The Italian keyboard, 1575 - 1725

Keyboard instruments have played a major role in European music history and continue to do so in our own time. They came and come in very different shapes, from the tiny spinet and the soft clavichord to the modern concert grand and large cathedral organs. Italy has played a key role in the development of some of the main genres of keyboard music during the renaissance and baroque periods, such as the toccata, the fantasia, the canzona and the ricercare. From the late 16th century to the early 18th century Italy experienced a kind of 'golden era' in keyboard music. In the first quarter of the 18th century a kind of decline seems to have taken place. The two most brilliant keyboard players, Giovanni Benedetto Platti and Domenico Scarlatti, left Italy to work elsewhere. Some of the main composers of the time, such as Vivaldi, Albinoni and Tartini, were no keyboard players and did not leave any music for keyboard solo. What was written is not that well-known, such as the sonatas by the likes of Benedetto Marcello, Baldassare Galuppi and Domenico Cimarosa. With the latter two we are in a different period: the galant idiom.

Thanks to Brilliant Classics our picture of the history of keyboard writing in Italy has been substantially extended. I have reviewed most of those recordings on my site and here on this weblog. In this article I want to pay attention to some recent recordings of Italian keyboard music spanning the about 150 years from 1575 to 1725.

Luigi Accardo [1] plays a programme under the title of "Harmoniae Varietates"; the subtitle indicates what he aims at: "Italian Music from the Golden Age of the Harpsichord". Obviously such a programme is a personal selection, but at least the main composers are represented: Girolamo Frescobaldi and Bernardo Pasquini had to be included. That said, the latter is not as well-known as he deserves to be (more about him later). A problem is that his large oeuvre for keyboard has not been catalogued. Ironically, Bernardo Storace is a somewhat mysterious figure, who has made a name for himself with just one collection of keyboard works, but these are probably more often played and recorded than Pasquini's music. Fortunately Accardo avoids the 'evergreen', the Ciaccona, but plays two different pieces instead, among them a nice Balletto. Domenico Zipoli is also pretty well-known, and another example of a composer who left Italy, this time for the New World. Alessandro Scarlatti is overshadowed by his son, but the complete recording of his keyboard works by Francesco Tasini (Tactus) showed that Domenico had inherited his skills from his father. Accardo includes two brilliant examples.

He closes the programme with specimens of later music. With Pescetti and Leo were are on the brink of a new era, in which the galant idiom conquers Europe. The former's Sonata IV included here is a good example. (His complete keyboard works were recorded by Paolo Bottini). Apart from organists, few keyboard players explore his oeuvre, and that also goes for Leonardo Leo, one of the main opera composers in 18th-century Naples, who has left a small keyboard oeuvre, among which the Trattenimento, which closes Accardo's recording.

He is an outstanding performer who does not show off, despite the often virtuosic nature of the pieces he has selected. It is telling that he mostly decides to end a piece not with a big bang, but rather arpeggiates the closing chord. If you look for a fine survey of Italian keyboard music in its golden era, this is a perfect choice.

The next disc focuses on one of the genres mentioned above, the ricercar(e) or ricercata. It is impossible to precisely define this form: New Grove mentions two forms, the 'preludial or rhapsodic' ricercar, and the imitative ricercar. The latter is the one which the three composers produced to which Ilaria Monticelli [2] devoted a disc on Da Vinci Classics. They are all from Naples, and their ricercares date from the last quarter of the 16th century and the first decade of the 17th. Despite the fact that all the pieces are specimens of the same genre, they are very different, as the artist explains in her liner-notes, which are very useful. These differences depend on the choice of mode and the way the thematic material is used. Some pieces show the influence of the madrigals of the time, which is not surprising, given the importance of this genre, certainly in Naples, and the fact that all three composers wrote madrigals themselves. De Macque was also in the service of Carlo Gesualdo, whose reputation is based on his madrigals.

Rocco Rodio, the earliest and also the least-known composer in the programme, was also associated with Gesualdo. He published two books of madrigals, one of which is lost. The five ricercate performed by Ilaria Monticelli are taken from his only printed edition of keyboard music, which also includes four fantasias, two of which on liturgical chants. The complete edition has been recorded by Luca Scandali on organ, and that makes Monticelli's performance on the harpsichord of the five ricercate a useful alternative.

She plays the copy of an anonymous Neapolitan harpsichord from around 1550, but is different from the original "by virtue of its broken octave and of its reconstruction of the original disposition, which had an added stop of 4’". It is the perfect tool for this repertoire and allows for an idiomatic interpretation of this compelling repertoire, under the hands of a player who shows a thorough understanding of the material. The polyphonic fabric comes perfectly off here, thanks to the clarity of the playing and the fine articulation, as well as the excellent recording.

Bernardo Pasquini was generally considered the most brilliant keyboard player in Italy in the second half of the 17th century, comparable with Frescobaldi in the first half. He was born in Pistoia and moved to Rome in 1650. Here he spent the rest of his life, although he made various appearances abroad. He performed for Louis XIV in Paris and at the imperial court in Vienna during the reign of Leopold I. His reputation crossed the borders of Italy: he attracted many pupils from all over Europe, such as Johann Philipp Krieger and Georg Muffat. He has left a large corpus of keyboard music which unfortunately has never been catalogued. That is especially problematic as his oeuvre includes a number of pieces with the same title or even without a title. That makes it very difficult to compare recordings or to identify a piece that is played.

The most - probably even all - of his keyboard works have been notated as pedagogical material, especially for the musical education of his nephew Bernardo Felice Ricordati. They have been preserved in two large sources: Ms. Landsberg 215, at the Deutsche Staatsbibliothek of Berlin, and the three books, at present bound into a single one, at the British Library in London.

The Italian keyboard player Roberto Loreggian [3], who has made many recordings for Brilliant Classics, recorded the complete Berlin collection. All the forms common in Italian keyboard music, as mentioned above, are represented, and to those Pasquini added variations (variazioni, partite), dances (sarabanda, alemanda), fugues, pieces on bassi ostinati and pieces with curious titles, such as bizzarria, tastata, as well as pieces whose titles may refer to situations or characters, such as Tastata per il Signor Melani per Genova. One wonders whether such a piece was also intended as 'pupil's fodder' (to quote New Grove about the keyboard works by Alessandro Scarlatti).

In most cases it is to the performer to decide which instrument to play. However, there are pieces which are undoubtedly intended for the organ, because of long-held notes; an example is the Toccata per Monaco, which opens the third disc.

The complete production comprises five discs, with a duration of almost six hours. That makes this project a mammoth undertaking, but the quality and variety of Pasquini's oeuvre justifies it. As I already suggested, there is much variety of forms and Loreggian has made sure that each disc includes a mixture of pieces of different kinds and size. Three discs are entirely played on the harpsichord (a copy of a harpsichord by Giusti), whereas two discs are filled with pieces performed at the organ by Bonatti (1713) in the Santuario Santa Maria in Valverde in Rezzato (Brescia, Italy). We have come to know Loreggian as an insightful and stylish player, and this is another testimony of his art. He fully explores the features of each piece, and thanks to the way he has put together the various discs and his engaging style of playing - and not to forget the two fine instruments - this is a set that no lover of baroque keyboard music should miss.

The second source of Pasquini's keyboard music, in the British Library in London, includes two sets of fourteen sonatas each, for one and two keyboards respectively. Instead of writing them out he provided only basso continuo lines which have to be worked out during performance. The latter have been recorded by Marina Scaioli and Francesco Tasini [4]. In their construction these sonatas show strong similarity with several forms of instrumental music, such as the trio sonata. They include contrasts between 'solo' and 'tutti', which is reminiscent of the concerto grosso, for example those of Pasquini's colleague Corelli. There are also passages in which the two keyboards are involved in a kind of dialogue. Each sonata consists of various movements. In his liner-notes Tasini refers to a number of movements, and therefore it is rather odd that these are not specified in the track-list.

This is not the first recording of these fourteen sonatas. The first that crossed my path is the one by Attilio Cremonesi and Alessandro de Marchi (Symphonia, 1992); that one may not be available anymore. Brilliant Classics released a new recording in 2013, in which Luca Scandali and Hadrien Jourdan play most of the sonatas on the two organs in the Basilica di Santa Maria della Misericordia in Sant'Elpidio a Mare (Fermo). These are fine instruments, but given that these pieces are intended as pedagogical material, performances on organs is not the most logical option. From that angle the recording by Scaioli and Tasini is to be preferred. They added a bonus: one of the sonatas for one keyboard (which, as far as I know, have never been recorded) indicates that "it can be done on two harpsichords". This results in a fifteenth sonata in A minor, which concludes the programme.

Marina Scaioli and Francesco Tasini have delivered excellent performances of these fine pieces, which are also historically interesting, in that they shed light on the Italian partimento practice - exercises in figured-bass playing, especially as self-contained pieces. The recording makes sure that the two instruments are clearly identifiable.

Agostino Tinazzoli (c 1660-1725) is an example of a composer whom hardly anybody may ever have heard of, before Brilliant Classics released a recording of his complete keyboard works by Simone Pierini [5]. Very little is known about Tinazzoli; in New Grove the article on Tinazzoli takes not even five full lines. The most remarkable fact is that in Rome he spent some time in prison for unknown reasons. He was released thanks to the cantata he had scratched on the wall of his cell. In later years he worked as an opera director, but did not compose any opera himself, but only arias to be inserted in operas by others. His oeuvre includes some sacred music, madrigals and keyboard works.

The latter come with three different titles: toccata, sonata and capriccio. Tinazzoli seems to have chosen those titles at random, because their forms seem to have little to do with those titles. All three can consist of only one movement or comprise several movements, either with tempo indications or the name of a dance. Stylistically they show quite some variety as well. A number of pieces remind me of the keyboard works by Alessandro Scarlatti, which is probably not surprising as they were exact contemporaries. However, there are also pieces that sound much more modern. In the Capriccio No. 15, which closes the programme, we hear drum basses in the left hand, which is a feature of the galant idiom. Even more surprising is the Sonata No. 13, whose addition Post Agnus indicates that it was intended for liturgical use. It is very operatic and points in the direction of liturgical organ music written in Italy in the late 18th century. The Partite sopra il Passagallo is the harmonically most daring work.

This should suffice to conclude that this is a remarkable recording of a remarkable composer, who deserves to be investigated by anyone with a special interest in early keyboard music. It is served very well by Simone Pierini, whose performances are impressive. He plays the copy of a Grimaldi harpsichord and an organ of 1999, which unfortunately is not specified in the booklet, but is well suited to this repertoire.

[1] "Harmoniae Varietates - Italian Music from the Golden Age of the Harpsichord"
Luigi Accardo, harpsichord
Dynamic CDS8036 (© 2024) details

[2] "Di voci affettuose - Neapolitan ricercars"
Ilaria Monticelli, harpsichord
Da Vinci Classics C00559 (© 2022) details

[3] Bernardo Pasquini: "Sonate per Gravecembalo - Manuscript S.B.P.K. Landsberg 215"
Roberto Loreggian, harpsichord, organ
Brilliant Classics 94826 (© 2020) details

[4] Bernardo Pasquini: "Quindici Sonate a due Cimbali"
Marina Scaioli, Francesco Tasini, harpsichord
Tactus TC 631804 (© 2021) details

[5] Agostino Tinazzoli: "Complete Keyboard Works"
Simone Pierini, harpsichord, organ
Brilliant Classics 96875 (© 2023) details