Un portal on escoltar i gaudir de l'art musical dels segles XVI, XVII, XVIII i XIX. Compartir la bellesa de la música és l'objectiu d'aquest espai i fer-ho donant a conèixer obres de compositors molt o poc coneguts és el mètode.
Soprano and composer of Italian descent. She was a daughter of Charles
Gambarini, counsellor to the Landgrave of Hessen-Kassel. She took the
second soprano part at the first performance of Handel’s Occasional
Oratorio in 1746, and in the Covent Garden revival a year later assumed
most of Duparc’s role as well. She created the Israelite Woman in Judas
Maccabaeus in 1747, and probably sang Asenath in Joseph and his Brethren
the same year. Her name appears in the performing scores of Samson and
Messiah, but it is not certain when she sang in these works. Her voice
seems to have been a mezzo with a regular compass of d' to g'', extended
occasionally down to b and up to a''. About 1748-50 she published some
harpsichord pieces and songs in Italian and English, including a setting
of ‘Honour, riches, marriage-blessing’ from The Tempest. Her op.2 has a
frontispiece portrait engraved by Nathaniel Hone in 1748; it gives the
date of her birth as above, but this may understate her age. She had a
benefit at the Great Room, Dean Street, on 15 April 1761, when an ode of
her composition was performed together with a cantata by the aged
Geminiani; he may have been her teacher. In May 1764, as Mrs Chazal, she
is said to have given a concert at which she appeared as organist and
composer. According to Gerber’s Lexikon she was also a painter.
Maltese composer, organist and theorist. After early studies with
Michel'Angelo Vella, he entered the Conservatorio di S Onofrio a Capuana
on 15 Oct 1763 as a convittore to study under Carlo Contumacci and the
German Joseph Doll. He left in 1767 but stayed on as maestro di cappella
in Naples and continued to study with Niccolò Piccinni, who is said to
have esteemed him greatly. In summer 1774, following an advantageous
offer from Mdina Cathedral, he returned permanently to Malta as
Cathedral organist with the right to succeed the then maestro di
cappella, Benigno Zerafa. His growing interest in pedagogy resulted in
Il musico prattico on the art of the counterpoint, published in the form
of French translations and introduced as a textbook in Paris by
A.-E.-M. Grétry: Cherubini based the 19th chapter of his treatise Cours
de contrepoint (1835) on its analysis of imitation. His students
included the composers P.P. Bugeja, Nicolò Isouard and Giuseppe Burlon
(1772-1856). Zerafa's failing health led to Azopardi's appointment in
1785 as substitute maestro, with an increased salary; he inherited the
full title in March 1804. Most of Azopardi's works, written mainly for
the cathedral, are extant. Recent revivals have disclosed a gifted
composer who fused contemporary Classical techniques with the austere
contrapuntal practices of earlier periods. This approach, which shows
Piccinni's influence, is most evident in his large-scale ‘Kyrie–Gloria’
masses. That composed in 1776, for example, for soloists, double chorus
and double orchestra, contains an eight-movement Gloria in which the
inner sections of virtuoso arias in flexible ternary form and an
eight-voice, madrigal-like ‘Qui tollis’ are framed by double-chorus
numbers, with the closing ‘Cum sancto spirito’ starting homophonically
but swelling into a majestic double fugue. The essentially symphonic
conception of a whole movement is often dramatic, without however
destroying a scrupulous concern for the music's appropriateness to
textual spirit and meaning. Azopardi's few instrumental works, though
inventive and melodious, are of less significance.
Performers: Edith Selig (1929-2020, soprano); Jean-Jacques Lesueur
(tenor); Pierre Germain (baritone); Georges Abdoun (bass); Chorale des
Jeunesses Musicales de France; Orchestre De L'Association Dеs Concеrts
Pаsdеloup; Louis Martini (1912-2000, conductor)
French composer. The son of an illiterate labourer, he enrolled on 6 May
1679 in the choir school of the Cathedral of St Sauveur at
Aix-en-Provence. His teacher was Guillaume Poitevin, who also taught a
number of Provence’s other most reputable composers, including Campra
and Blanchard. In 1687 he left the boys’ choir but continued in the
service of the cathedral. On 5 November 1688, at Poitevin’s request, he
shared the positions of sous-maître and organist with another student,
Jacques Cabassol. Poitevin retired on 4 May 1693 and he succeeded him as
maître de musique. But despite an increase in his salary and several
remunerative privileges his action in April 1695 in leaving without
notice to become maître de musique of Agde Cathedral indicates that he
was dissatisfied with his lot at Aix. He soon attracted the attention of
the Bishop of Rieux, who wanted him to succeed Campra as maître de
musique of the Cathedral of St Etienne at Toulouse, although the
position had recently been given to Michel Farinel. Farinel, for unknown
reasons, left Toulouse in November 1697, and on 18 December 1697
Gilles, who was in Toulouse at the time, was appointed to direct the
choir school. In 1701 the Duke of Burgundy and the duc de Berry,
grandsons of Louis XIV, visited Toulouse with great ceremony. With the
attention this event brought him, Gilles’s reputation grew, and in July
1701 he was offered the directorship of the choir school at Notre Dame
des Doms, Avignon. Evidently he agreed to accept, and Rameau was
appointed to deputize until he arrived, but although Gilles may have
spent a short time at Avignon he never left his post at Toulouse. He
renewed his contract there for four years on 3 December 1701 and the
chapter records show that he was still there when he died.
In the 18th century Gilles’s Messe des morts became one of the most
famous works in all France. According to M.A. Laugier's Sentiment d’un
harmoniphile (1756), ‘Today there is seldom a funeral service with music
without a performance of Gilles’s mass’. It was performed at services
for Rameau in 1764 and for Louis XV ten years later. It was praised by
many critics, including Mattheson, who called it ‘one of the most
beautiful of musical works’. With the motets of Lalande, Gilles’s
Requiem and the motets Diligam te and Beatus quem elegisti remained
popular at the Concert Spirituel during the first three-quarters of the
18th century. Diligam te remained in the repertory of the royal chapel
at Versailles until the fall of the monarchy in 1792. Gilles’s motets
are constructed on the same principles as Lalande’s, that is in the form
of the Versailles grand motet. Like Lalande’s, his orchestra is
relatively independent of the chorus. His harmony is less dissonant than
Lalande’s. His fast movements often suggest dance rhythms, with
frequent use of hemiola in those in triple time. His motets show his
early maturity, and his earliest surviving works demonstrate exceptional
expression and pathos, particularly the Lamentations, which constitute
one of the few choral settings for Holy Week by a French composer. The
choral writing in Gilles’s later works shows a convincing balance
between polyphony and homophonic declamation. His well crafted and
expressive fugal choruses usually contribute substantially to the
overall structure of his works. In the Messe des morts, for example,
after a pattern alternating polyphony with homophonic, dance-like
textures, the fugal ‘Requiem aeternam’ crowns a polyphonic development
that has been unfolding throughout the work. In the Te Deum (1697) two
choral fugues (‘Te per orbem’ and ‘Aeterna fac’) frame an arresting
trio, ‘Tu devicto mortis’ for three basses-tailles, which forms the
centre of a completely symmetrical 11-movement structure.
Spanish violinist and composer. His father was José de Herrando
(c.1700–c.1750), a composer and performer in musical comedies. Herrando
was the most important violinist in 18th-century Spain: he played for
the most prestigious musical institutions and wrote the only substantial
Spanish violin tutor of the time. He may have received musical training
from Giacomo Facco. He entered the service of the Real Convento de la
Encarnación in Madrid probably in the 1740s and became principal
violinist in 1756. Farinelli employed him as one of 16 violinists at the
Coliseo del Buen Retiro; he appears in its records for 1747 and 1758.
He was also selected for Farinelli's orchestra at Aranjuez. His high
reputation in these circles is born out by one of Jacopo Amiconi's
official royal portraits in which three musicians, Herrando, Farinelli
and Domenico Scarlatti, are depicted in a balcony overlooking the royal
family. A tapestry in La Granja depicts the same triumvirate appearing
in a window. Some of Herrando's compositions were written at Farinelli's
request, such as the six sonatinas for five-string violin. Herrando
also forged professional affiliations with the well-respected Geminiani
family. Miguel Geminiani (brother of Francesco) also played violin at
the Buen Retiro, and Herrando was his successor as principal violinist
at the royal chapel; Geminiani held the post until 1758, it then fell to
Francisco Manalt and eventually to Herrando in 1759, despite the fact
that his poor eyesight caused him to miss several notes during the
sight-reading exam. In the 1750s and early 1760s he worked with José de
Parra's company in the major theatres in Madrid.
He was closely associated with the dukes of Alba and Arcos the latter
being his patron and dueño. It has been suggested that Herrando possibly
went to Paris to oversee the printing of his violin treatise and
probably met Francesco Geminiani there. Geminiani used the engraving
from the beginning of Herrando's treatise (in which Herrando is seen
playing the violin) in the French translation of his own violin method
(Paris, 2/1762), substituting his own head for Herrando's. It may have
been Geminiani who brought Herrando's music to England, thus explaining
the publication of some of his sonatas in London. Herrando's Arte y
puntual explicación is a comprehensive compendium of advice on violin
technique and performing practice. His 28 violin exercises are roughly
analogous to Bach's Das Wohltemperirte Clavier in that Herrando wrote
one study in each of the major and minor keys. The set works
progressively through the sharp keys and then the flat keys, continuing,
unlike Bach's set, to the extremes of C major and A minor and C
major and A minor. The pieces become longer and technically more
demanding as the book progresses, and they run the gamut of techniques
and effects. In many ways they are worthy cousins to Corelli's op.5
sonatas. One of Herrando's most fascinating pieces is his sonata El
Jardín de Aranjuez en tiempo de primavera con diversos cantos de páxaros
y otros animales (‘The Aranjuez garden in springtime with the diverse
songs of birds and other animals’). It incorporates bird calls (e.g.
canary, cuckoo, quail and dove) and other natural sounds (e.g. a
murmuring brook and a tempest) reproduced on the violin.
Bohemian composer and teacher. Almost nothing is known about his life
and career. He was mainly active as a teacher in Praga where his pupils
included Jan Josef Eberle, Frantisek Richter and Jin Tolis. As a
composer, only a Viola d'Amore concerto has survived. This piece is
conceived for a seven-string instrument tuned to a D major triad.
Virtuoso elements are to be found above all in the playing of high
passages. During the solo sections the lower instruments of orchestra
pause, allowing the tonal qualities of the viola d'amore to have their
full effect.
