Tuscany, for six scudi monthly so that he could study at Florence, where the cathedral organist from 1703 was Giovanni Maria Casini. On 2 February and 9 March 1708 he cooperated with Casini, Caldara, Gasparini and 20 others in composing an oratorio produced at Florence under the supervision of Orlandini by the Compagnia di S Marco, and later that year at the Oratorians’ church in a version with arias by Zipoli replacing those of Omodei Sequi. Supported by a further ducal charity grant, he moved to Naples in 1709 for lessons with Alessandro Scarlatti but left in the same year after disagreements and went to study at Bologna under Lavinio Felice Vannucci; he next went from Bologna to Rome for lessons with the veteran Bernardo Pasquini. Staying in Rome after Pasquini’s death in 1710, he composed two oratorios of which only the librettos survive, S Antonio di Padova (1712) and S Caterina vergine, e martire (1714). In 1715 he was appointed organist of the Jesuit church at Rome and the next year published the keyboard collection on which his fame rests, Sonate d’intavolatura. The Princess of Forano to whom he dedicated the work, Maria Teresa Strozzi, may have been related to the bishop, Leone Strozzi, who had confirmed him at Prato Cathedral on 2 May 1699. Throughout his stay in Rome Zipoli lodged with Filippo Baldocci, prior of S Giovanni dei Fiorentini.

Zipoli joined the Society of Jesus on 1 July 1716, and soon after went to Seville to await passage to the Paraguay province. With 53 other prospective Jesuit missionaries he sailed from Cádiz on 5 April 1717. After a violent storm he and the others disembarked in July at Buenos Aires, and after 15 days set out for Córdoba. By 1724 he had completed with distinction the required three years each of philosophy and theology at the Jesuit Colegio Máximo and university in Córdoba. He was ready to receive priest’s orders in 1725, but died (of tuberculosis) without them for lack of a bishop in Córdoba to ordain him that year.

Zipoli was one of many excellent musicians recruited by the Jesuits between 1650 and 1750 for work in the so-called Paraguay reductions. His music was much in demand in South America: the viceroy in Lima asked for copies, and as late as 1784 a three-part orchestrally accompanied mass was copied in Potosí and sent to Sucre (Higher Peru, now Bolivia). Jesuit documents of 1728, 1732 and later note his continuing reputation up to at least 1774 in Yapeyú and other Guarany Indian villages from which Europeans were excluded; at one mission, S Pedro y S Pablo, nine ‘motetes’ by Zipoli were listed among the effects left after the expulsion of the Jesuits. In the 1970s some 23 works by Zipoli (including copies of known keyboard pieces) were discovered among a large collection of manuscripts at the San Rafael and Santa Ana missions in eastern Bolivia (they are now deposited at Concepción, Apostolic Vicariate of Ñuflo de Chávez). At San Rafael the Swiss Jesuit Martin Schmid (1694–1772) may have prepared a Spanish drama celebrating the lives of Loyola and Francis Xavier, which ended with a paragraph in the Chiquitano language summarizing the moral of the drama. In 1997 the Argentine scholar Bernado Illari interpolated excerpts into this (including some possibly by Zipoli) to form an ‘opera’, S Ignacio.

The charm and winsomeness of Zipoli’s 1716 keyboard works inspired their republication in London by Walsh and in Paris (1741; the harpsichord music only). The first part, for organ, consists of a brilliant prefatory toccata followed by five sets of short versos, each set ending with a canzona (of which much the most elaborate is the last in G minor), two elevations, a post-communion, an offertory and a folklike pastorale. The second part, for harpsichord, contains four short dance suites and two partitas (or variations). Zipoli moved freely between keys, timed his modulations exquisitely, never laboured an imitative point, made a virtue of concision, and wrote melodies instead of mere contrapuntal lines. His South American mass, copied at Potosí in 1784, closing with the ‘Osanna’, exhibits similar virtues. He was the most renowned Italian composer to go to the New World in colonial times and the most famous to have chosen the Jesuit order.

Girolamo Cavazzoni (b c1525; d after 1577). Italian composer, son of Marco Antonio Cavazzoni . Mischiati placed his birth between 1506 and 1512, when both his father and Pietro Bembo were in Urbino, on the basis of a confusion between him and Girolamo de Adaldis, an organist at Mantua from about 1520 to 1564. Certainly, Cavazzoni said that he was born while his father was in Bembo's service, but in the preface to his first publication (Intavolatura libro primo, 1543) he referred to himself as ‘quasi fanciullo’ (probably about 17). He obtained a privilege from the Venetian senate on 31 October 1542 for the printing of this volume. The second volume, which carries no publication date, must have been printed before 1549, the date of the death of its dedicatee, Benedetto Accolti, Cardinal of Ravenna. Ortensio Landi referred to a ‘Girolamo d’Urbino’ in his Cathaloghi (Venice, 1552) as one of the best musicians of that period; and three of Cavazzoni's works were reprinted after 1555, ascribed to Hieronymo d'Urbino. In 1565–6 he supervised the building of the organ in the church of S Barbara, Mantua, and also played the organ there at Mass. He apparently was closely associated with the music-loving Guglielmo Gonzaga, for on 17 October 1565 he requested the duke to purchase some silver spoons for him at Venice. During his Mantuan years Cavazzoni taught the organ to Costanzo Antegnati (1549–1624), son of the organ builder at S Barbara, Graziadio Antegnati. Costanzo's L'arte organica (Brescia, 1608) recalls Cavazzoni as ‘Hieronimo d'Urbino già mio honorato maestro’. Mischiati stated that Cavazzoni was still organist at S Barbara in 1577.

Cavazzoni's four ricercares (1543) differ strikingly from the pair published in 1523 by his father, Marco Antonio, for they comprise a series of imitative expositions, each having from three to 19 entries, connected by a few free figurative sections. The large number of entries of a single point and also the appearance of an ensuing point as the conclusion of a preceding one suggest that the stylistic model was the vocal music of Gombert's generation. Unlike Cavazzoni's rather austere ensemble ricercares of 1540 (a 4) and 1551 (a 3), those of 1543 are enlivened by idiomatic cadential flourishes and occasional rapid passage-work; they are, however, almost always supported by continuing polyphony. Aside from modal similarities, there is no indication that the four keyboard ricercares of 1543 were intended to be connected with their ensuing canzonas, hymns or Magnificat settings. Brevity, restricted range, absence of clear cadential points and a subsequent lack of sectionalism distinguish Cavazzoni's two ensemble ricercares from those for keyboard.

The two canzonas are modelled on chansons by Josquin and Passereau. They are not transcriptions but arrangements, reducing Josquin's five voices to four, altering pitches of the points of imitation and the times of their entries, radically shortening Passereau's chanson, and introducing passaggi, especially at cadences.

The 12 hymns, probably intended to be played in alternation with a choir, present their cantus firmi usually in a single voice, normally superius or bassus (tenor in Jesu nostra redemptio), and only occasionally migrate from one voice to another (e.g. bass to tenor in Jesu corona virginum). Sometimes a brief contrapuntal introduction precedes the statement of the hymn tune, and motifs derived from the tune inspire the surrounding imitative polyphony. The textural severity is lightened by passaggi, which in Christi redemptor omnium are quite extended. Cavazzoni's four Magnificat settings are for alternatim performance. He set the odd-numbered verses, treating the chant not as a cantus firmus, however, but as a source for imitative expositions. Since the chant is both decorated and presented differently in each verse, a series of miniature variations results.

The three settings of the Mass are also for organ performance alternating with a choir. The first is based on Mass IV, the second on Mass XI, and the third on Mass IX. The Gloria of the last incorporates some Marian tropes which were customary in masses de Beata Virgine before they were eliminated by the Council of Trent. The compositional style closely resembles that of the Magnificat sections.

Giuseppe Carcani: (b Crema, 1703; d Piacenza, end of Jan 1779). Italian composer, conductor and organist. He succeeded Hasse in 1739 as maestro di cappella of the Ospedale degli Incurabili in Venice, and on 4 September 1744 succeeded G.B. Benzoni as maestro di cappella of Piacenza Cathedral, where he remained until his death. From 1744 to 1760 he also directed the Cappella di S Giovanni in Piacenza, again as Benzoni’s successor, and became a leading light at the Bourbon court of the dukes of Piacenza and Parma, presiding over their musical functions, both official and private. He was disliked, however, by the first minister, G. du Tillot, who in 1760 ordered Carcani to relinquish to his son Giacomo the post he had held since 1745 as musical director of the Congregazione di S Alessandro in Piacenza. In a letter dated 15 June 1768 Hasse expressed the wish that Carcani return to the Incurabili.

Although famous in his day, and praised on occasion by Carpani and Caffi among others, Carcani does not now appear to have possessed strikingly individual gifts, following the general tastes and style of his period. His instrumental music inclines towards the Milan school and reflects the transition from the Baroque style to the new sensibility, displaying certain pleasing ideas and technical ability. His operatic arias and duets follow obsequiously the style of Hasse’s without possessing their purely musical gifts.