Paolo Dirani & Ferruccio Amelotti - Duo pianistico: G. Martucci, O. Respighi, A. Casella, G. F. Malipiero (1999/2023) [24/48]

A leading figure of the second 'Italian instrumental 19th century', Giuseppe Martucci (Capua, 1856 -Naples, 1909) is known for his Germanophile attitude at a time when the homeland of opera was dominated by verist melodrama. The Pensieri sull'opera 'Un ballo in maschera' op.8, written around. 1874, constitute the only piece in his catalogue for piano four-hands. The art of transcription constitutes one of Martucci's own stylistic traits: think of the famous Pastorale by Sammartini. As a devout friend of Liszt, it is not surprising that the musician from Campania turned to the 19th-century form of the piano paraphrase from an opera, As an Italian promoter of Wagner, it is surprising that his choice, in this work, fell on Verdi's danceable vitality. Op. 8 thus represents musical proof that in Martucci, the 'Italian instrumental renaissance' did not flourish on the basis of a snobbish detachment from the national melodramatic tradition. The Sei piccoli pezzi (or Six Little Pieces for Children), composed in 1926, are the only four-hand piano piece by Ottorino Respighi (Bologna, 1879 -Rome, 1936). Amidst the various influences the musician has undergone (Gregorian chant, Italian Baroque, Rimsky-Korsakov, Strauss, Debussy), Respighi seems to turn in these polite little pages to the Schumannian romanticism of the Album for Youth. In these characteristic six-part pieces, his vocation for musical exoticism and popular song appears clearly: these are, of course, melodies dressed up with subtle harmonic finesse, with breathy reverberations and slightly irregular rhythms. The work transitions from the narrative progression of the 'Romanza', to the folkloristic snapshot of the 'Canto di caccia siciliano', to the archaic charm of the 'Canzone armena', to the domestic 'mezzo carattere' of 'Natale, Natale!', to the contrapuntal modalism of the 'Cantilena scozzese', to the bagpipes of the dances of the mountain people inhabiting the mountainous regions of northern Scotland in 'Piccoli highlanders'.

Two aspects of the woody neo-classicism. of Alfredo Casella (Turin, 1883 - Rome, 1947) are revealed in the two collections for piano four-hands Pupazzetti and Pagine di guerra, both from 1915. (Pupazzetti 'Cinque pezzi facili' op. 27, will be transcribed in 1918 for nine instruments and in 1920 for orchestra). In these first five miniatures, the angular modernity of the music seeks above all grotesque effects: it is undoubtedly

The 'Marcetta' (I) is buffoonish, the 'Serenata' (III) caricatured, while the 'Polca' (V) harks back to a biting 'circus' comedy thanks to the polytonality learnt from Stravinsky. The even numbers are more pensive: in the "Berceuse" (Il) Casella chooses a rhythm dear to him (6/8), which according to some commentators even has a meaning of childish regression; the "Notturnino" has something Bartokian in its hallucinated fixity. The War Pages op. 25 bears the subtitle "Four musical 'films'", which Casella explains in a caption at the beginning of the score: "Title adopted because these brief impressions were suggested by film visions". Here, modern music, updated linguistically by polytonal techniques, shows its aggressive and aggrieved face. A Hindemithian constructivism, made up of sound masses and futuristic harshness, is present in "IN BELGIUM: parade of German heavy artillery"; miserable chords, without any harmonic pleasantness, accompany "IN FRANCE: in front of the ruins of Reims cathedral"; a modernised version of the traditional 19th-century "characteristic piece" is "IN RUSSIA: Cossack cavalry charge"; in the concluding "IN ALSACE wooden crosses…" Casella resumes the beloved Berceuse rhythm.

The European fortunes of Gian Francesco Malipiero (Venice, 1882 Treviso, 1973) began with the orchestral piece Pause del silenzio Prima serie, 7 impressioni sinfoniche (1917), of which we propose to listen to the version for piano four hands. This First was followed in 1926 by a Second Series of five symphonic impressions. Far from expressionistic ruins, refusing the principle of thematic development in favour of obsessive reiteration, Malipiero recreates in this page an Italic melos, combined with the harmonic achievements of Impressionism. One theme - a plaintive dirge, Malipiero's version of the "Promenade" from Mussorgsky's Pictures of an Exhibition - returns as a link between the various numbers, as well as framing the work at the beginning and end. It is as if it were stitching together various aspects of the sorrowful progress of existence: the inconsolable poetics of the musician alternates between terse and motionless sonorities (I), spaced symphonic writing (II), a nocturne in the grip of existential tedium (III), some vivid influence of Stravinsky's Petrouschka (IV), black humour (V), austere and archaic modalism (VI) and the vague overlapping of different rhythms (VII).

Tracklist:
01. Martucci: Pensieri sull'opera "Un ballo in maschera" Op.8
02. Respighi: Sei Piccoli Pezzi, Romanza
03. Respighi: Sei Piccoli Pezzi, Canto di caccia siciliano
04. Respighi: Sei Piccoli Pezzi, Canzone armena
05. Respighi: Sei Piccoli Pezzi, Natale, Natale!
06. Respighi: Sei Piccoli Pezzi, Cantilena Scozzese
07. Respighi: Sei Piccoli Pezzi, Piccoli Highlanders
08. Casella: Pupazzetti Op. 27, Marcetta
09. Casella: Pupazzetti Op. 27, Berceuse
10. Casella: Pupazzetti Op. 27, Serenata
11. Casella: Pupazzetti Op. 27, Notturnino
12. Casella: Pupazzetti Op. 27, Polca
13. Casella: Pagine di guerra Op. 25 Nel Belgio:sfilata di artiglieria pesante tedesca
14. Casella: Pagine di guerra Op. 25 In Francia:davanti alle rovine della cattedrale di Reims
15. Casella: Pagine di guerra Op. 25 In Russia: carica di cavalleria cosacca
16. Casella: Pagine di guerra Op. 25 In Alsazia: croci di legno
17. Malipiero: Pause del silenzio


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