WITH THE ENSEMBLE NUOVE MUSICHE
Seven composers coming from different parts of Italy have selected as many lyrics of the Master of Busseto and re-arranged them according to their own taste and aesthetics. In addition to these “re-makes”, which do not lose sight of Verdi’s musical lesson, the program includes the performance of some of Verdi’s own works in their original version for voice and piano.
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VERDI OUR CONTEMPORARY
Due to its constant focus on the new in both the music of the past and the present, Ensemble Nuove Musiche, on the occasion of Verdi’s Bicentennial, invited seven contemporary italian composers to arrange seven lyric works by Verdi according to their own poetic interpretation and composition aesthetics.
The result was Verdi our contemporary. The program includes works by Azio Corghi, Fabrizio De Rossi Re, Marco Betta, Marcello Pusceddu, Riccardo Piacentini, Colombo Taccani, and Marco Lombardi, in addition to a few lyric works by Verdi in their original form for piano and voice.
THE PROGRAM
Azio CORGHI
Prelude “Ad una stella”
for voice and five instruments
(based on L’abandonnée, 1849, and Ad una stella, 1845)
Fabrizio DE ROSSI RE
La seduzione
for voice, vibraphone and piano
(based on La seduzione, 1839)
Giuseppe VERDI
Il tramonto (1845)
La zingara (1845)
for voice and piano
Marco BETTA
Perduta ho la pace
for voice and six instruments
(based on Perduta ho la pace, 1838)
Marcello PUSCEDDU
Quando tace il mondo inter
for voice, clarinet and cello
(based on Nell’orror di notte oscura, 1838)
Giuseppe VERDI
L’esule (1839)
for voice and piano
Riccardo PIACENTINI
Deh… oh…
for voice and six instruments
(based on Deh pietoso oh addolorata, 1838)
Giorgio COLOMBO TACCANI
Ier…
For voice and six instruments
(based on Il poveretto, 1847)
Marco LOMBARDI
1843: un anno nella vita di Giuseppe Verdi
for voice and six instruments
(based on Cupo è il sepolcro e mutolo, 1843)
PROGRAM NOTES
AZIO CORGHI
Prelude “Ad una stella”
for voice and five instruments
(based on L’abandonnée, 1849, and Ad una stella, 1845)
The composition, written for the Verdi Bicentennial, consists of the reworking of two pieces for voice and piano by Giuseppe Verdi: The Abandonnée andante-étude pour Soprano (and Piano) Paroles de M.D.L. Composé pour M.me G.Strepponi, and Ad Una Stella, lyrics by Andrea Maffei for voice and piano. The first, purely instrumental, is the prelude to the second that consists of the vocal part. By playing in a modern form, the vibraphone becomes the backdrop of two pairs of instruments, consisting of Flute/Clarinet and Violin/Cello, which rework the original part of the piano. The vibraphone, which irradiates light (the star) becomes the symbol of the mystery of femininity and underlines the romantic vision of Verdi’s music. (A. Corghi)
FABRIZIO DE ROSSI RE
La seduzione
for female voice, vibraphone and piano
(based on La seduzione, 1839)
Written on the occasion of the Verdi Bicentennial, and dedicated to Marco Lombardi and New Music Ensemble, La seduzione is a free interpretation of the short opera by G. Verdi Seduzione published in 1839. The text, taken from a poem by Luigi Balestra (Busseto 1808-1863) tells the story of an innocent woman, young and beautiful, who is seduced by a cruel and callous man. After nine months (“nine moons”) the girl dies in disgrace, and is buried in an unmarked grave (“There arose not a cross, not a cypress, not a stone bears her name”). This piece is not an arrangement of the original, but rather it amplifies the character of the work in a grotesque, ironic and deranged manner by reassembling all through the distorting filter of our time. (F. de Rossi Re)
MARCO BETTA
Perduta ho la pace
for voice and six intruments
(based on Perduta ho la pace, 1838)
The musician imagines a surreal scenario describing Verdi young and poor, in a winter landscape. A soprano and a pianist are on the road. A traveler picks up multiple sounds from the surroundings. Homeless, visitors, a carousel, the passage of a band in the distance, an exhibition of nativity scene with small carillons, street performers, light snow. The soprano and the pianist remain at the center, surrounded by other musicians. The pianist put some thin piece of paper on the strings so that the piano would sound like an old pianola. Everything is mixed around until it disappears slowly (M. Betta)
MARCELLO PUSCEDDU
Quando tace il mondo inter
for voice, clarinet and cello
(based on Nell’orror di notte oscura, 1838)
Verdi’s lyric “In The Horror of a Dark Night” combines a happy melody with the desire to create an aura of sadness and sorrow. This re-interpretation takes its title from the second line of the original poem, and it aims at exacerbating these components through a relentless and static tempo ostinato, and the use of a instrumental pedal, on which the aria develops. The vocal line uses melic elements that seem to recall the popular tradition of Sardinian culture.
The exploitation of the dark timbre of both the cello and the clarinet was the most effective choice to express the sense of anguish in Verdi’s original lyric. (Francesco Ottonello)
RICCARDO PIACENTINI
Deh…oh..
for voice and six intruments
(based on Deh pietoso oh addolorata, 1838)
Deh … oh … for voice and six instruments is the reinvention of a famous chamber piece, Deh pietoso oh addolorata…, sixth of the Six Romances published by the twenty-five years old Verdi. The vocal line remains unchanged, as well as the text, but the context is different: new lights and shadows. The original object is not lost; rather, it is found anew, integrated in a different ecosystem which challenges its image congealed over the year. This allows us to implement a healthy “conversation therapy” (R. Rorty), which in music I would call the “infinite counterpoint,” where tradition survives as a necessary requirement for continuous transformations, and as a stepping stone for a renewed expressive capability. The “given part,” as it is called even today in the studios, here is not an index of sterile academic work, but it is pure invention, the vital element of a poetics that constrains and at the same time supports the artist and, therefore, makes him feel absolutely free. To this day, this conversation on the “letter” rather than on the “spirit” of tradition, has been essential for me and my work. (R. Piacentini)
GIORGIO COLOMBO TACCANI
Ier..
A game of echoes for voice and six intruments
(based on Il poveretto, 1847)
A chamber piece by Verdi seems to come from far away in a windy night. It lets us hear clearly only a few syllables of the song, although the whole profile can be perceived. The piano part is almost completely lost. The few parts still extant are resounding freely and are echoed in the whole ensemble; nothing is added to the original score, except for these extensions and a very few double octaves. Surprisingly, a melancoly page emerges, which reveals its intimate self as if through the decoding of an encrypted message?like a letter forgotten for decades in a writing-desk secret drawing. (G. Colombo Taccani)
MARCO LOMBARDI
1843: one year in Giuseppe Verdi’s life
For voice and ensemble
(based on Cupo è il sepolcro e mutolo, 1843)
How many Verdis are there? The first is obviously the composer who became an object of research in musicology, then, the aggressive opera composer who was his own boss, and the author of refined chamber pieces. My Verdi, whom I celebrate in this Bicentennial, is a synthesis of all of them. The first incentive to undertake a “komponiert Interpretation” of the piece Cupo è il sepolcro e mutolo was the date Verdi wrote on the score: July 7, 1843. I wanted to stretch that date and that musical piece across the years though, and in so doing I caused some tears, like windows, which let in fragments of the composer’s daily life. What is Verdi doing at that time? He has just completed I Lombardi alla prima crociata and is about to start a new work, Ernani, hich will premiere on March 9 the next year. Therefore, one may consider 1843 as a transition year, in which Cupo è il sepolcro e mutolo serves as a watershed between the two operas. I draw from the epistolary for episodes of his life and work, and the everyday tasks and troubles of a composer who was just over thirty. (M. Lombardi)
ENSEMBLE NUOVE MUSICHE
Ensemble Nuove Musiche was born in 2010 from an idea of composer Marco Lombardi. He gathered a group of musicians around a repertoire that contained at its core the hallmark of modernity, the modernity of yesteryear and the modernity of today. The Ensemble pays particular attention to the repertoire of the 20th and 21st centuries, and refers to the new music, i.e. the works of composers who over the centuries have traced the course of music history: from Nuove Musiche by Giulio Caccini (Florence, 1602) to Neue Musik by Ferienkurse of Darmstadt, through the Corporazione delle Nuove Musiche founded by Alfredo Casella and Gian Francesco Malipiero in 1923.
THE PERFORMERS
Marco Lombardi
President Ensemble Nuove Musiche
The president and founder of the Ensemble, Marco Lombardi, is a composer and a musician. His works have been performed in Italy and abroad, and published by Pizzicato Verlag Helvetia. He started his career in Genoa as a cellist. His main interests are analysis, aesthetics and music theory, with particular reference to the modern and contemporary repertoire. He is the winner of international competitions.
Francesco Ottonello – Percussion
Vice – President Ensemble Nuove Musiche
Percussionist Francesco Ottonello studied between Milan and Turin, graduating in Composition and Band orchestration. He collaborated with major Italian theaters and various European musical institutions. He took classes in orchestra conducting at the Prague Conservatory. Ottonello played with prestigious conductors, such as Riccardo Muti, Fabio Luisi, Daniel Barenboim, Gustavo Dudamel, Daniel Harding, Gianluigi Gelmetti, Myung Whun Chung, and others. He is now completing a degree in Musicology at Milan University, where he pursues his interest in the Italian opera in the era of Rossini.
Filippo Del Noce – Flute
Born in Turin in 1993, he began studying the flute in 2007 in the prestigious class of Maestro A. Semolina at the Conservatory of Turin, where he graduated after four years. Already a winner of numerous national and international competitions, since 2011 he is studying with Peter Lukas Graf.
Roberto Bocchio – Clarinet
He has studied with musicians such as G. Deplus, G.Garbarino, T.Friedli, F. and B. Mezzena. In 1992, Roberto Bocchio won the 1st prize with honorable mention at the National Conservatory of Nice under the guidance of Maestro M. Lethiec. He collaborated with the most prestigious Italian orchestras and performed in France, Switzerland, Germany, Japan. Since 1984 he is professor of clarinet, and since 2005 he has been teaching at the Conservatory G. Cantelli of Novara. He plays clarinet Buffet Crampon and Ance Rico.
Valentina Messa – Piano
She graduated in Venice under the guidance of G. Lovato, and continued her studies in Genoa. She has studied with P. Rattalino, L. B. Arcuri, P. Masi and E. Peace and attended workshops given by B. Petrushanski, S. Pedroni, A. Mirrors, K. Helvigg, J. Achucarro, M. Dandies, B.Canino. Valentina Messa won awards in national and international competitions, and has given concerts from the age of thirteen in Italy and abroad. She has played as soloist with the Orchestra of Padua and Veneto, the Philharmonic of Udine, Classical Orchestra Belvedere and Philarmonische Orchester der Stadt Trier. She performs in “chamber music duo” with violinist Ermir Abet, and plays with artists such as L. Borrani, R. Agosti, J. I. Murakami, M. Dandies, M. Ben Omar, A. Berovsky, A. Pinzaru, Dami Kim, K. Nagaoka, M.Milstein.
Massimo Marin – Violin
Born in Turin, Massimo Marin studied music under the guidance of Lorenzo Lugli. After graduating at a very young age, he played in several of the most prestigious Italian orchestras. He furthered his training with Salvatore Accardo, Leonid Kogan, Corrado Romano. Active as a soloist in Italy and abroad, and as a member of chamber ensembles (duo with pianist Andrea Bambace, Quintet Italian, Solisti Veneti, New Virtuosi di Roma, Italian Soloists), Marin has made concert tours all over the world. He was invited by Claudio Abbado to work with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and chosen by Riccardo Muti for the Prime Parts of the Orchestra and the Orchestra Filarmonica del Teatro alla Scala, where he played under the greatest conductors. In 1992 he was awarded the “A Life for Art” prize. He has taught violin at the Conservatory of Turin for many years. He plays a violin G. B. Guadagnini – Piacenza 1747.
Dario Destefano – Cello
After training with Renzo Brancaleon, Antonio Janigro and Johannes Goritzki , Dario Destefano graduated from the Conservatory “G. Verdi” in Turin, Italy, and the Hochschule “Schumann” in Dusseldorf, Germany. In 1987, at the age of twenty-two, he became the principal cellist in the orchestra of the Teatro Comunale in Bologna. As first cello he has also collaborated with the RAI Orchestra and the Teatro Regio in Turin. He played in theaters in Europe and around the globe, and has performed numerous pieces as world premieres. He is professor of cello at the Conservatory “G. Verdi” in Turin. He plays a cello Santagiuliana – Vicenza 1821.
Guido Maria Guida, Conductor
Conductor Guido Maria Guida graduated in piano, composition and conducting at the Conservatories of Turin and Milan. He continued his studies at the École Normale in Paris and the Accademia Chigiana under the leadership of Franco Ferrara, where in 1978 he obtained a diploma of merit. From 1982 to 1994 he worked as the musical assistant of Giuseppe Sinopoli, actively participating in numerous symphonic and opera productions at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, Covent Garden in London, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Nationaltheater of Munich, the Teatro alla Fenice in Venice. In January 1995, he performed in Japan with the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI. With Giuseppe Giacomini he recorded for the Bongiovanni; he also made many other recordings for Capriccio, Memories, Fonit-Cetra, Disc Mountains and Urtext. He has worked with soloists such as Maria Tipo, Cyprien Katsaris, Laura De Fusco, Horacio Gutierrez, David Geringas, Placido Domingo, and Juan Pons. From 1996 to 1998, Guida was the principal conductor of the Opera Bellas Artes in Mexico City, where from 2003 to 2006 he performed the entire cycle of The Ring of the Nibelung by R. Wagner. In October 2004 he made his debut at the Opera Theater in Houston, where he performed the world premiere of a new opera by Daniel Catan Salsipuedes, receiving critical acclaim from the public and the international press. Conductor Guida is professor of score reading at the Conservatory “Giuseppe Verdi” in Turin.
Jaime Kathleen Korkos – Mezzo-soprano
San Francisco native mezzo-soprano Jaime Kathleen Korkos received her Artist and Graduate Diplomas in Opera Studies from Boston’s New England Conservatory of Music under the tutelage of Luretta Bybee. Ms. Korkos was most recently seen as Edith in The Pirates of Penzance with Opera Theatre of St. Louis, where she has been a Gerdine Young Artist for the past two summers. Along with numerous roles at the conservatory, Ms. Korkos has also worked with many local Boston companies, including MetroWest Opera, Longwood Opera, and the Diva Day Foundation. Previous credits include La Gazzetta (Doralice), Orfeo ed Euridice (Orfeo), La Périchole (La Périchole), Cendrillon (Cendrillon), Rusalka (Rusalka), Le nozze di Figaro (Cherubino), Don Giovanni (Elvira), Hansel and Gretel (Sandman), Hansel and Gretel (Mother). Ms. Korkos also gave a solo recital in NEC’s Jordan Hall in March of 2013.
COMPOSERS – BIO
Azio Corghi (Ciriè, Torino 1937) is a composer, musicologist and a member of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia, Rome; he has received several international awards for his work.
Until 1950, he dedicated himself to both painting and music; however, it is to the latter that he devoted his career both as a composer and a teacher.
He taught Composition in Parma, Turin and Milan. From 1995 to 2007 he was professor of Advanced Composition at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. He was commissioned several works by the major Italian musical institutions such as the Teatro alla Scala and La Filarmonica della Scala, the Orchestra Nazionale della RAI, the Accademia Chigiana di Siena, and the Accademia di Santa Cecilia.
Corghi is a composer who loves the “contamination” genre, and on several occasions he has been inspired by the works of the past as in “… fero dolore”, inspired by Monteverdi, Un petit train de plaisir, inspired by Rossini, Il dissoluto assolto, inspired by Mozart, and La cetra appesa, inspired by Verdi.
Marco Betta (Enna 1964), author of symphonic and chamber music, and music for theater and cinema, studied composition at the Conservatory in Palermo under the guidance of Eliodoro Sollima. Later he continued his studies with Armando Gentilucci and Salvatore Sciarrino.
He debuted as a composer in 1982 at the Spaziomusica Festival in Cagliari. Since then his compositions have been regularly performed in many Italian and European institutions. His musical language combines the ancient musical cultures of Sicily with the main techniques of the avant-garde, with particular focus on minimalism and “neotonalismo”.
From 1994 to 2002 he was artistic director at Teatro Massimo in Palermo, where he played an active role in its reopening. He has composed soundtracks for films by Andò and Tornatore, and music for theater, collaborating with directors such as van Hoecke, Puggelli and Rigillo.
Marco Betta teaches Composition at the Conservatory in Palermo.
Giorgio Colombo Taccani (Milan 1961) obtained a degree in Modern Literature at the University of Milan with a thesis on Bruno Madera, and, at the same time, graduated in Piano in 1984 and in Composition in 1989 at the “G. Verdi” Conservatory in Milan under the guidance of Pippo Molino and, later on, Azio Corghi. He earned an advanced degree in composition upon completion of a two-year course of specialization held by Franco Donatoni at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. Furthermore, he attended master classes with György Lignite, and among other things, studied music informatics. His compositions have received awards and special mentions at national and international competitions, have been broadcast by several domestic and foreign radio and TV stations and published by Edizioni Suvini Zerboni in Milan.
Giorgio Colombo Taccani teaches Composition at the “G. Verdi” Conservatory in Turin, and Analysis of Contemporary Music at the Conservatorio della Svizzera Italiana in Lugano.
Fabrizio De Rossi Re (Roma 1960) studied at the Conservatorio di S. Cecilia in Rome, graduating under Mauro Bortolotti and Raffaello Tega. Musicians as Sylvano Bussotti, Salvatore Sciarrino and Luciano Berio have played an important role in his developement.
De Rossi Re performs regularly at international music festivals, and draws his inspiration from a wide array of contexts, which form the basis for a musical expressivity that combines heterogeneous sources. His dynamic vision on art led him to embrace virtually all areas of creativity: opera theater, great symphonic works and chamber music.
De Rossi Re teaches at the “Giovan Battista Pergolesi” Conservatory in Fermo.
Marco Lombardi (Finale Ligure, Savona 1960) graduated at the Genoa Conservatory and continued his studies at the Accademia Chigiana under Franco Donatoni.
His relationship with Gerard Grisey and Helmut Lachenmann was fundamental for his career and development as a musician. He has received awards and recognitions in several composition competitions. His music, which is published by Pizzicato Verlag and Musikhaus Doblinger in Vienna, has been performed in Italy and abroad by groups such as the Ensemble Orchestrals Contemporaine, the Penderecki String Quartet and the New York Miniaturist Ensemble. He is the founder and president of Ensemble Nuove Musiche and the author of numerous essays and articles dedicated to the aesthetics of the music.
Riccardo Piacentini (Moncalieri, Torino 1958) graduated in Composition at the Turin Conservatory and in Piano at the Conservatory in Alessandria. He holds a degree in Modern Literature from the University of Turin and a Diploma in Choral Music and Choral Conducting from the Conservatory in Bologna. He furthered his studies at Accademia Chigiana in Siena and at Accademia Internazionale Perosi in Biella under Franco Donatoni; he attended classes by Bussotti, Ennio Morricone, György Ligeti and Karlheinz Stockhausen, and has studied electronic music at the Heinrich Strobel Center in Freiburg, Germany. In 1988 he participated at the “Internationalen Ferienkurse für Neue Musik” in Darmstadt, Germany. His work has received several awards from international juries, including those of the Accademia Chigiana di Siena, in collaboration with Radio-France and the Conservatoire National Superieur in Paris. His