Performer: Paolo Ghidoni
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On SaleRolla: Violin Concertos / Paolo Ghidoni, Mantova Conservatory
CD$18.99$14.99Dynamic
Oct 30, 2012DYN-CDS714 -
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Casella: Triple Concerto; Ghedini / Iorio
$19.99CDNaxos
Oct 29, 20138573180
Rolla: Violin Concertos / Paolo Ghidoni, Mantova Conservatory
Dynamic
Available as
CD
ROLLA Violin Concertos: in Bb; in D; in A • Paolo Ghidoni (vn, cond); O da Camera del Conservatorio di Mantova • DYNAMIC 714 (60:30)
Dynamic’s release of violin concertos by Alessandro Rolla makes available three of the 21 works in the genre written by the violinist, teacher, conductor, and composer. Those versed in the lore of Nicolò Paganini will remember Rolla as the teacher to whom Paganini’s father brought the young prodigy, who read one of Rolla’s concertos at sight while waiting for the master to appear. That anecdote alone (not cited in the booklet notes by Mariateresa Dellaborra) should lend these works a special interest for aficionados of the violin. The notes cite the sources from which Marco Pinotti transcribed each of the three concertos for performance. Listeners will notice from the outset that the winds (oboes and horns) that Rolla incorporated in his orchestral textures serve a more important function than merely fluffing up the blanket of orchestral sound. The solo part of the first movement of the Concerto in Bb-Major explores a range and variety of technical devices (though, surprisingly, not double-stops) far in advance of Giovanni Battista Viotti but hardly so daring as those of Paganini. Paolo Ghidoni serves as a bold and technically alert champion, playing the solo part of this concerto with a big-toned ardor, accompanied from some distance behind—despite the recorded sound’s clarity—by the orchestra, which, for its part, occasionally detours into a byway of contrasting affect. The first movement’s cadenza sounds brilliant without making onerous demands on the soloist. The slow movement opens with a theme of near-Mozartean purity, in both the orchestral and solo parts; Ghidoni embellishes it with sweet figuration, much of it in the violin’s higher registers, leading into the final movement, an elegantly lyrical “Rondò.”
The Second Concerto on the program, in D Major, falls into the same three movements, the first opening with an orchestral tutti that includes darker threads among the brighter ones. Once again, the solo part lies in a somewhat higher tessitura than those in Viotti’s and Pierre Rode’s concertos, although the passagework remains similar, at times uncannily reminiscent of particular figural turns in Viotti’s celebrated Concerto No. 22, though the interaction between solo and orchestra has grown more conversational in Rolla’s concertos. The slow movement enshrines passages of melting cantabile and leads to a “Rondò” that again recalls Viotti’s concertos. If the D-Major Concerto recalls Viotti, the final one on the program, in A Major, suggests Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, especially in the first movement’s orchestral thematic statements, although the violin part still bears traces of Viotti’s influence. Ghidoni sounds particularly rich in the few passages in the lower register that Rolla provides for the soloist in this movement. The simple and straightforward slow movement leads to a “Rondò polonaise,” recalling in its themes rondos by Viotti and Louis Spohr. These concertos should prove interesting in their own right for collectors who delight in exploring the violin literature’s byways but should also ingratiate themselves with general listeners—and they could provide a technical missing link between Viotti and Mozart for violin students. Warmly recommended.
FANFARE: Robert Maxham
Casella: Triple Concerto; Ghedini / Iorio
Naxos
Available as
CD
$19.99
Oct 29, 2013
CASELLA Concerto for Piano, Violin, and Cello. GHEDINI Concerto dell’albatro ( Concerto of the Albatross ) for Violin, Cello, Piano, and Speaker 1 • Damian Iorio, cond; Emanuela Piedmonti (pn); Paolo Ghidoni (vn); Pietro Bosna (vc); 1 Carlo Dogliioni Majer (spkr); O I Pomeriggi Musicali • NAXOS 8.573180 (58:11 Text and Translation)
The music of Alfredo Casella and Giorgio Ghedini, modern and brilliant as it is, has been marginalized in part because both composers complied with the Fascist government—Casella willingly and eagerly, Ghedini passively. This disc combines major concertos by both of them. The former concerto grosso is almost Modernist in style, with the three soloists emerging from and returning to the ensemble, either individually or together; by contrast, the latter is a much more expansive and almost Impressionistic work, leaning on techniques pioneered by French composers, with its last movement including a spoken text (in Italian) from Herman Melville’s Moby Dick about the first time an albatross was spotted. Essentially, then, we have a contrast in influences, Casella’s Russian-Germanic style versus Ghedini’s more Francophile one.
This makes perfect sense in Casella’s case, as in 1930 he formed a piano trio, the Trio Italiano, with himself at the keyboard (violinist Alberto Poltronieri and cellist Arturo Bonucci were the other two members), and it was for his trio that he constructed this Concerto in 1933. David Gallagher’s liner notes claim a sameness in the construction and music of this Concerto and the Introduzione, aria e toccata, the Cello Concerto, and his purely instrumental Concerto of 1937, and he may indeed be right. I only have, or have heard, the first-named of these, and there is indeed a strong similarity to this Triple Concerto. Still, it is an excellent work; and, as Gallagher also points out, the composer thought the middle movement of this Concerto one of his finest pieces.
Ghedini’s music is almost uniformly original and inventive by comparison. The opening movement of his Concerto dell’albatro, marked Largo at a tempo of quarter note = 46, bears a striking resemblance to the music of Pïteris Vasks—but Vasks, born in the 1940s, only came to composition long after Ghedini’s death. Indeed, the only movement in this amazing work that struck me as somewhat artificially contrived was the fast movement (No. 4, Allegro vivace – Poco a poco animando – Lentamente ), a mere succession of rapid note patterns in an ambiguous jumble of tonality and an annoying, almost aggressive 6/8 rhythm. Carlo Doglioni Majer’s narration of Melville’s story is cool and detached.
Without having any prior knowledge of these works. I nonetheless enjoyed them both tremendously. The three soloists, though not strong personalities, are all fine musicians and the orchestra plays sublimely under Iorio’s baton. And here, wonder of wonders, Naxos’s sonics are excellent. This is, simply, a remarkably fine disc.
FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley
