Luigi Perrachio, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Piano Quintets

Description

Luigi Perrachio (1883-1966) and Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco (1895-1968) were both part of the flowering of Italian instrumental music in the first decades of the twentieth century. Perrachio was born in Turin, and spent his life in that city, performing as a pianist, composing, organizing concerts, and incorporating Piedmontese folk elements in his music. Castelnuovo-Tedesco was born in Florence, and also performed as a pianist; his music is suffused with a broad range of Italian popular influences, especially Tuscan. In 1938, he was forced to leave Italy as a result of Mussolini’s anti-Jewish laws, and he settled in the United States, where he became an important teacher to composers, including John Williams and André Previn. The musicologist Guido Gatti (1892-1973), who promoted both Perrachio and Castelnuovo-Tedesco in his prolific writings on Italian music of the period, writes of the effects of the upheaval of the first World War on music in Europe, and notes that Italian composers, by-and-large, resisted atonality and wrote music that was more accessible and attractive than many of their European contemporaries (Musical Quarterly, July 1932). Perrachio and Castelnuovo-Tedesco both composed music that never strays far from tonal norms and adheres to classical structures. They also share a love of the music of Bach and exhibit a strong sense of counterpoint in their writing, which is especially evident in the quintets presented here.
Perrachio, while influential as a teacher and performer (he was on the faculty of the Conservatory in Turin from 1925 until 1955), published relatively little, although he composed prolifically. As a result, his music is largely unknown today, even in his native Turin. Although he ultimately received a composition degree from the conservatory in Bologna in 1913, he was largely self-taught. Before his conservatory education, he had spent time in Vienna and Paris, absorbing the musical cultures of both cities. In particular, he fell in love with the music of Debussy, and spent time with Ravel and the pianist Ricardo Viñes, among other figures.
I initially discovered Perrachio via his impressionistic Nove Poemetti (1917-1920) for piano, a collection that I recorded in 2018. Guido Gatti wrote an enthusiastic essay on Perrachio in 1918, admitting that it is unusual to profile a composer who has published almost nothing. The Quintet was composed in 1919 and dedicated to Gatti; it remained unpublished. In 2019, I had the opportunity to examine and make a photograph of the manuscript, which is housed in the library of the Conservatory in Turin along with other papers donated by Perrachio’s son. The Quintet was published under my supervision by DaVinci Press in 2022. Bringing this music to life for the first time since its premiere has been a privilege.
The first movement is immense and powerful. Here, Perrachio moves away from the language of Debussy and Ravel that so strongly influenced the Poemetti, and into the more muscular and neoclassical language that was to dominate much of his composition in the 1920s and 1930s. (Listen to his 25 Preludi for piano, composed in 1927, to get the idea.) The turbulent and dramatic first theme is played by the strings in unison, accompanied by tempestuous piano figuration. The simple and spare second theme is first presented by the piano, and then expanded on by the strings in a richly harmonized choir. The extensive development builds to an immense climax, and then moves into a moment of stillness that shows Perrachio’s imaginative use of orchestration and color. The first theme returns emphatically, with the piano joining the strings in rhythmic unison.
The concise scherzo that follows is full of playful rhythmic and compositional tricks, introducing the opening motif from Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony and even flirting with a unison line of eleven different notes—almost a twelve-tone row.
The pastoral third movement, marked Allegretto semplice, is gently lyrical with a dance-like lilt, hinting at a folk style. As the opening C major evolves into a new idea in F-sharp major, the Beethoven’s Fifth motif returns as a gentle birdcall in the piano. The music comes to a point of rest, and then a slowly unfolding violin line creates an atmosphere of contemplative stillness with the suspension of time. The opening returns in a simpler orchestration, and Beethoven’s birdcall reminds us of where we have been before a series of gentle breaths brings the movement to a close.
The Presto finale is full of infectious joy, driven by the piano’s insistent eighth notes and a rollicking melody in the cello marked spigliato quasi sgarbato (jaunty, almost rude). The use of modality and pentatonicism, along with the rhythmically energetic tunes tossed back and forth throughout the movement, evoke the music of Perrachio’s beloved Piedmont.

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s career was far more public than Perrachio’s, with early success and many important performances and publications. While his fame rose after he met Andrés Segovia in 1932 and began to write for guitar, his reputation in instrumental music, song, and opera was already well established. In 1926, Guido Gatti wrote in the Musical Quarterly,

One of the salient characteristics of Castelnuovo’s music [is] a breadth of human feeling which, brought to bear on us, strives and is able to awaken the generous emotions that often lie dormant in man, awaiting only a fraternal word for their awakening. Hence, the temper of Castelnuovo’s work is never indifferent, never a mere motive for picture-painting. Friendly voices speak from the pages where the drama of life is depicted with marked emotion; echoes are awakened of long ages of tenderness thrown away because men failed to divine it.

The first Piano Quintet was composed in 1932, and, from his own account, we know that the composer toured with the piece with the Poltronieri Quartet. His memoir includes a description of a bizarre performance of the work at the home of the poet-turned-failed-insurrectionist Gabriele D’Annunzio (whom he refers to, tongue firmly in cheek, as “the Commander”). As Castelnuovo-Tedesco tells the story,

[D’Annunzio] immediately took me to … the new music room he had created, “because [said D’Annunzio] no one knows the laws of Acoustics as I know them! The beauty of a Sound does not result from the materials used, but rather from the number of acoustic planes. Have you ever happened to play in the shade of a magnolia tree?” I admitted that I had never taken it into my head to have my Steinway brought out of doors, let alone into the shade of a magnolia tree. “Well, now,” he said, “if you had ever played under a magnolia tree, you would have heard an admirable acoustical effect, for the great number of shiny leaves in a variety of positions increases the sound. This is why I have built my music room to resemble a magnolia tree!” Alas, it was true! Big and little curtains, stretched every which way, were scattered throughout the room, and the acoustical results were truly catastrophic. Nevertheless, the performance of the Quintet went well, and D’Annunzio showed real enthusiasm for it. (A Lifetime of Music, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco and Harvey Sachs)

The First Quintet is tuneful, colorful, theatrical, and brilliantly orchestrated. The writing evokes the composer’s native Tuscany as well his Jewish roots, and also shows the perfect craftmanship and attention to detail that characterize all of his works. And, while the structures he uses are all quite traditional, his sense of tonal direction is unusual, perhaps influenced by Mahler’s idea of progressive tonality. The first movement begins in F major, the principal key of the whole work, but ends in D major—a color shift that the composer makes especially telling. The second is in D minor at the outset, and ends in D major. The third movement begins in A minor, but again cannot resist the pull of D major in the end. The finale begins in A minor as well, but moves to E-flat for the second theme, returns to A minor for varied reprises of the opening theme (including a funeral march), and then ends up at long last in a mock-triumphant F major.
The first movement has a brief slow introduction, opening with a four-note motive that develops into the main theme of the movement. While Castelnuovo-Tedesco is economical with his material, there is such sweep and lyrical intensity in the writing that the listener hears an endless stream of familiar melody. Under the surface, there is always intense counterpoint, featuring constant layering of the different short motives upon which the movement is based. The second movement is a simple nocturne, a slow march, melancholy and nostalgic. The Scherzo that follows dances lightly, as its tempo indication tells us. The sense of nostalgia is never far away, though, with moments of grotesquerie and charm freely intermingling, and a sense of chiaroscuro throughout. The finale is intense and passionate, with its Rondo structure cloaked by a continuous evolution and transformation of the opening theme. The contrasting second theme may celebrate his Jewish heritage—an explicit characteristic of his contemporaneous violin concerto. This material is combined contrapuntally with the less exotic material of the opening, creating an effect of not-quite-assimilation that gives the movement its particular flavor. The inclusion of a funeral march, the turbulence of much of the music, and the character of the individual themes create a sense of unease that could reflect the rising anti-Semitism of fascist Italy. The apparent triumph of the final pages rings hollow against the larger drama of the movement and the times.

David Korevaar
July 25, 2023
Boulder, Colorado