DA VINCI PUBLISHING800: 19th Century Guitar music

Additional information

Artist(s)	Emiliano Verrino
Composer(s)	Dionisio Aguado, Fernando Sor, Francisco Tarrega, Johann Kaspar Mertz, Julián Arcas, Mauro Giuliani, Miguel Llobet
EAN Code	7.46160917405
Edition	Da Vinci Classics
Format	1 Cd
Genre	Instrumental
Instrumentation	Guitar
Period	Modern, Romantic
Publication year	2024

Description

The nineteenth century can be seen as the period when the guitar finally acquired a standing of its own as one of the main instruments of the Classical tradition. It was a century of great technical discoveries, both as concerns instrument building and playing techniques. It was a century when great guitar virtuosi established international careers, touring Europewide – at times also to America – bringing new ideas, concepts, and fashions along. It was a century when the guitar claimed a status as a solo, unaccompanied instrument; when it was found that it was capable of singing as a human voice, of performing polyphony, of evoking the colours and sounds of other instruments, or of the whole orchestra; that it could both adopt and elude the idiosyncrasies of folk music. On the one hand, the near-identification of Spain with guitar and of guitar with Spain promoted an equation which fostered the employ of musical exoticism in a wide range of compositions. On the other hand, guitarists-composers coming from other countries, or Spaniards who did not passively accept the “folk” characterization, explored many other opportunities leading to a vast new repertoire.
This Da Vinci Classics CD offers the listener an intriguing itinerary through some iconic works of the Romantic and Late-Romantic repertoire for the guitar, displaying the full palette of its expressive resources, technical possibilities, and also of its sources of inspiration – from opera to Hungarian-style music, from Spanish echoes to Classical forms.
This recital opens with works by Fernando Sor, a musician from Catalunya whose life was deeply intertwined with the dramatic political events of his time, and who, as a result, travelled and lived abroad bringing with him his expertise, sensitivity, talent, and skill. In this recording, two of his works bear witness to the multifaceted inspiration of his genius. His Twelve Etudes op. 6, written during the time he spent in London, date from the early years of the nineteenth century; each is tailored upon a specific technical difficulty, but they also have a marked musical characterization. Technical difficulty does not perforce mean brilliancy: some of these Etudes are deep, reflective, enchanted. These are “concert Etudes”, meant for public performance, and they enjoyed continued success since the time of their premiere and of their publication. His op. 35, by way of contrast, is one further example of what a great composer can achieve with a seemingly, deceptively simple material. Like the “easy” piano pieces by Schumann, Debussy, or Bartók, these “Exercises” are no less beautiful to hear than useful for a pupil’s progress.
Contrasting with the miniature-size of these Exercises, Mauro Giuliani’s Grande Ouverture op. 61 is a masterpiece in terms of beauty, intensity, expressive power, and compositional skills. It is a milestone of the guitar repertoire, not only because it is played by most great performers of this instrument, but also for the historical significance it had. It was one of the pieces which contributed to establishing the guitar as a miniature orchestra, and to claim for it the status of a solo concert instrument. Giuliani was at the centre of his time’s cultural scene; he was appreciated, known, and fostered by some of the greatest musicians of the era (including Rossini and Beethoven), and he can be likened to Tárrega since both of them, in their respective times, were able to respond creatively to the challenges and opportunities offered by the technical advances in instrument building.
This Ouverture is akin to the great compositions in this style crafted by the Italian operatic composers of the era. It draws from the large repository of technical resources and of musical gestures of this genre, including the stately grandiosity of the French Overtures, some topoi of coeval music (such as the hunting style or the Sturm-und-Drang élans), and some idiomatic features of specific musical schools (such as the “Mannheim crescendo” or the Alberti bass).
By way of contrast, and rather ironically, doubts have been raised as to Giuliani’s authorship of his Gran Sonata Eroica precisely because it seems… too quintessentially Giuliani’s! In fact, there is plenty of Giuliani’s typical trademarks, to the point that some critics advanced the hypothesis that it is the work of an imitator rather than by the Italian master. These doubts are substantiated by the fact that very little is known about the origins of this work. In 1821, Giuliani wrote to publisher Ricordi claiming that he had written five pieces “in a style never before known”, and that one of them was a “Gran Sonata Eroica”, described by the composer as very lengthy and of a hitherto unknown style. Only in 1840, however, a work by this title was published as Giuliani’s op. 150; other dubious circumstances include its dedication and the absence of an autograph, to the point that Giuliani’s entry in The New Grove (2) omits this work from the list of Giuliani’s compositions. Still, today Giuliani’s authorship seems established, and the cases of self-plagiarism obviously detectable in the score seem to correspond to a practice which was not unusual, either for Giuliani himself or for his contemporaries. This is a composition with an ambitious breadth, a powerful architecture, a brilliant conception, and an intense expressive power – all weaved together in a combination of innovative melodies, harmonies, and technical solutions.
The Napoleonic era, with its political turmoil, international tensions, and philosophical challenges, impacted also the life of Dionisio Aguado, who sought refuge from the Napoleonic invasion of Spain in a small village where he lived a rather secluded life. This period of confinement prompted him to enter more deeply into the secrets of guitar playing, and to write numerous works which would impact the history of the modern guitar. His activity as a teacher encouraged him also to write guitar methods, and to create novel solutions for technical problems. Some of his intuitions would later become common knowledge among the wider community of the guitarists, whilst others (in spite of their brilliant conception) would soon be abandoned. For instance, Aguado had proposed the use of a device (a tripod) distancing the guitar’s body from the player’s, in order to favour the instrument’s resonance; this idea, however, did never gain universal acceptance.
Interestingly, one of Aguado’s main intuitions (i.e. that fingernails should be used for setting the string into vibration) was defended by him in polemics precisely with Fernando Sor (who, still, was a good friend and colleague of the Spaniard).
Aguado’s Introduction and Rondo op. 2 no. 2, recorded here, belongs in a series of three Rondo Brillants. It shows a patent kinship with Beethoven’s Grande Sonate Pathétique, op. 13, and this affinity is doubtlessly intentional. This piece, in fact, was published in 1827, the same year when Beethoven died. In spite of the seeming frivolity of a genre such as that of the “rondo brillant”, therefore, this piece demonstrates that virtuosity and depth can well go hand in hand.
Three works by Johann Kaspar Mertz follow suit. Mertz was probably the greatest Austrian guitarist-composer of his day; in turn, he was an acclaimed touring virtuoso. One event left an important mark in his life: an overdose of strychnine, which had been prescribed to him as a cure for neuralgia, nearly killed him. The process of recovery was long and painful, and some solace was provided to the convalescent musician by his wife’s performances at the piano. Through her, Mertz became familiar with the “salon repertoire” of his era, but also with the miniature works by Schubert and Schumann which seemingly belong in that same category, but in fact display a much greater profundity. Prompted by these models, Mertz sought to establish a similar repertoire for his instrument, and he certainly succeeded in this task. His Elegy, recorded here, is considered by most critics not only as one of his signature pieces, but also as one of the landmarks of the Romantic guitar. Here, the full pathos, expressiveness, intensity, and beauty which characterize the Romantic aesthetics appear clearly. Mertz’s career would have been crowned by the prize at the first Makaroff Competition in Brussels; however, alas, the composer died before the publication of the results, so that his victory was in fact a posthumous recognition of his career. His Romanze is excerpted from the Bardenklänge and is clearly reminiscent of the lyrical expansiveness of Franz Schubert’s works. Here, the guitar displays its potential as a melodic instrument, and seems to support and sustain itself, as if evoking a Lied.
Mertz also composed numerous Fantasias, where virtuosity, brilliancy, and technical prowess are fully displayed. They manage to combine the two poles of the Romantic aesthetics, i.e. the fiery and the emotional facets. Mertz was rather jealous of his Fantasies, and preferred not to have them published during his lifetime, for the reasons he explained as follows: “First, on seeing these, the publishers would say it was too difficult, that I would have to rearrange them. That would spoil the composition. Second, as long as these compositions remain in my briefcase, they remain new and are mine for my own concerts. Within six months after publication, they would become old. Further, they would become distorted and mutilated by those miserable guitarists who can only scratch the strings of the guitar”.
His Fantaisie Hongroise takes inspiration from the wave of “Hungarian” (or rather “gypsy”) music which was beloved by his contemporaries and the Romantics in general – starting with the pieces all’ingharese written by Haydn and Beethoven, up to Schubert, to Brahms, and especially to Liszt, whose Hungarian Rhapsodies clearly represent the model after which this piece is crafted.
Tárrega is represented here by pieces he wrote, arranged, or made known. Recuerdos de la Alhambra is one of his best-known works, and one of the most regarded in the entire guitar repertoire, thanks to its sheer technical complexity and to its exquisite melody, which emerges from the unceasing, and extremely difficult, tremolo. It was offered to a friend in 1899 as a birthday present. The Fantasia sobre motivos de La Traviata belongs in the host of operatic fantasies written for all kinds of instruments in the nineteenth century. It creatively weaves together many themes and motifs of Verdi’s beloved opera; it has also been the object of many musicological discussions, after which it was established that the true “authorship” should be ascribed to Arcas, Tárrega’s teacher, but that Tárrega’s version contains elements of originality.
If Recuerdos de la Alhambra brings the listener to Granada, the Capricho árabe suggests the atmospheres of Andalusia and Northern Africa; such is its importance, that it was played at Tárrega’s funeral. The “serenade”-like style of this piece suggests a romantic inspiration, but its structure does not correspond to that of the typical Spanish serenade – as a consequence, speculation is open as to its “real” inspiration.
Llobet, who was Tárrega’s pupil, is considered as the one ushering Impressionism into the world and repertoire of the guitar. With him, the circle of this album closes, since his Variaciones sobre un tema de Sor, op. 15, bring us back to the opening pieces; here, we find elaborations after Sor’s Folies d’Espagne, op. 15, and a new range of variations bearing witness to the passing of time and to the itinerary of guitar music throughout the nineteenth century.
Chiara Bertoglio © 2024

Artist(s)

Emiliano Verrino
Emiliano Verrino (Sondalo, 1996) received his first classical guitar at the age of nine. He developed a passion for the instrument that led him to begin studying guitar at Conservatory of Music "Ottorino Respighi" in Latina (Italy) at the age of twelve.
In 2009, he began his studies at the highly renowned Conservatory of Music "Santa Cecilia" in Rome, where he completed his Master's degree in 2016 under the direction of Prof. Domenico Ascione with highest grades and honors.
After winning various national and international competitions and after numerous concerts throughout Europe, Emiliano moved to Berlin to start a second Master at the "Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler" under the guidance of Prof. Eugenia Kanthou, which he completed in 2020 with honors.
In 2023 he started a Post-Graduate in guitar at the highly renowned “Mozarteum” in Salzburg with Prof. Andrea De Vitis.
Emiliano is particularly artistically active in Berlin - he has performed at the Konzerthaus Berlin (as a duo with David Garrett), Congress Center Alexanderplatz, Schloss Glienicke, Akademie der Künste, Hotel Intercontinental, Schwartzsche Villa, among others. In 2019 he also played three solo concerts in New York City (Civic Hall) and one concert in Boston.
He has been a mandolinist and guitarist in the "Verace Duo" with Marco Surace since 2020.
In the same year he founded Guitstars, an online community featuring original video contributions from the best guitarists in the international scene.

Since 2022 he works as head of the department for plucked instruments at the music school "Friedrichshain - Kreuzberg" in Berlin.

Composer(s)

Aguado (y Garcia), Dionisio
(b Madrid, 8 April 1784; d Madrid, 29 Dec 1849). Spanish guitarist and composer. ‘Padre Basilio’ of Madrid, possibly Miguel Garcia, gave him his first instruction in the guitar, an instrument for which tablature notation was still commonly used in Spain. In about 1800 Aguado, like Fernando Sor, was influenced by the Italian Federico Moretti and adopted the conventional staff notation for the guitar; thereafter both Spaniards published their music in the improved manner championed by Moretti, distinguishing the musical parts by the direction of note stems, use of rests, etc. Aguado's artistic career unfolded slowly, owing to the Napoleonic invasion of Spain and its aftermath. He retreated to the village of Fuenlabrada in 1803, teaching and perfecting his technique there until 1824, the year his mother died; his Colección de estudios para guitarra appeared in Madrid in 1820. He moved to Paris in 1825 (while Sor was in Russia) and immediately gained an enviable reputation as a virtuoso and teacher; a revised version of his Escuela de guitarra (Madrid, 1825) was translated into French by François de Fossa as Méthode complète pour la guitare and published in Paris (c1826). The last ten years of Aguado's life were apparently spent in Madrid, where he revised his method (as Nuevo metodo para guitarra, 1843) and devoted himself to teaching.

In the years before his final departure from Paris (1838), Aguado was in close collaboration with Sor. They gave many concerts together, and Sor dedicated a duet op.41, Les deux amis, to his younger colleague. They did not agree on right-hand technique in guitar playing; Aguado recommended the use of fingernails in plucking the strings for the sake of clarity, while Sor advocated using the flesh of the fingertips for a mellower and more powerful tone. But despite their differences, they greatly admired one another, Sor gallantly ‘excusing’ Aguado's fingernail technique on account of the latter's superb musicianship and skilled execution.

A complete catalogue of Aguado's compositions is not available. According to Prat, he wrote several dozen studies, rondos, dances and fantasias. His guitar method was extremely popular in the 19th century, and was republished frequently, including a facsimile edition by Minkoff (Geneva, 1980). His subsequent Nuevo metodo para guitarra (Madrid, 1843) was issued in English as New Guitar Method (London, 1981). Other facsimile editions include The Selected Works of Dionisio Aguado, ed. S. Wynberg (Monaco, 1981), and Selected Concert Works, ed. B. Jeffery (Heidelberg, 1990). Aguado is also known for the invention of the tripedisono, which supported the guitar away from the performer's body.

Fernando Sor: (b Barcelona, bap. 14 Feb 1778; d Paris, 10 July 1839). Catalan composer and guitarist. He was educated at the choir school of the monastery of Montserrat, and then attended the military academy in Barcelona. His opera Telemaco was produced at the Teatro de la S Cruz, Barcelona, in 1796. In 1799 he moved to Madrid, and from then until 1808 he held administrative sinecures in Barcelona and the vicinity of Málaga, making occasional visits to Madrid. During this period he composed symphonies, string quartets, a motet and many boleros and seguidillas boleras for voice with guitar or piano accompaniment. Some of his works for solo guitar were probably also written at this time. Sor fought against the French during the invasion of 1808 and composed patriotic songs, of which Vivir en cadenas and Venid, vencedores (both with words by J.B. Arriaza) became famous. But in about 1810, like many Spanish intellectuals, he accepted an administrative post under the French. When the French retreated in 1813, he was obliged to leave Spain, and went to Paris.

In 1815 Sor moved to London, publishing there 11 sets of three Italian ariettas for voice and piano, of which the Repository of Arts wrote (1 March 1820): ‘Mr. Sor’s vocal compositions have gained such favour that a new set of arietts, from his pen, causes almost as much sensation as the publication of a new novel by the author of Waverley’. At this time he also published vocal duets and two English songs, as well as pieces for piano solo, piano duet and solo guitar. Four of his ballets were produced in London between 1821 and 1823, the most successful of which was Cendrillon. At its première the famous dancer Maria Mercandotti achieved her first big success in England. Cendrillon was danced at the Paris Opéra over 100 times and chosen for the grand opening of the Bol’shoy Theatre in Moscow in 1823. Sor went to Russia in that year with the ballerina Félicité Hullin, who danced the title role in the Moscow production. In 1826 he returned to Paris, publishing there immediately six guitar compositions probably written while he was in Russia and later his Méthode pour la guitare (1830) and further compositions for the instrument. He continued to teach and play the guitar until his death.

Sor achieved fame as a concert performer on the guitar and is best known for his more than 65 compositions for that instrument, which form an important part of the classical guitar repertory. He took from Moretti the idea of playing on the guitar not merely chords but music in parts, and acknowledged his debt to Haydn and Mozart in matters of style. His Méthode has been called ‘easily the most remarkable book on guitar technique ever written’ (Grunfeld, 182). As well as his guitar compositions, his songs and ballet music were admired throughout Europe. His vocal music influenced his guitar music, above all in its treatment of melody.

Francisco Tarrega: (b Villarreal, Castellón, 21 Nov 1852; d Barcelona, 15 Dec 1909). Spanish guitarist and composer. When he began the study of the classical guitar with Julian Arcas in 1862, the instrument was at a low ebb throughout Europe, overshadowed by the piano. Tárrega’s father insisted that the boy study the piano as well, and he became accomplished on both instruments at an early age. In 1869 he had the good fortune to acquire an unusually loud and resonant guitar designed and constructed by Antonio Torres, the famous luthier, then living in Seville. With this superior instrument Tárrega was to prepare the way for the rebirth of the guitar in the 20th century. He entered the Madrid Conservatory in 1874, and received a thorough grounding in theory, harmony and the piano. By 1877 he was earning his living as a music teacher and concert guitarist; he gave recitals in Paris and London in 1880, and was hailed as ‘the Sarasate of the guitar’. He married María Josepha Rizo in 1881 and they settled in Barcelona in 1885. Within a few years he displayed a repertory that included, besides his own compositions in the smaller forms, piano works by Mendelssohn, Gottschalk, Thalberg and others arranged for the guitar. The Spanish ‘nationalist’ composers, Albéniz and Granados, were his friends; many of their works were first transcribed for the guitar by him. He also adapted movements from Beethoven’s piano sonatas (including the Largo of op.7, the Adagio and Allegretto from the ‘Moonlight’ Sonata) and half a dozen preludes of Chopin. During the years 1885–1903, Tárrega gave concerts throughout Spain. He toured Italy in 1903. At the height of his fame, in 1906, he suffered a paralysis of the right side from which he never fully recovered. He did, however, appear publicly, and to loud applause, in 1909.

Tárrega’s influence on the 20th century, through pupils who included Emilio Pujol, Maria Rita Brondi and Josefina Robledo, has been tremendous. His compositions for solo guitar, not all of which have been published, comprise approximately 78 original works and 120 transcriptions; he also made 21 transcriptions for two guitars. Among his most famous solos are Recuerdos de la Alhambra (a tremolo study), Capricho árabe and Danza mora.

Caspar Joseph Mertz (baptised Casparus Josephus Mertz)[1] was born in Pressburg, now Bratislava (Slovakia), then the capital of the Kingdom of Hungary and part of the Austrian Empire. He was active in Vienna (c.1840–1856), which had been home to various prominent figures of the guitar, including Anton Diabelli, Mauro Giuliani, Wenceslaus Matiegka and Simon Molitor. A virtuoso, he established a solid reputation as a performer. He toured Moravia, Poland, and Russia, and gave performances in Berlin and Dresden. In 1846 Mertz nearly died of an overdose of strychnine that had been prescribed to him as a treatment for neuralgia. Over the following year he was nursed back to health in the presence his wife, the concert pianist Josephine Plantin whom he married in 1842. Some speculation may lead one to the conclusion that listening to his wife performing the romantic piano pieces of the day during his period of recovery may have had an influence on the sound and unusual right hand technique he adopted for the Bardenklänge (Bardic Sounds) op. 13 (1847).

Mertz’s guitar music, unlike that of most of his contemporaries, followed the pianistic models of Chopin, Mendelssohn, Schubert and Schumann, rather than the classical models of Mozart and Haydn (as did Sor and Aguado), or the bel canto style of Rossini (as did Giuliani). Though the date of his birth indicates that that was the logical influence, since Sor was born in 1778, Aguado in 1784 and Giuliani in 1781 while Mertz in 1806, a difference of about 25 years.

The Bardenklänge are probably Mertz’s most important contribution to the guitar repertoire – a series of character pieces in the mould of Schumann.

Mauro Giuliani: (b Bisceglie, nr Bari, 27 July 1781; d Naples, 8 May 1829). Italian guitar virtuoso and composer. He studied the cello and counterpoint, but the six-string guitar became his principal instrument early in life. As there were many fine guitarists in Italy at the beginning of the 19th century (Agliati, Carulli, Gragnani, Nava etc.), but little public interest in music other than opera, Giuliani, like many skilled Italian instrumentalists, moved north to make a living. He settled in Vienna in 1806 and quickly became famous as the greatest living guitarist and also as a notable composer, to the chagrin of resident Viennese talents such as Simon Molitor and Alois Wolf. In April 1808 Giuliani gave the première of his guitar concerto with full orchestral accompaniment, op.30, to great public acclaim (AMZ, x, 1807–8, col.538). Thereafter he led the classical guitar movement in Vienna, teaching, performing and composing a rich repertory for the guitar (nearly 150 works with opus number, 70 without). His guitar compositions were notated on the treble clef in the new manner which, unlike violin notation, always distinguished the parts of the music – melody, bass, inner voices – through the careful use of note stem directions and rests. Giuliani played the cello in the première of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony (8 December 1813) in the company of Vienna’s most famous artists, including Hummel, Mayseder and Spohr, with whom he appeared publicly on many subsequent occasions. He became a ‘virtuoso onorario di camera’ to Empress Marie-Louise, Napoleon’s second wife, in about 1814. He returned to Italy in 1819, heavily in debt, living first in Rome (c1820–23) and finally in Naples, where he was patronized by the nobility at the court of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies until his death. Towards the end of his life he was renowned for performances on the lyre guitar.

Giuliani had two talented children, Michel (b Barletta, 17 May 1801; d Paris, 8 October 1867), who became a noted ‘professeur de chant’, succeeding Manuel Garcia at the Paris Conservatoire, and Emilia (b Vienna, 1813; d ?after 1840), a famous guitar virtuoso who wrote a well-known set of preludes for guitar op.46.

Miguel, Llobet Soles
(b Barcelona, 18 Oct 1878; d Barcelona, 22 Feb 1938). Spanish guitarist, composer and arranger. His uncle brought a guitar home when Llobet was 11; at 14 he was presented by his first teacher, Magín Alegre, to Francisco Tárrega, who accepted him as a pupil. He gave his first series of private concerts in 1898 and his first public appearance was in 1901 at the conservatory in Valencia. He performed in Madrid in 1902 and again in 1903 in front of the royal family. His friend Ricardo Viñes, the noted pianist and Debussy interpreter, presented him in his foreign début, in Paris in 1904. From 1905 to 1910 Llobet gave concerts throughout Europe. He made his South American début in 1910 and set up home temporarily in Buenos Aires, from where he left from time to time on concert tours. Having made his US début in 1912 he continued to tour until the outbreak of World War I, when he returned to America for the duration of the war. After 1930 Llobet settled in Barcelona to teach and give occasional concerts. In 1934 he gave concerts in Vienna, Germany and other parts of western Europe, and a final concert in the USA at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC. He returned to Barcelona at the height of the Spanish Civil War in 1937.

Llobet is given credit for bringing the classical guitar into the modern musical world of international concert tours. He also contributed new works and transcriptions to the repertory and introduced the public to works by Falla, Villa-Lobos, Ponce and others. (Falla wrote Homenaje pour le tombeau de Claude Debussy in response to Llobet’s persistent requests for a new work for guitar.) In 1925 he made the first electric recordings on the classical guitar.

Llobet’s tally of approximately 75 publications includes 13 known original compositions, among them his guitar arrangement of Catalan folk songs, Diez canciones populares catalanas (1899–1918); of these the best known, El mestre (c1900), is harmonically one of the most advanced guitar works of its time and was much admired by Segovia.