Paolina Capece Minutolo: Piano Variations and Waltzes

Description

The piano works of Paolina Capece Minutolo

The figure of Paolina Capece Minutolo is very representative of Neapolitan musical life at the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Historians have formulated various hypotheses about the origins and name of the ancient and illustrious Minutolo family: certainly the first components date back to the times of the Duchy of Naples (eighth century).
The House reached the height of greatness during the Swabian period and beyond; he held the highest offices in the civil, military and ecclesiastical fields.
It enjoyed great nobility in Naples where it was aggregated to the Neapolitan Patriciate in the Seats of Capua and Nido and, after the abolition of the Seats, was inscribed in the Neapolitan Golden Book.
He joined the Monte dei Capece and, as per the statute, put his surname before that of Capece.
Paolina Capece Minutolo della Sonora (1803 † 1877), daughter of Raimondo (Naples, 1769 † 1827), Neapolitan patrician and Maresciallo di Campo, son of the aforementioned 4th Prince of Canosa, married Francesco del Balzo of the Dukes of Caprigliano, a nobleman of Capua.
Like all young women of noble lineage, Paolina was educated, together with her other two sisters Adelaide and Clotilde, in the liberal arts and showed a great predisposition to the study of music, revealing herself to be a skilled pianist. Between 1822 and 1824, between the ages of 19 and 21, he wrote several pieces of piano music, piano and harp and also in trio of piano, harp and natural horn: all this music is kept in manuscript at the library of the San Pietro a Majella Conservatory in Naples.
In this study only the works for solo piano are examined.
These compositions consist of:

1.Variazioni su “O cara memoria”, op.3
2.Variazioni sopra un tema del Maestro Balducci, op. 5
3.Variazioni su un tema conosciuto op.8
4.Variazione sopra un tema del Maestro Balducci, op. 9 dedicato al padre
5.Collezione di Valzers composti e dedicati al Sig. Maestro Balducci da Paulina Capece Minutolo, Napoli anno 1824, op. 18

The Variations on “O cara memoria”, op.3, are a fine exercise in style even if on a very singable but extremely simple theme from a harmonic point of view. The simplicity of the tonal structure gives the composer the opportunity to explore different technical difficulties: the first variation is dedicated to broken arpeggios, the second opens with a series of double descending octaves, the third deepens the technique of the retort, the fourth, martial, leads to a conclusion that is not at all obvious in diminuendo.

The Variations “Un tema del Maestro Balducci”, op. 5, take their cue from a very interesting sinuous theme; the first variation is conventionally brilliant, the second more mysterious, the third very restless and the fourth and last is very expressive with authentically romantic traits.

The Variations op.8 develop on “Un tema conosciuto”, very martial and brilliant, certainly in the public domain. In these variations Paolina Capece Minutolo presents the theme at the beginning but, unlike the other works, she proposes it again between one variation and another. Op. 8 is also characterized by the interesting final “Fantasia” where we find a piano writing that is clearly inspired by Beethoven.

The Variations on “Un tema del Maestro Balducci, op. 9 “dedicated to his father General Capece Minutolo of the Princes of Canosa” are very refined starting from the theme of the master Balducci. The variations flow sometimes fluidly, sometimes meditative, and end with the fifth variation characterized by a pianism that recalls Franz Schubert.

The Collection of Waltz composed and dedicated to Mr. Maestro Balducci by Paulina Capece Minutolo, Naples year 1824, op. 18 is perhaps the most conventional production among the works of Paolina Capece Minutolo, however interesting traits emerge in the organization of the sound material such that each waltz has its own clear characterization.

The piano production of Paolina Capece Minutolo is clearly influenced by the teaching of maestro Giuseppe Balducci who certainly gave different stylistic indications for each piano work to be composed; each work is a study of different composition and makes us understand the didactic quality of Balducci’s teaching which fits perfectly into the Neapolitan musical tradition.
Giuseppe Balducci was born in Jesi on May 2, 1796 and was a distant cousin of Giovanni Battista Pergolesi. At the age of 17 Balducci constituted his own opera company in which he also sang as principal tenor but soon moved to Naples where he found employment as music teacher with the three young daughters, Paolina, Adelaide and Clotilde, of Raimondo Capece Minutolo.
Balducci would remain linked to the Capece Minutolo family for the rest of his life.
In Naples, Balducci resumed his musical studies with the composer Nicolò Zingarelli, director of the Conservatory of Music, and successfully undertook the activity of composer of operas.

On the death of Raimondo Capece Minutolo in 1827, his widow Matilde, daughter of the former viceroy of Mexico Bernardo de Galvez, appointed Balducci protector of his daughters Pauline, Adelaide and Clotilde. Balducci continued to devote much of his time to the Capece Minutolo family in the administration of finances and in the education of the three sisters. Between 1827 and 1839 Balducci composed five “salon works” that were performed by Pauline, Adelaide and Clotilde and their friends in the family home. Unusually for Italian operas of the time, these operas were composed for female voices only.
He died in Malaga in 1845 while dealing with business for the Capece Minutolo family.
On closer inspection, the works of Paolina Capece Minutolo can be ascribed to the Biedermeier style, considered a “minor” style, but unequivocally influenced by the composers defined as “major” at the turn of the century.
It’s correct to consider the Biedermeier as a phenomenon of European culture, generated by the Restoration era. The evolutionary and typological qualities of Biedermeier in all the diversity of its national models (German, Polish, Russian, Italian, French) are projected on the piano music of XIX century and its performing traditions; to present Biedermeier as a specific direction of musical art which creates the conditions for understanding and absorbing of a complex academic repertoire by an unprepared audience.
This musical style, superficial, virtuosic and at the same time reactionary in the affirmation of forms and modes of classicism, nevertheless managed to decisively push the development of keyboard musical instruments and to considerably expand the possibilities of performance technique.
During the nineteenth century we witness a very strong expansion of the production of pianos in Naples and this success also extends to nearby Sicily.

The apparent adherence to classical forms from the end of the eighteenth century actually reveals a sound predisposition already projected into the future and this is all the more significant because it is the demonstration that the most advanced Viennese models, both from a compositional and constructive point of view, actually migrated to the rest of Europe with surprising speed.
Paolina Capece Minutolo shows that she is aware of Beethoven’s style and sometimes launches into Schubertian expressiveness. She remains, however, a pianist linked to the ancient aristocratic convention of musical study aimed at the aesthetic formation of the personality and not at all directed to a professional musical activity. After her marriage, Paolina Capece Minutolo seems to have no longer dedicated herself to the composition of piano or chamber music.

The fortepiano used for the recording of this CD is of
Sicilian manufacture (around 1820) but is intimately linked to the Viennese tradition. The fortepiano is property of Conservatory of music “Vincenzo Bellini” of Caltanissetta and has been restored by Ugo Casiglia.
Diego Cannizzaro © 2024