Stravinsky and Gesualdo’s Mo(nu)ment[1]
Claudia Vincis and Paolo Dal Molin
Even at
the time of Rake’s Progress, little
was known of the works of Carlo Gesualdo. If the darkest and most mysterious
secrets of the murderer/madrigalist’s adventurous biography were the object of
centuries of constant attention, the rigorous study of his oeuvre came only
after 350 years of misunderstandings. In fact, numerous early twentieth century
revivals of composers and genres of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries
depended notoriously on a fortuitous convergence of research, musical
production,
performance
and composition. Something similar can be seen with the “Prince of Venosa”. His
modern ‘cult’ goes back to the beginning of the ‘fifties, when collection of
documents began for the two musicological undertakings which disseminated it,
the edition of Sämtliche Werke (SW)[2]
and Gesualdo. The Man and his Music.[3] The first replaced the few existing
sporadic anthologies, and finally rivaled such initiatives as the monumenta of the Istituto Italiano per la Storia della Musica[4];
the second - the labor of one of the curators of the complete works - still
remains today the principal book of reference.
Igor Stravinsky culminated his own visitation
of Gesualdo - which will be the subject of this study - with the completion of
three motets of the Sacrarum cantionum
liber primus of six and seven voices, that is, the Illumina nos (1957), the Da
pacem Domine and Assumpta est Maria (1959),
and with the re-composition of three madrigals in the Monumentum pro Gesualdo di Venosa ad CD Annum (1960) - Asciugate i begli occhi (book V, VIV), Ma tu, cagion di quella (second part of Poiché l’avida sete; book V, XVIII) and Beltà, poi che t’assenti (book VI,
II). It is convenient first of all to go
back to the occasions of his encounters with Gesualdo, and the sources and the
literature that engaged him. The writings, signed or co-signed by Robert Craft
and Stravinsky - both initiated readers of Gesualdo
(the High Fidelity edition of
September of 1961 did not exaggerate when it presented Craft as “our prime
authority on Carlo Gesualdo of Venosa”) - and the documents conserved in the
Igor Stravinsky Collection of the Paul Sacher Stiftung of Basel (PSS)[5]
allow us to confirm those facts that Erik
Walter White and Roman Vlad have spoken of in well researched listings.[6]
As others would tend to
conclude, it is easy to observe that Stravinsky’s thoughts on Gesualdo’s
original text became explicit in this re-elaboration. (By now however, such
correct and well-considered judgments are like a circulating form ready to be
filled out and signed.) We have therefore attempted to illustrate the
Stravinskian means and the ends, comparing its assumptions with the image of
Gesualdo in the American and imported German musicology of the ‘fifties and
‘sixties. It is therefore not expected for this examination of Monumentum and the Tres sacrae cantiones to (by means of catch-all categories) retrace Stravinsky’s interventions on the originals
back to a record of operations and so to refine their lack
of systematicality or enlighten the analytical naivety of our historical
approach. Neither is it our intention to pursue the umpteenth funambulesque comparison between the
Gesualdo-Stravinsky works and that postmodern
carousel which, despite the composer’s intentions, has become Pulcinella. It has seemed more urgent for
us to elucidate the passages in the writings and the conversations concerning
Gesualdo (indicated henceforth by the alphanumeric acronyms in Table 1) so that
finally the essentials would be placed in perspective.
A Robert Craft, preface to Don Carlo Gesualdo, Illumina nos. From the book of ‘Sacrae Cantiones’ for six and seven
voices. The missing parts composed by Igor Stravinsky, London, Boosey and
Hawkes, 1957. Implicit bibliography: see C (Einstein, Gray-Heseltine, Vatielli
and La Polifonia Cinquecentesca e i
Primordi del Secolo XVII commented by Pannain).
B Igor
Stravinsky, Robert Craft, “Gesualdo,” Conversations
with Igor Stravinsky, New York, Doubleday, London, Faber & Faber, 1959,
pp. 32-34. This text was clearly edited
before the summer of 1959.
C Robert Craft,
‘Gesualdo (Don) Carlo, principe di
Venosa,’ Encyclopédie Fasquelle de la Musique, vol. II, edited by François Michel with the
collaboration of François Lesure and Vladamir Fédorov, Paris, Fasquelle, 1959. Catalogue of the works in the entry (titles have
been standardized):
- Sacred
vocal music: Sacrarum cantionum liber
primus. 5vv (Naples, 1603); Sacrarum
cantionum liber primus, 6, 7vv (Naples,
1603); Responsoria et alia ad Officium
Hebdomadae Sanctae 6vv (Naples,
1611) including the Benedictus Dominus
Deus Israel and «1 messe» [mistaken for the Miserere mei, Deus]; In te, Domine,
speravi. 4vv (Salmi delle compiete de diversi musici
napoletani, Naples, 1620).
-
Secular vocal music beyond the six books of madrigals: All’ombra degl’allori, canzonetta, 5vv and Come vivi cor mio, canzonetta, 5vv (Pomponio Nenna, Ottavo Libro de’Madrigali a 5, Naples,
161811); «1 de madrigaux à 6v. (VII[XVIII],
1626) [Madrigali, 6vv, ed. M Effrem
(Napoli 1626)]; il ne reste que le quintus de ce volume, au Lic. Mus. de Bologne [1 of the six-voice
madrigals… ; only the quintus
remains of this volume, at the Lic. Mus. of Bologna]». - Instrumental: Canzon francese, in 4 voices, for keyboard
(GB-Lbl Add. 30491). Sources pointed
out in the entry: editions of the six books of madrigals (Ferrara, 1594a 1594b
1595 1596; Gesualdo 1611a 1611b; Genova 1613) and collection of letters of
Gesualdo, Alfonso Fonatanelli, Leonora d’Este conserved at the State Archives
of Modena. Modern Editions: SW i-VII. La Polifonia Cinquecentesca e i Primordi del Secolo XVII. Musica Sacra
e Spirituale di Gian Domenico Montella, Giov. Maria Trabaci, Carlo Gesualdo, edited
by Guido Pannain, Milan, Ricordi, 1934 (L’Oratorio
dei Filippini e la Scuola Musicale di Napoli Volume I; Istituzioni e Monumenti dell’Arte Musicale Italiana, Vol. V). Bibliography: Ferdinand Keiner, Die Madrigale Gesualdos von Venosa, Leipzig,
Breitkopf & Härtel, 1914. Cecil Gray, Philippe Heseltine, Carlo
Gesualdo: Prince of Venosa, Musician and Murderer, London, Paul Kegan
Trench Trubner, 1926. Francesco
Vatielli, Il principe di Venosa e Leonora
d’Este, Milan, F.lli Bocca, 1941. Alfred Einstein, The Italian
Madrigal, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1949, 3 vol, pp.
688-717. Remo Giazotto, ‘Poesia del Tasso in morte di Maria
Gesualdo,’ Rassegna Musicale, XVIII
(1948), pp.15-28. George Ruffin Marshall, The
Harmonic Laws in the Madrigals of Carlo Gesualdo, Ph.D. Dissertation, New
York University, December 1955 [dated in January of 1956; “Univ. of Michigan,
D Robert Craft, preface to Carlo
Gesualdo di Venosa (1560-1613), Tres
Sacrae Cantiones, Completed by Igor Stravinsky, London, Boosey & Hawkes,
1960. This text corresponds in large part, except for some revision, to writing
A.
E Igor Stravinsky,
Robert Craft, ‘Chromaticism’, Memories
and Commentaries, New York, Doubleday, London, Faber & Faber; 1960, pp.
115-17. Implicit bibliography: Edward E.
Lowinsky, Secret chromatic art in the
Netherlands motet, translated from the German by Carl Buchman, New York,
Columbia University Press, 1946 [PSS IS B 1157]. Edward E. Lowinsky, ‘Adrian
Willaert’s Chromatic Duo’ Re-Examined’, Tijdschrift
voor Muziekwetenschap, XVIII (1956-1959), pp. 1-36 [PSS IS A 27]. Edward E. Lowinsky, ‘Matthaeus Gretier’s
‘Fortuna’: An Experiment in Chromaticism and in Musical Iconography,’ The Musical Quarterly, XLII/4 (1956),
pp. 500-519 and XLIII/1 (1957), pp. 68-85.
F Igor
Stravinsky, preface to Edward E. Lowinsky, Tonality
and Atonality in Sixteenth-Century Music, Berkeley-Los Angeles, 1961 (H, 106-108). Dated Hollywood, January 27,1961. [PSS IS B
90]. Stravinsky’s text mentions many
passages of Lowinsky’s in the following
order: chapter 1 ‘Frottola and Villancico’ with reference to p. 14; chapter VI
‘Tonality in Dance Music’ citing from p. 66; chapter IV ‘Floating Tonality and
Atonality in Sixteenth-Century Music’ with reference to pp. 46-50; chapter VII
‘Tonality and Statistics’ citing from p. 74; chapter V ‘Consolidation of
Tonality in Balletto and Lute Ayre’ citing from p. 61; chapter II ‘From
Dunstable to Josquin and Palestrina’ with reference to p.15; chapter I citing
from p. 14; chapter II with reference to p. 26; chapter VI citing from p. 70.
G Robert Craft, ‘The Murderous Prince of
Madrigalists,’ High Fidelity, 11/9
(September 1961), pp. 54-56, 130-131.
H Igor Stravinsky, Robert Craft, Expositions and Developments, New York,
Doubleday, London, Faber & Faber, 1962, pp. 104-108. A previous version of the dialogue appeared
in the concert program of the world premiere of Monumentum (Venice, Festival Internazionale di Musica Contemporanea
della Biennale, September 27, 1960).
I Igor Stravinsky,
‘Gesualdo di Venosa: New Perspectives,’ preface to Glenn Watkins, Gesualdo The Man and His Music, London,
Oxford University Press, 1973, dated Hollywood, 7 March 1968 and already
published in Retrospectives and
Conclusions, New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1969, pp.107-116.
Table 1: List of the writings and conversations of Igor
Stravinsky and Robert Craft entirely dedicated to, or with notable passages
about, Carlo Gesualdo, excluding the press releases signed by Craft for Sunset,
Columbia and Odyssey records (citation, [commentary], explicit or implicit
bibliography and call-numbers of the musicological literature archived in the
Igor Stravinsky Collection of the Paul Sacher Stiftung).
On the
West Coast
My own passion dates
from a chance view of a friend’s transcription of Aestimatus Sum. Seeking further examples, I learned that only
a few pieces existed in modern reprint and that these few were to be found
badly edited, defunct publications. The Library of Congress owned the 1613 complete
score edition, however, and this could be microfilmed and rewritten in a more
familiar notation. I did just that, and
during a period of about a year, “transcribing” Gesualdo became a
suspense-charged late-night diversion (R. Craft, G).
Beginning
in 1954 the Southern California Chamber Music
Society offered the city of Los Angeles its famous Monday Evening Concerts directed until 1971 by Lawrence Morton.[7]
Evolved from the Evenings on the Roof (1939-1954),
to which Stravinsky dedicated the Three
songs from William Shakespeare on the occasion of the sixteenth and final
series, the new Monday concerts re-proposed the well-worn formula of the
cross-section programs: contemporary music (with numerous premières), standard
repertoire (Bach cantatas above all) and ‘pre-classic’ literature (even better
if unknown).[8]
At least in the program of the first three seasons, the pioneering performances
of the Gesualdo Madrigalists by
Robert Craft[9]
(then transformed into a recording project,[10]
parallel initially to that of the complete works of Anton Webern[11])
figures, along with Machaut, Crecquillon, Obrect, Josquin, Tallis, Monteverdi,
and others.
September 20, 1954: Dylan Thomas Memorial
Program (authors and titles as in the concert program).
Andrea Gabrieli, Ricercare del
12° tono; Henry Purcell, Funeral Music
for Queen Mary (March, Anthem, Canzona); Adrian
Willaert, Ricercar for Instruments; Heinrich Schütz, Symphonia Sacra:
“Fili mi, Absalon”; Carlo Gesualdo, Six Madrigals for five voices (Moro
lasso, Itene o miei sospiri, Io tacero, Invan dunque o crudele,
Luci serene e chiare, Dolcissima mia vita); A word about Dylan
Thomas (1914-1953) [by] Aldous Huxley; Three Poems by Dylan Thomas, recorded by
himself (Poem in October, In My Craft or Sullen Art, Do not go
gentle into that good night); Igor Stravinsky, In Memoriam Dylan Thomas (Dirge-Canon
and Song, “Do not go gentle into that good night”), first
performance; Johann Sebastian Bach, Cantata no.106: “Gottes Zeit ist die allerbeste Zeit”.
October 17, 1955[12]
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Piano Trio in C major,
K 549; Carlo Gesualdo, Five Madrigals (Dolcissima mia vita, O
dolorosa gioia, Tu m’uccidi o crudele, Ecco moriro dunque, Moro
lasso); Some comments on the Court of Ferrara and Gesualdo [by] Aldous
Huxley; Carlo Gesualdo, Five Madrigals (Ardita zanzaretta, Tu piangi, Ardo per te, Meraviglia
d’amore, Itene o miei sospiri); Renaissance Instrumental Music (Josquin Des Pres, Royal Fanfare ; Luzzasco
Luzzaschi, Canzona ; Heinrich Isaac, Canonic song; Henry Purcell,
Funeral Music for the Queen Mary; Andra Gabrieli, Ricercar).
February 4,1957
Compere, Missa Alles Regrets ; Stockhausen, Music
for 5 Wind Instruments ; Verg, Canon on a Schoenberg Tone Row ;
Gagliano, Madrigals for 5 voices ; Gesualdo, Responses for 6 voices,
Bach, Cantata No 152:“Tritt auf die Glaubensbahn”.[13]
All
of the madrigals in the pageant in memory of Dylan Thomas (none of which were
repeated the following year) were published in a widely circulated edition by
Wilhelm Weismann (8 Madrigale für fünfstimmigen Chor, Leipzig, Peters,
1931), later the editor of the first six volumes of the Sämtliche Werke.[14]
For the second festival Craft and Morton prepared a transcription of books
four, five and six following the example of the Partitura delli sei libri
de’ madrigali a cinque voci (Genova, Pavoni, 1613) preserved at the Library
of Congress in Washington.[15]
Ruth Adams, a musician and student at the University of California -
photographed with Stravinsky in the control room of the Radio Recorders of Los
Angeles during a recording of the madrigal ensemble in May of 1955[16]
- was working on the Responsoria.
Some vague information on performance
practice is found in the preface to Glen Watkins’ Gesualdo where he took or molded the opinions of the gran notabili in clarification of the
adopted criteria, and thus in support of the validity of the result. The
madrigals were performed a cappella
and without embellishments, not with full but sotto voce, and with dynamic gradation searching for such perfect
intonation as would justify the bold dissonance - as Zarlino, Cerone, Mazzocchi
and Padre Martini (I, viii-ix) would
have reported, prescribed or deduced.
Even in the terminological confusion an ideal of clarity is expressed
here which few among the most talented singers throughout Los Angeles could
possibly pursue. Marilyn Horne - the diva to whom Stravinsky would later
dedicate his Two Sacred Songs of Hugo
Wolf (1968), and invited by Paul Hindemith to sing the most noted madrigal
of the Prince, at the Festival of Vienna with Christa Ludwig, Walter Berry and
others - wrote to Morton on February 24 of 1957: «Can’t you just hear all our vibrati swinging against each other when we
should be singing a heavenly well-tuned Gesualdo chord.»[17]
1952-1962
Stravinsky was excited about the
“Prince of Venosa” at least from 1952 (A),
one year earlier than the Gesualdo
Madrigalists began rehearsing in his residence in Hollywood.[18] The idea of recomposing some madrigals must
have occurred at the latest in 1954 (H,
104) on the evidently too restricted scale of the Peters’ 8 Madrigali. It was then
taken up again in 1959 when the Sämtliche Madrigale für fünf Stimmen (SW
I-VI) had been in circulation for two years, although the transcriptions of
the last three books of Morton and Craft’s work had already been in circulation
for four. In the meantime the composer and assistant entered into possession of
a considerable part, if not all, of the sacred opus of Gesualdo.(A) Fourteen of the nineteen Sacrae
cantiones for five voices (Naples,
Costantino Vitale, 1603) were found in a modern edition in the first volume of L’Oratorio
dei Filippini e la Scuola musicale di Napoli edited by Guido Pannain.[19]
In 1959 the photocopies arrived of the remaining five motets from Italy and of
the Responsoria et alia (Gesualdo, Gian Giacomo Carlino, 1611), and, in
the fall of the next year, of the Sacrae cantiones for 6 and 7 voices (Naples,
Costantino Vitali, 1603).[20]
(A) As Pannain had warned, the Filippini
copy of the Vitali printing was missing the books for the sextus and bass parts which were irretrievably lost.
For the occasion of the concert at
the Saint Mark’s Basilica in Venice on September 13,1956 which was the premiere
of Canticum sacrum, Stravinsky thought of including the Illumina nos in six voices completed ex novo.[21]
Alessandro Piovesan, director of the
Festival Internazionale di Musica Contemporanea of the Biennale,[22]
was however, not
persuaded by the proposal. The work on the «Sacra Cantione» then
became delayed but not the visit to the «unpicturesquely squalid» town
of Gesualdo. (A)[23]
In June of the following year, the month of the inauguration of the Gesualdo
complete works, Boosey & Hawkes printed the Illumina nos (“the missing parts composed by Stravinsky” who had
completed them in Hollywood on May the 5th) with an invaluable introduction by
Craft.[24]
Preparing the ninth volume of the complete works the young and adventurous
musicologist Glenn Watkins noted in the compilation two single pieces: the
canonic motets Da pacem Domine and Assumpta est Maria.[25]
This must have been in the spring of 1959. The discovery (or, rather, the
confirmation) of Gesualdo’s attempt at the standard par excellence of
speculative music - i.e. the canon - was destined to erase any suspicions of
contrapuntal inexperience: the frontispiece of the seventeenth-century
printing, which Pannain had already edited in semi-diplomatic transcription, also
contained a significant clin d’oeil
(«singulari artificio compositae, summa aurium animorumque oblectatione
concinuntur»).[26]
Watkins wrote to Craft[27]
and the first response was a letter of congratulations which, without doubt,
met his expectations; having deduced the second part according to the
prescription, it remained to invent the bass.[28]
That Stravinsky could have burdened himself with this remained likely but not
certain for the next two months. Three weeks had not passed from sending the
transparencies with the transcribed parts and the resolved canons,[29]
to the 27th or 28th of September when in Venice, the two motets were completed.[30]
Shortly thereafter Stravinsky undertook the final pilgrimage to the sites
of the Prince’s dynasty, to the D’Este Library of Modena and to Ferrara (the
cities in which Gesualdo stayed between 1594 and 1597), then to Naples where he
conducted a concert at the Teatro San Carlo before returning to Venice. In that
autumn he ordered volumes IV, V and VI of the Weismann edition which were
delivered to him in November.[31]
Looking over to the two last of them again on February of 1960, the project of
the re-elaboration of the madrigals finally took form (H,104). By the 20th, writing to Mario Labroca,[32]
Stravinsky spoke of the Monumentum as
if it were complete and proposed its absolute premiere for the Biennale’s
Festival of the following autumn.[33]
The homage to Gesualdo was performed the 27th of September 1960 (four years
after the misunderstanding about the Neapolitan with the late Piovesan)
together with the Symphony of Psalms
as well as the Opus 6 of Anton Webern and Alban Berg which Craft conducted in
the first part of the concert. Two
months later George Balanchine presented a choreography of them at the New York
City Ballet.[34]
For the occasion of the four hundredth
anniversary of the birth of Gesualdo (1560)[35]
the Monumentum pro Gesualdo di Venosa ad CD annum. Three madrigals
recomposed for instruments and the
set of the Tres sacrae cantiones. Completed by Igor Stravinsky[36]
were finally published by Boosey and Hawkes with a new preface by Craft.[37]
Stravinsky himself asked the London publisher to lay out the titles in new modern
printing in the same «luxury of engraved frontispieces and decorative frames»
which Gesualdo demanded from Vitale and Carlino to emulate «the splendor of the
ducal printer [of Ferrara]» (Figures 1-3).[38]
From the “Musician and Murderer” to the “Man and his
Music”.
The coincidence of the
Stravinsky-Gesualdo encounter, the programs of the Monday Evening Concerts, the Gesualdo records directed by Craft,
and the Sämtliche Werke has finally been cleared up: the works ‘d‘après
Gesualdo’ evidently originated at the heart of a manifold development. When Stravinsky
began the Monumentum, not only were
there two complete editions of the madrigals, but in particular the genre
counted a number of studies, some of indisputably authoritative quality. Without
doubt the most advanced of these until the ‘60s was the chapter on Gesualdo in The
Italian Madrigal by Alfred
Einstein (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1949, 3 vol.) and the
dissertation of George Ruffin Marshall, a pupil of Gustave Reese, entitled The
Harmonic Laws in the Madrigals of Carlo Gesualdo (New York University,
December 1955). Einstein’s monumental study was the source of many shared
beliefs about text setting, form and mannerism in the music of Gesualdo,
although Craft only explicitly cited one of its secondary comments on sacred
works.(A) Marshall’s thesis, listed in the bibliography
of the Encyclopédie Fasquelle’ entry
(C), pointed to the madrigal’s neglected counterpoint.
Figure 1: Frontispiece of the Printing of
the Sacrarum cantionum liber primus for six and seven voices
(Naples, Costantino Vitale, 1603)
Figure 2: Frontispiece of the Tres
sacrae cantiones (London, Boosey & Hawkes, 1960).
Figura 3: Frontispiece of the Monumentum
pro Gesualdo di Venosa (London, Boosey & Hawkes, 1960)
The research on the sacred output did not in fact make any progress
beyond the fifth volume of the Istituzioni e Monumenti dell’Arte Musicale
Italiana (see above). Since
Pannain certainly would have abstained
from transcribing an incomplete text and, in any case, turned to the subject
twenty years later, it was Stravinsky and his entourage who were the first to
lay hands on the Responsoria and the Sacrarum cantionum liber primus for six and seven voices.[39]
With the publication of the Illumina nos by Boosey & Hawkes (1957)
and the commission for the second of three volumes directed by François
Michel the opportunity presented itself to reveal the state of the art. In his
essentially biographical article for the Fasquelle
(C), Craft devoted a quite original
paragraph to the Responsoria. He was
not the first to write on the complete collection, seeing that Ruth Adams’s
thesis, The Responsoria of Carlo Gesualdo (University of California, Los
Angeles, 1957), dated from two years earlier; yet he would certainly have
reached a much broader public. After presenting some clues on the sources and
their delayed examination, the introduction to the seven-voice motet (A)[40]
dwelled on the circumstances which saw Stravinsky as a protagonist in the
exhumation of the Illumina nos (if
not simply of all the six- and seven-voice motets) and led to the Columbia
recording.[41] Needless to say that the role of Morton and
the catalysm of Craft himself were all obscured to the complete advantage of
the Maestro. In the ensuing writings the more anecdotal contents were dismissed
and the memorial value exalted (that is the homage of the great contemporary
figure to one of the great historic composers), while no echo remained of the
spirit of discovery and the atmosphere of renaissance.
(B and D)
Further to the editions by Pannain and Weismann,
Einstein and Marshall’s studies, and the consultation with Ruth Adams, Craft
and Stravinsky collected what was for the time, a relatively exhaustive corpus
of Gesualdian literature from Cecil Gray and Philippe Heseltine’s ambiguous
monograph Carlo Gesualdo: Prince of Venosa, Musician and Murderer (London,
Paul Kegan Trench Trubner, 1926[42])
to Francesco Vatielli’s booklet Il principe di Venosa e Leonora d’Este (Milano, F.lli
Bocca, 1941).[43] On the first of December 1955 Stravinsky
ordered a copy of the doctoral thesis of the Riemannian Ferdinand Keiner, Die
Madrigale Gesualdos von Venosa (Leipzig, Breitkopf & Härtel, 1914),[44] which was an essential reading for various generations
of scholars, with an impressive number of (rather questionable)
transcriptions. Books and specific
articles went side by side with numerous other musicological studies such as the famous Secret Chromatic Art in the Netherlands Motet
(New York, Columbia University Press, 1946)[45]
and Tonality and Atonality in Sixteenth-Century Music (Berkeley-Los
Angeles, University of California Press, 1961),[46]
both among the works of Edward Elias Lowinsky, one highly annotated by Craft,
the other prefaced by Stravinsky.
This sector of Stravinsky’s library appeared to be
always updated from constantly renewed attention or by generous recognition
from other scholars in sending complementary copies of their work. From the imposing article which Weismann
published at the conclusion of his editorial work, through to the influential Gesualdo
ovvero assassinio a cinque voci: storia tragica italiana del secolo XVI di
Alberto Consiglio (Napoli, Berisio, 1967), it reaches the monograph Gesualdo. The Man and His Music (London,
Oxford University Press, 1973). Stravinsky not only wrote the preface of
Watkins’ book, dated Hollywood, March 7, 1968, but had followed its genesis
from afar.[47]
It is worth noting that,
Aldous Huxley, Stravinsky’s «walking encyclopedia» in the American period/years
before 1963, and also himself an enthusiastic Gesualdian of the moment, was one
of the protagonists of the events of the 16th and 17th of October of 1955 and
translated the texts of the madrigals for the concerts and the records as well
as some paragraphs from Vatielli’s volume.[48] Charged with the reconstruction of the
contexts and the psychological profile of the musician, the writer delved into a
fairly extensive article in 1956 (“Gesualdo:
Variations on a Musical Theme”),[49]
a series of data and comments which he had already presented in the public
conferences and in some letters.[50]
Scholarship apart, the writing is strongly indebted to Gray-Heseltine, Vatielli
and Einstein. Moreover
it confirms the old prejudices on the art of a troubled man and contains
quite a grotesque and contemporizing preamble which
almost makes one long for the genuine meschalinic associations between Gesualdo
and late Schoenberg found in The Doors of Perception (1954).
«Composing Instrumental Translations»
In the list of Stravinsky’s works from
the new edition of the Grove, Monumentum appears with Pulcinella and the Greeting Prelude to Happy Birthday among the orchestral works
(along with the Concerto, Movements etc.) instead of the
‘arrangements’ such as the Choral-Variationen über das Weihnachtslied ‘Vom
Himmel hoch da komm’ ich her’, the Tres sacrae cantiones, the Two
Sacred Songs of the Spanisches Liederbuch of Hugo Wolf and the last unpublished Four Preludes and Fugues of
the Wohltemperiertes Clavier.[51] The catalographic distinction between the
three madrigals «recomposed for
instruments» and, for example, the Bachian Bearbeitung von Einige canonische
Veränderungen depends upon internal criteria.[52]
The level of elaboration of the original is in no way inferior In the latter
but the many readings of Weismann’s diplomatic transcription (the score, the
common time signature “C”, and the note values are those of the Molinaro
printing), which Stravinsky modernized in a coherent way, are re-barred,
re-metered, compressed, and cut or developed with new inserts.
Nevertheless, the
transcription for instruments is a salient aspect of the Monumentum and imposed certain criteria in the selection of the
originals from the last three books of madrigals. Since Stravinsky wanted to
work with a potentially “transliterative” model which would not require the
least modification whatever to render stylistically instrumental what was not
so, there was an absence of any type of specifically vocal rhythmic profile
(successions of sixteenths or combinations with rapid values) to limit the
number of suitable madrigals. The various combinations of the ensemble resources
were employed to individuate the parts of the form and the alternation of types
of writing. Except for certain
exceptions, the results, if still not the intentions, are plain to see, and not
at all unusual. Operating instead on lower formal levels, the orchestration
often brings the texture and voice leading into a new layering.
The transcription for winds and strings of
the madrigals omits the text, the basis and assurance of the formal logic, that
is, the
correlation between the poetic and
musical structure.[53]
A historical justification arose a
posteriori in Otto Kinkeldey, probably via Watkins:
I mentioned this quote from Kinkeldey to Mr. Stravinsky and promised to
send him a copy. The idea that contrasting fast-polyphonic, slow-homophonic
style implies instruments is perhaps a bit naive, but the quote from Doni, as
well as K[inkeldey]’s additional comments elicits interest – particularly to
the Gabrielian sound, which all of us must have been struck with in
Stravinsky’s Monumentum.[54]
In spite of
this, and in the light of the conviction of Gesualdo’s poetic selections and
techniques of text setting, Stravinsky would not have missed noticing the specific
articulation and exegesis in the music of the text provided in the originals.
The correspondence of poetry and music was summarily assumed in the ‘fifties,
as is proven in numerous inventories of musical-poetical oxymorons and
antitheses (which - even before distinguishing phases of Gesualdo’s madrigal
output, and if facile equations were not drawn between the constant sound
pictures and the joy or pain of the musicians -
contained a germ of awkwardly expressed truth). [55]
Stravinsky and Craft considered these parallels «conventional insipidities» (I,vi)
in the same way as Huxley, who in the 1956 article had detailed the reasons for
his own opinion. Taking out certain findings from previous musicology to add
others, similar points of incorrect but penetrating criticism - as some
sympathetic readers maintained - could have been written thirty years earlier.
The inspiring source was the second part of the 1926 monograph on Carlo
Gesualdo which was more ambiguously moderate than the first part in its neuro-psychiatric
account. Its author, Philippe Heseltine, was no less than the noted composer
under the pseudonym of Peter Warlock, a friend whom Huxley portrayed in the
youthful Antic Hay.[56]
The conciliatory digressions on the poetics of alienation, the consensual
catch-all of formalists and postmodernists, could, this time, be based on first
hand intuition and produced through the effort of listening for echoes of the Monday Evening Concerts repertoire among
the sonorities of Monumentum.[57]
The openings of the three movements are especially exemplary. In the first,
the distinction of the two homogeneous instrumental groups (the winds f against the strings p) covers the heptameter Asciugate i begli occhi [Dry your beautiful eyes] and its partial repetition
differently. Following the same principle Stravinsky crudely splits the second verse (Deh,
cor mio, non pian-/gete [come,
dear heart, weep not]) and its
repetition, which are orchestrated symmetrically, except for dynamics
and expression. The incipit of Ma tu, cagion di quella atroce pena [But you, the cause of that atrocious pain],
instead reunites some of the centrifugal motions (such as the redistribution of
the vocal lines in distinct octave registers, sometimes obsessively alternated)
which are clearly responsible for the departure from the model. The original
voice leading is placed below a typically Stravinskian diffraction in the same
instruments or in diverse timbres.[58]
It is therefore of little importance to know if Stravinsky saw in Ma tu,
cagion the application of a
specific type of harmonic progression.[59]
In fact, the re-composition tampers with the texture of the chords, i.e. the
movement of the major sixth to the octave (Ma tu, cagion)
and tenth to the octave (tu, cagion)
in oboe parts I and II and bassoon I, obtaining in the later an unlikely
Gesualdian line (see Example 1, mm. 1-2).
Finally in the transcription of the first four measures of the third
madrigal, Beltà, poi che t’assenti (see Example 2), the timbral contrast of the two homogeneous and
separated instrumental groups, as in Asciugate i begli occhi, seems to
especially illustrate the manner of reading of Gesualdo’s work circulated
throughout the ‘70s. In this way the last movement is properly selected as a
clear example of an age-old misunderstanding.[60]
Certainly the composer could not imagine that the original intonation of the
heptameter would imply the sequence g-E
Example 1: Monumentum; II, beginning, (Ma tu,
cagion)
Monumentum pro Gesualdo di Venosa ad CD Annum – Igor Stravinsky © 1960 by Hawkes & Son (London) Ltd. US copyright renewed Reproduced by
permission of Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd.
Example 2: Monumentum, III,
beginning, (Beltà, poi
che t’assenti)
Monumentum pro Gesualdo di Venosa ad CD Annum – Igor Stravinsky © 1960 by Hawkes & Son (London) Ltd. US copyright renewed Reproduced by
permission of Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd.
Asciugate i begli occhi [Dry your beautiful
eyes]
As early as the last issue
of 1960 of Boosey & Hawkes’ Tempo,
its future director, Colin Mason, noted that the first madrigal was the most
markedly recomposed of the three.[64] The second was translated ‘solely’ for the woodwinds
and the brass without strings and with the addition of an echo effect at
measures 23-25, this was a pseudo-Gabriellian gesture evoking instrumental
canzonas and their «sonorités rutilantes» [sparkling sonorities].[65] Not even the last movement of the Monumentum is close in number and range
of modifications to the first, although the surface appears noticeably changed.[66]
Octave transpositions,
exchanges of parts, harmonic doublings, occasional completions of the implied harmony,
and one or two inserted passing-notes, but the substance of the two pieces
remains essentially as it was […] (the beginning of the second madrigal and
Stravinsky’s version of it) illustrate his method of re-spacing the harmony
without introducing anything new.[67]
Mason however was not going on
intuition: he wrote before the publication of the Developments but after the world premiere of Monumentum. If he had not benefited from first hand indications, he
certainly read the concert program of the world premiere where the writing
which was included two years later in
Developments (H) appeared for the first time.
Se lontano da voi gir mi vedete [Though I go far away]
The re-elaboration of
segments a (SW mm. 10-12), b (mm.13-15), and c (mm.
16-17), now rebarred by Stravinsky in 4/2 (mm. 12-131, 142-15 and 18) analyzes the rhythmic and melodic
contour, in particular the head of the alto and bass entries and of the other
voices, the one in response to the other (see Example 3). On this basis Stravinsky grafts into the
original texture a chain of imitations and canons.[68]
The strings anticipate with some variation (mm. 11 and 132-14) the complete presentation of a and b in the woodwinds (a fragment from motive a occurs later, forming a rhythmic mirror with what follows). A
two-beat diversion on c sounds next
in the horns (mm. 16-17).
Finally a varied repetition of the three segments closes the episode (mm. 19-22). This sample of Gesualdo’s «mastery of phrase-building» (H, 105) could undoubtedly have figured
among the examples in the fifth chapter of Marshall’s thesis “The Construction of Single Melodic Lines and
Their Contrapuntal Use,” where it would have proved «his unusually high degree of technical skill
in the traditional medium.»[69] Conscious of Gesualdo’s command of canonic
writing, Stravinsky supplied the appropriate reflections of this; that the
so-called experimentalism was based on conservatism was by now clarified and
added to other certainties.[70]
Example 3: Se lontano da voi gir mi vedete, mm. 10--22 of Monumentum
Monumentum pro Gesualdo di Venosa ad CD Annum – Igor Stravinsky © 1960 by Hawkes & Son (London) Ltd. US copyright renewed Reproduced by
permission of Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd (London) Ltd.
Ahi, che pianger debb’io, misero
e solo [Alas, ‘tis I must weep,
wretched and alone]
The
first part of the endecasyllabic and the reiteration transposed down a fifth
appeared in Stravinsky in the form of a sequence of two phrases of three
measures, as already in Deh, cor
mio, non piangete (two measures plus one). This time however, he did
not limit himself (as later in agreement with mm. 25-30) to avoiding literal
repetition, but rather he condenses the materials modifying each duration and
pitch and ultimately varying the meter, so that the original could be reduced
to a phrase of three units (4/2, 3/2, and 3/2) and one of two (4/2 and 3/2).[71]
Mason was explicit on Stravinsky’s reasons and goals (see Example 4):
Gesualdo’s startling Neapolitan
cadence in bars 19 - 20 […] is attractive the first time, but the sequential
repetition of it a fifth lower in bars 21 - 22 is lame. Stravinsky therefore
avoids a strict sequence by condensing the cadence the second time, and
deliberately robs the second Neapolitan chord of its already stale ‘surprise’
by preparing for it in the harmony […] The effect is markedly stronger and
smoother than in the original. Stravinsky’s leap from the cadential B major
chord to a D minor chord […] instead of Gesualdo’s G minor […], and his
thorough re-harmonization of this bar and the next, are similarly motivated by
the repetitiveness of Gesualdo’s harmonic progression. The expressive force of
Gesualdo’s descending melodic lines is weakened by the persistence of the chord
of G minor and the absence of all accented dissonances except against the
suspended D in bar 23. Stravinsky therefore drives out the chord of G minor
except on the last half-beat of his own bar 29 (where he takes care to have an
A suspended through it), and introduces a series of accented dissonances,
preserving only the general descending motion of Gesualdo’s progression and the
harmonic basis of the cadence. […] In dispelling the harmonic monotony of the
original Stravinsky has done more here than was necessary, and given us a
ravishing passage of almost pure Stravinsky.[72]
Also in this circumstance
neither the vocabulary nor the category are surprising since Keiner
(undoubtedly blinded by a highly personal application of the Funktionstheorie)
was not alone in taking into account similar cases to draw conclusions on
matters of the history of harmony.
Example 4: Ahi, che pianger debb’io, misero e solo [mm.
19-35 of Monumentum]
Monumentum pro Gesualdo di Venosa ad CD Annum – Igor Stravinsky © 1960 by Hawkes & Son (London) Ltd. US copyright renewed Reproduced by
permission of Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd.
Vis-à-vis the so-called
‘chromatic clausula’ in the Flemish motet (intended as a transformation, for
example of e-d-c#-d into e
«Glimpse of the Whole»
The
restitution of the book of the motets in six voices presented the dilemmas and
the risks of integral restructuring. Watkins wrote that the edition of the «torso» in the Gesamtausgabe
would have permitted, first of all, envisioning the original complex but Stravinsky had to intervene three times on
such a “vision” to legitimize the modern publication of a text otherwise
unperformable in itself.[74]
Craft had vowed that a scholar would not be sufficient: in addition to
scholarship «Stravinsky’s daring and
composer’s imagination» were needed. (A) The excusatio non petita from an overly cautious editor (Watkins) and
the over-enthusiastic beliefs of the pioneer (Craft) point out the technical
and esthetic challenge posed by the empty staves.
The
Illumina nos affair is well documented. The motet belongs, like the
other two, to the first formal type isolated by Craft, created from
uninterrupted polyphonic writing as opposed to the ‘madrigalistic one’ of
alternating sections.(A) In the
formal articulation the composer picks the «very dramatic musical symbolization» of (mm. 35 to 74), «the Sevenfold Grace of the Paraclete»
in the translation of Ernst Křenek,[75]
a further rare exception to Einstein’s thesis on «eye music» in
the works of Gesualdo.[76]
The intervention complies with the thinning out of the polyphony, emphasizes
the two axial chords and immediately abandons the tonal center.[77]
Initially the motet turned out strangely except for its two nearly equal parts:
the «consistent and complex polyphony»,
and a «bass-ic» and quasi omnipresent bass seemed unprecedented (B, 32). Of course Craft and Stravinsky
did not yet know the Da pacem Domine and the Assumpta est Maria; but, the book of the Sacrae cantiones for five voices was well known.(D) Doubtless Pannain and Einstein
contributed to such misunderstandings: they had placed too much emphasis on the
persistence of the secular rather than sacred output - they digress more to
commentaries on the «want of style»
than to «Palestrina’s classic manner»
that is, more the episodic ‘collisions’ than the norm of the counterpoint and
the esthetic intent of their application (so much so that in 1957 Craft alluded
only to the motets O vos omnes and Ave dulcissima Maria). But
until then none of them had dealt, as Stravinsky’s assistant had, in false
quantifications:
[…] many of the motets employ a more simple chordal style, and with so many
parts so close in range one would expect a treatment of that sort: Gesualdo’s
music is never dense […] His madrigals
are almost all top heavy and even in the motets and responses the bass rests
more than any other part (B,
33).
The Illumina
nos, in short, would not reveal the “ultimate work” which Stravinsky and
Craft, knowing its position in the collection and the in seven-voice motets,
seem to have almost justifiably expected. With no concentration of homophony,
dissonance or chromaticism, its features were quite different. Taking the
reasons for their disillusion as anomalies, they convinced themselves that the
motet had a testamentary character.The belated acknowledgement of the real
identity of the motet however, allowed clarification of the misunderstanding
surrounding the writing and the style of the Sacrae cantiones as well as it prepared the ground for the
revelation of another type of Gesualdo’s excessus
mentis, that of the canonic writing. The accounts are confused on one
point. When the three Cantiones were
already completed Craft wrote: «What
he [Stravinsky] has done is to recompose the whole from the point of view of
his added parts.»(D)
Since this supplied apparent motivations for the experiment, the formula
decorated the first reviews and finally attained wide and enduring resonance in
the critical literature.[78]
Nevertheless some years later Stravinsky had to affirm the exact opposite so
that Craft must always have using the wrong terms (A): «One has to play the
piece [the Illumina nos] without
any additions to understand me, and ‘additions’ is not an exact description;
the existing material was only my starting point: from it I recomposed the
whole.» (B, 33) There is no
point in racking one’s brain over these complementary
perspectives, equally likely, and inadvertently opposed:
The result is Gesualdo-Stravinsky of course. Though Stravinsky’s
additions are all within Gesualdo’s style the listener who knows a great deal
of Gesualdo will guess that the work is not purely his. For one thing it is
probably more complicated than the original, which is to say that it probably
moves more rapidly harmonically and contains more musical ideas (A).
It would be difficult to expect a
conservative intervention, notably when one descends from the understanding of
the whole to the compositional details. The Conversation
(B) and the introduction to the
three Cantiones (D) offer some more useful indications on this subject. We do not
allude to the proliferation of slogans, nor do we raise – by conditioned reflex
– Craft’s umpteenth formula (it is not a matter of Gesualdo but of «fusion
of the two composers.»,D) to the
level of heuristic principle. What interests us here is the Stravinskian
intuition of the difference between the so-called “academic solutions” and his own and if, amid the restoration and the
divination, one can trace this
awareness in Stravinsky’s interventions. It was a shame for what Watkins
remembers having prepared to have completely disappeared; otherwise we would
have had the most ideal investigative conditions.[79]
This notwithstanding, it would be completely anachronistic to think that
Stravinsky had a ‘musicological’ version in front of his eyes when he wrote his
parts:
even
if the existing parts did not rule out academic solutions, a knowledge of Gesualdo’s
other music would. I have not tried to guess ‘what Gesualdo would have done’,
however - though I would like to see the original […] My parts are not attempts at
reconstruction. I am in it as well as Gesualdo. (B, 33) [80]
To fulfill the task of integration it was necessary to
confront two burning issues: the dissonance and, following the survey of
canonic fragments, the counterpoint.
Enigmas of a Pitch Composer
The opening of the restored Illumina nos offers a sample of those
interventions whose motivation persists primarily in the horizontal dimension.
The sextus responds to the imitation
at the octave and the unison set up in the bass, cantus and tenor, with a non-rigorous contrary motion, different
and partially mirrored in its rhythmic profile.
It then aligns harmonically with the bass to form and resolve the
tritone. On the syllables of “misericordiarum” the bass imitates
respectively in direct and contrary motion, the motive of the head and that of
the coda of the sestus, realizing an
almost palindromic succession of durations in correspondence with the modular
ones of the antecedent (mm. 5-9). Craft, initially convinced of the absolutely
exceptional nature of the inversions in Gesualdo’s works,
spoke of the deliberate departure from the outline.(A) Yet Marshall had presented some cases either from imitative
writing or contrary motion and the Ardita Zanzaretta had already figured in the second
program of the Singers of Ferrara.(G,130) The discovery of the two canonic
motets served to shift the common ground for the polyphonists who, as again in
the Fasquelle de la Musique (C, 256), lacked a taste for
contrapuntal «puzzles» (A), and in particular, to adjust certain beliefs
and hasty statements on the Gesualdo-Stravinsky compositional dialectic.(A)
Gesualdo, thus «could
have written everything that Stravinsky has added», the sighs of
measures 22 and 32 of the Assumpta est and
even the incipt of the Illumina nos.
«The point is he probably would not
have done so.»(D) This
is to say that even though the result is not stylistically uniform, the
deviations preserve a Gesualdian origin. Many other interventions reflect the
discovery of ingenious procedures or at least the will to apply them either
following or disregarding the author’s intention (as Stravinsky in the first
intonation of the in caelum of the Assumpta est Maria imitates the cadential structure of the cantus in augmented values). But in Tres sacrae cantiones the opportunity is presented to proceed not
just episodically by direct or contrary motion (as for instance in the Illumina nos: mm. 12-15, cantus-bassus; 42-43 and 72, sextus-cantus) and by motivic elaboration. Some
Stravinskian choices convey the intuition of a much broader strategy: in the Da pacem Domine,
for example, the non-retrogradable bass beneath nisi tu Deus noster could rise from the long Gesualdian palindrome
of the cantus. Ultimately Craft and
Stravinsky must have imagined the Gesualdo of the motets (which were printed a
few years after his last stay in Ferrara) as a composer inspired by the legacy
of Josquin and Brumel preserved at the Estense library or in the musical
tradition. Before Nino Pirrotta and Anthony Newcomb defined the environment and
the relations of the court, Stravinsky had noted in fact that Gesualdo, the
pseudo-Josquin Brumel, Willaert, Lasso, and Isaac had all employed the same
device in their polyphonic settings of the antiphon Da pacem Domine. This is the crucial proof later produced by
Marshall of the «skilled but
tradition-minded» musician. (H,106)
The fulfillment of Gesualdo in
contrapuntal thought and technique became the main challenge of the Cantiones. In principle there still
existed the fleeting question of the dissonance, second only to the
chromaticism, as the source of both collective and sympathetic swoon. It was
inevitable that the motets would be judged in relation to secular works and to
the Responsoria (A;B,33-34;C,256;D). First
of all, Craft and Stravinsky did not recognize in the Tres sacrae cantiones those general features passed from the
madrigals to the sacred works of Gesualdo which Pannain and Einstein had
already illustrated (i.e. the functional alternation of homophonic and
imitative writing and the particular use of pauses).(A and D) Compared to the
dramatic structure, the rhythmic figuration and florid lines of the Responsoria, the motets seem written in
the style of the first half of the sixteenth century.(A;C,256;D) The so-called rhythmic uniformity, which was at the time
considered a characteristic of all the Gesualdian output and as the favorable
domain for the expression of a harmonist, must have given an initial impression
of antiquity.(A and D;H,105;I,vii) Needless to say, similar
discernments disregard specific technical and stylistic choices.[81]
The quality of the dissonance of the Sacrae
cantiones would therefore be
intrinsic to the type of writing (A),
as well as will be seen, to the lower register and the diatonic genre (D): rarely rich, it is instead «harsher, more somber» and «belongs to an older harmonic spirit than
that of the madrigals».(A and
D) Although the terms are, in
themselves, clear (“harsh” was an overused adjective in this matter) something
further is understood in reading:
I have even chosen solutions that I am sure are
not Gesualdo’s. And though Gesualdo’s seconds and sevenths justify mine […] (B, 33).
By the
same reasoning I contend that the lost volume of six-voice madrigals contains
more complex, more ‘dissonant ’music than the five-voice volumes, and the one
reference we have to any of the madrigals in that book, to Sei disposto, bears me out; even his early six-part madrigal, Donna, se m’ancidete, has a great number of seconds besides those
which are editors’ errors (B, 33-34).
Concerning the harmony one finds
many more accented seconds and sevenths than in the “cantiones” known to us,
although I suspect that this is not true concerning those in 6 voices and, and
to judge according to the incomplete scores of some of them. (C, 256)
So, let us come back to «the Sevenfold Grace of the Paraclete».
The five voices of the septiformi[s]
and the tenor and the quintus above Paracliti
would leave little room for
imagination. Numerous comparisons suggest that Stravinsky understood the unison
or the leap of the octave in the same sense as a legato note in what is called
a “primary” dissonance. That which, if for some was not out of place (see the
extract of the Quare de vulva of Clemens non Papa in the Secret Chromatic Art and precisely the
treatment of the bass and the cantus above no
essem fugis)[82]
was nevertheless controversial for others. Here is a paragraph from the review
of Tonality and Atonality signed by
the same Ernst Křenek whom Lowinsky had already sincerely thanked back in
October of 1945 at the time of prefacing the Secret Chromatic Art.
As to
dissonance, Lowinsky pleads very eloquently for the indispensability of
dissonant approaches to essential cadence points in sixteenth-century music,
marshaling as witnesses the contemporary theorists Zarlino and Tigrini. The
typical device in these cases is the familiar suspension dissonance,
occasionally expanded to a chain of two or three links preceding the final
chord […] The fact that in some of the more “modern” specimens the dissonant
tone is not tied over from the preceding beat but enters as a repetition of the
previous tone (as in Ex. 3, Claudin de Sermisy’s chanson Tant que vivray)
does not seem to me particularly bold.[83]
We admit therefore the resolution
on the syllable septiformi via simultaneous motion in skips in
the sextus and the bassus (m. 36, see Example 5), a type of
synthesis of Examples 4 and 5b of Claude Palisca’s famous article on Vincenzo
Galile’s treatise.[84]
The voice-leading in septiformi and
paracliti remains nonetheless more
than licentious: the bassus, instead
of descending conjunctly (producing with the Septima pars a succession of third-third -octave, but parallel
fifths with the quintus) introduces
in the leap, a false relation and forms a major
seventh and an augmented fifth with the two upper voices. It is difficult to
accept such a situation as a case study in secondary dissonance.[85]
Example 5: Illumina nos mm. 34-41
Reproduced by permission of
Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd.
Stravinsky legitimized the
choices for the Illumina nos with
reference to the “other music” of Gesualdo. But in the intonation of the verse Se
amara è la mia vita of the Donna se m’ancidete - as in al dolore of the Gioite voi
col canto - which seemed to have touched Stravinsky so greatly, the
technical assumptions of the Gesualdian dissonance are very different. Whatever
the case may be, the Illumina nos
complies with a certain type of intervention and ultimately the Da pacem Domine and the Assumpta est Maria enrich the inventory.[86]
In the first Stravinsky only unconsciously anticipates what was rightly
ventured after due consideration of the others. Announcing therefore the conclusion
of the two canonic motets to Watkins, Craft adds: «The 2nd motet, too, becomes rather dissonant - more S. than Ges.»[87] The new preface to the collection of the
three Sacrae cantiones surpasses the
first (A) and the Conversation (B), takes up the arguments of the Fasquelle de la Musique (C)
and goes further: nothing less than philology was invoked (D) in order to justify the true and proper Stravinskizations (however excessively numerous), considered as
genuine clashes in the manner of the madrigals and responsoria.
«Padre Martini n’était que de Bologne» ([Padre
Martini was just from Bologna)
Those
generous commentators intending to assess the influence of the Sacrae cantiones and the Monumentum on the contemporary and later
works of Stravinsky would indeed practice their acrobatics in vain.[88]
They would otherwise take certain hardly unexpected scraps of technique for
projections of some onto others or, worse, for signs of a new compositional dialectic
(that of the Gesualdo-Stravinsky’s works) with its subsequent manifestations.[89] In times of canonical obsession a
counterpoint like that of the Da pacem
Domine drew, at most, an enthusiastic “tu
quoque”. These commentators
certainly did not find the type of support offered, for example, by the
analyses of Paul Hindemith’s Fünfstimmige Madrigale (1958)[90]
or by Weismann’s choral works. (Massimo Mila - writing in 1962! - saw in Anthem [the dove descending breaks the air] for chorus a cappella a
serial-sounding Gesualdo, and a more valid homage to the Prince than the Monumentum. [91])
Nor would they discover analogies such as the Epitaphium (1959) and the Funeral
Music for Queen Mary of Henry
Purcell,[92]
or effects of specific circumstances such as the insertion of the four
trombones of Heinrich Schütz’s Fili mi, Absalon in the Dirge-Canons of In Memoriam Dylan Thomas.[93]
Concerning the words which Stravinsky
had for Gesualdo we would not say that they were free from intentional bias or appropriative
impulse, but that, with rare exceptions, they were kept sober and out in the
open.[94]
Even the most propitious opportunity, the introductory text to Lowinsky’s Tonality and Atonality in Sixteenth-Century
Music, was not completely exploited as such: but instead, discretely, apart
from the famous closing accolades. The theses of the “Tonality in Dance Music”
chapter, in fact, were to evoke the utmost interest for Stravinsky and not
those of the central “Floating Tonality
and Atonality” which the composer saw as a propagation of previous
contributions. In the later, Lowinsky
seemed in fact to pursue the notion that literary text and the elevation of
chromaticism were connected. In “Tonality in Dance Music” he showed how repetition
and symmetry, optional in modal music, were «part and parcel of tonality». Thus, in two discrete parentheses
the composer mentioned the false relation of the tritone on falsus pater in Oedipus Rex and in «my own
use of tonality repetition in my ballet scores, versus my development, in Threni for example, of a kind of “triadic atonality.”»(F/H,107)
Not incorrectly Robert Wangermée stated that in rediscovered, or never
abandoned, antiquity no more «ideal plot for composition» was ever conceived
(the Epitaphium excepted).[95] In fact Craft thought of restoring Gesualdo’s output into musical practice
and later spent almost a year transcribing the Molinaro imprint (G, 54), reading a relatively vast
biography for the time, taping a record (C,
257) and frequenting Gesualdian country in Italy (A) - maintaining the importance of the study of the works in their
original setting (C, 256), and
convincing Stravinsky in the meantime to do likewise (as the dedication beneath
the autograph of the Monumentum recounts : «To Bob who have forced me to do it, and I
did it.»)[96]
Some Further Chronological Notes
The Illumina nos, whose first performance was hoped to be with that of
the Canticum, was completed a few
days after Agon; the other motets two
months after Movements (1958-59), and
the Monumentum during the gestation
of the A Sermon, A Narrative and a Prayer
(1960-61). The Gesualdo-Stravinsky pieces therefore occupied the intervals
between two compositions or two phases of the genesis of works belonging to the
so-called late period, eventually distinguished as «proto-serial» (1951-59) and
«last» (1959-1971).[97] In 1957 Craft recalled that «Stravinsky’s astonishment at the music of
Gesualdo has been continuous for at least five years.» (A), or since the year of the Cantata (1951-52). But then, wasn’t this
moment also a few months after the death of Arnold Schoenberg and coincidental
with the decisive «rencontre avec le
mort»?[98]
Sixteen years passed and the preface Gesualdo di Venosa: New Perspectives revealed such a special (and unpublished) interest
in Gesualdo’s historical influence as would be difficult to explain as a
satisfying diversion with the posthumous fortune of a disturbed madrigalist.(I)[99] (It was Huxley who
thought of collecting anecdotes on the uxoricidal artist, not Stravinsky).[100]
The controversy of opinions on Gesualdo extended to the mid-20th century and to
evaluate it in sure, precise terms the Maestro and Craft did not wait for
Watkins’ draft.
On the
whole, however, it seems to me that the most likely explanation for the change
in Gesualdo’s style is that he discovered Nicolo [sic] Vicentino’s
“archicembalo” in the famous instrument collection of the dukes of Ferrara and
that he made himself familiar with it. […] It would perhaps be too much to
expect the same understanding from Gesualdo in 1594. Yet many passages seem to
show it, and traces of an acquaintance with some chromatic-enharmonic
instrument are found in his late work on every hand. Did it lose by this? Did
it gain by this? I am inclined to think that it did both and to consider this
the solution of the “Gesualdo controversy.” He is an insufferable mannerist
when, with his predilection for the extreme, he uses his extreme style for the
sake of the style alone; he is a genuine artist when he finds ways of using it
with feeling, with significance, and with force. Posterity’s attitude toward
him will continue to change and will depend always upon the extent to which his
expression is held to be truthful and sincere; it is not surprising that he
should have fared worse in the time of John Christian Bach, in Burney’s History
of Music, than he fares today in the time of Stravinsky and Schoenberg. Perhaps
the pendulum will swing to the other side again before long.[101]
Common ground, witticisms or pure
prescience? Only the biography of Einstein could document this. (The paragraph
above explains why Stravinsky had searched so stubbornly for a
chromatic-enharmonic keyboard in the castle of the Prince.) The freedom, the
background, the sensibility and the ears necessary for seizing the miracles of
Gesualdo were among the contributions offered by contemporary composers to the
Twentieth Century Man. (C, 255) Even
the most authoritative studies legitimized it;[102]
Huxley’s The Doors of Perception and
the conclusions of the Tonality and
Atonality can be read to see how, sooner or later, the same convictions
became common knowledge.
When Gesualdo was no longer considered
as one or another’s precursor - like a «Wagner
gone wrong» - he could be found fossilized in a constellation or in a
teleological trajectory, one could be inscribed in the other. The constellation was expressionism,
understood as a trans-epochal category, of which the 15th- and 16th-century
madrigalists were considered historical precedents. Both Einstein and Lowinsky
adopted a metaphorical extension of expressionism which was historically not so
far from their own (this is not surprising if we imagine how many continue
today to distribute certificates of structuralism.)[103]
Einstein defined Gesualdo as a “pure expressionist” and provided the reason «in a nutshell», as he evidently loved
to say. Lowinsky (who had dedicated his Tonality
and Atonality to the memory of the German-American musicologist) reunites
Cipriano, Caimo, Orso, Marenzio, and the Prince of Venosa, in a “chromatic
expressionist” movement. Both suggested the widespread parallel to Tristan and Isolde, though
distinguishing themselves from the vulgata.[104]
In the “Schoenbergian teleology,”[105]
on the other hand, the radical madrigalists are to the Wagner and the Second
Viennese School as the crisis of the diatonic system was to the crisis of
tonality. Or this is at least the official version that others gave to show
that such modernities had already existed many times over. We omit certain
hitherto over-attended «appeals as
ingenious as they are naive».[106]
Those who look for strong transcendent visions should
read the part of Ernst Křenek’s Music
Here and Now entitled “Western Concept of Music” and notably the passages
on Gesualdo and Cipriano of the “First Inroad of Chromaticism” chapter.[107]
The knowledge and the biases in the subtle argument all through the
‘40s, and those evidently personal to Křenek
(who, contrary to logical expectation, encountered the work of Gesualdo through
Craft), adapted wonderfully to the ideology.[108]
Stravinsky deigned both positions with
an eloquent silence, or almost. Could we conclude that, enamored of the music
of Gesualdo, and engaged in dodecaphonic technique and serial processes, the
composer studied it in a pure historic sense?
Not at all, in fact, since the instances in which Stravinsky distanced
himself here from certain ideas seemed ever so opportune and their comments so
subtly revealing. In the introduction to Tonality
and Atonality, which is something more than a «garland of quotations from
Lowinsky’s text, accompanied by the approval of the composer»[109], Stravinsky comes to outline a criticism developed two years later by
Křenek.[110]
For those places in the discussion which defined the cultural and geographic,
if not national, characters of Renaissance music, Stravinsky showed a genuine
contentment: «He demonstrates that the
Flemings were inclined to stick to counterpoint and modality whereas ‘the
creative impetus for the new harmonic language and for modern tonality came
from Italy…’.» (F/H,
108) On the contrary, those passages which placed the same understanding
in a diachronic perspective, as well as the most genuinely famous ones in which
the name of Stravinsky was directly involved, seem
like a compromising concession to a familiar philosophy of history: «Professor Lowinsky betrays Hegelian
tendencies in asserting that ‘modality stands for an essentially stable,
tonality for an essentially dynamic, view of the world.’ (Does Schoenbergian
‘atonality,’ or ‘non-tonality,’ since ‘atonality’ doesn’t make any sense to me,
represent the point of view of the flux?)» (F and H,108) It is
difficult to say if the response was already in
Lowinsky’s preface or its contents were not in reaction to the slight from the
composer.
Stravinsky seems to prefer by far the
result of the comparative study of the Spanish vilancico and the Italian frottola to the speculative logic of
“predecessors” and “successors,” constructed obviously by others. When,
some months later, Craft must have questioned him on the relationship of pathos
and chromaticism, the composer did not fail to recall: «I prefer to use chromatic in a
limited sense, and in relation to diatonic. But we have acquired the habit of
looking for our (post-Wagnerian)
chromaticism in old music, with the result that contexts are grossly distorted.» (E,116) This “limited sense” could involve
the distinction between musica
comuna (diatonic, for common places and popular ears), and musica reservata (chromatic-enharmonic,
for the private pleasure of nobles and pure ears), reprised by Lowinsky from
Knud Jeppesen,[111] as well as that between their respective attitudes to
pitch and intervallic organization. A scholarly query ensued which all
but exposes the fundamental misconception at the origin of certain evolutive
systems («our whole approach to
sixteenth-century music is apt to be slanted towards a chromaticism that
was really no more than a tiny development.» E,116) It was no longer a matter therefore, of
accusing as André Schaeffner did insightfully at one time: «Since Leibowitz elaborates little on chromaticism,
should he not have pursued examples of quite singular chromatic coloration in
the Italians? But no matter to what subject he is drawn, Leibowitz immediately
assures himself of a German denomination.»[112]
Since continuing in this way would indeed be pursued in error (even if on that
occasion Leibowitz’s response was completely inadequate), it should be noted
that the polemic in itself was rather biased.
A sign of the times, it confronted the unilateralism of Leibowitiz’s
vision rather than criticize its fundamentals. The conflict staged between the
two differently oriented esthetics ultimately and involuntarily touched on a
nerve if not on a prejudicial element of that system, so that in the reply, it
was vociferously confused as an invitation to the game of balance and counter
balance. In contrast to the living tradition which Bach and Fux bore through to
Schoenberg, Schaeffner’s pre-history would have sounded like a provocation from
an ethnomusicologist returning from Africa.
Excluded from many in spite of the
spirit of the time, Gesualdo revived in performance
was more relevant than ever - especially after 1952, when some had the
impression that he had arrived opportunistically late. All of his opus seemed
to consist in the briefest samples, of a few minutes:
like most music of that
time. The scope, by Wagnerian standards, is small, but it is a measure that we
today are able to feel, or at least adjust to, perhaps for the first time since
the cinquecento.
Five minutes of densely packed contrapuntal and harmonic movement, with no
repetition beyond an occasional sequence, and no backward loops in the form:
this is a musical dimension common again to the mid-twentieth century (G,130).
Is it important, then, if his
chromaticism propagated an older order or constructed a new one? The usual paragon with Caravaggio taught that
both champions of mannerism and the baroque, the painter and the Prince were
associated with an afflicted posthumous existence and a later rehabilitation.
Nevertheless a European portrait was born from the original and its crowd of
imitators - «Gesualdo is an end, his
music dies with him.» (C,
256). Gesualdo is dead, Gesualdo remains.[113]
Translation/revision:
Claudia Vincis, Paolo Dal Molin and John MacKay
[1] Note from the original publication Mo(nu)mento
di Carlo Gesualdo in Acta Musicologica LXXVI (2004) pp. 221-252: The present work
elaborates a chapter of Claudia Vincis. “Una
rara forma di cleptomania”. Le riletture stravinskiane di due modelli del
passato: Bach e Gesualdo [“A rare form of cleptomania. The Stravinskian
re-readings of two models of the past: Bach and Gesualdo] (graduate thesis, Università
di Pavia, 1999, supervision by Gianmario Borio). The first five sections, up to
Asciugate i begli occhi, were edited
by Claudia Vincis, the following sections by Paolo Dal Molin.
[2] By Wilhelm Weismann and Glenn
Elson Watkins, Hamburg, Ugrino, Verlag, 1957; Hamburg -Leipzig, Ugrino Verlag -
Deutcher Verlag für Musik, 1962, 1967, 10 vol..
[3] Glenn Watkins, Gesualdo. The Man and his Music.
[4] On the situation in Gesualdo studies in the middle of the last century
and for an almost complete list of editions prior to SW see Gustav Reese, Music in
the Renaissance, New York, W. W. Norton & Co., pp. 430 - 33, 486 - 487
and the related bibliography.
[5] Files entitled Tres sacrae cantiones [I, II, III] (Microfilm 122,000/0889-0943)
and Momentum pro Gesualdo ad CD annum (Microfilm
122,000/0846-0872) and various correspondence. Call numbers are referred for
those letters which had not been published in Igor Stravinsky, Selected Correspondence, 3 vol., edited
with commentaries by Robert Craft, London, Faber & Faber, 1982 (I), 1984
(II), 1985 (III), or elsewhere. We thank Ulrich Mosch and Stephen Walsh for
their generous and invaluable consultation.
[6] Eric Walter White, Stravinsky, The Composer and his Work, London, Faber and Faber, 21979.
Roman Vlad, Stravinsky,
[7] Lawrence
Morton (1904-1987) was also three times the director of the Ojai Festivals
(1954-1959,1967-1970 and 1982-1984). Stravinsky dedicated the Eight Instrumental Miniatures (1921-1962)
to him.
[8] See Dorothy Lamb Crawford, Evenings on and off the Roof. Pioneering Concerts in Los Angeles, 1939-1971, Berkeley-Los
Angeles, University of California Press, 1995.
[9] Also known as The Singers of Ferrara or Gesualdo
Singers: Marylin Horne ([mezzo- soprano), Grace-Lynne Martin (soprano),
Cora Lauridsen (contralto), Richard Robinson (tenor) and Charles Scharbach
(bass) to whom were added - for the passages with more than five voices, for
the recording or for substitution - Florine Hemmings (contralto), Paul
Salamunovich (tenor), Richard Levitt (countertenor) and Howard Chitjian
(baritone).
[10] The list which follows has been compiled in
accordance with catalogues of major American university libraries. The dates of the contracts and the recordings, with
the exception of those of the first record, are taken from PSS, Correspondence
and documents Igor Stravinsky - Columbia Records. The translations of the
madrigals of discs (a)-(d) are likely by Aldous Huxley, those from the Latin,
by Ernst Křenek.
a)
Madrigals,
Sunset
LP 600 (mono), [1956-]. Singers of
b) Madrigals and Sacred
Music,
c)
Canzonettas, Madrigals, Gailliards, Sacrae Cantiones & Psalms, Columbia ML 5341, MS 6048 [1959]. Notes by
Robert Craft. Contract
d) Don Carlo Gesualdo,
1560-1613, Prince of madrigalists,
e)
Madrigals, Book VI, Complete, Columbia MS 7441
(stereo), [1970]. Singers of
Venosa, Robert Craft (dir). Re-published collections: Madrigals, Odyssey 32 16 0107- (mono), [1967-] (Columbia ML 5234); Madrigals and sacred music, Odyssey Y
32886 [1974] (ML 5341, MS 6048 and KL 5718, KS 6318).
[11] Anton
Webern. The Complete Music, Columbia Records, K4L-232, 4 discs, 1957.
Recorded in Hollywood between February 1954 and May1956 with musicians
primarily associated with the cinema studios of Hollywood, Robert Craft (dir),
[12] On the preceding day Monday Evening
Concerts gave the Aldous Huxley and
The Gesualdo Madrigalists concert in preview at the Music Society of Santa Barbara (Lobero Theatre): I. Four Madrigals
by Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa (Dolcissima
mia vita, O dolosa gioia, Meraviglia d’amore, Moro lasso); II. Mr. Huxley, speaking on “The Court of Ferrara and
Gesualdo”; III. Four Madrigals by Gesualdo (Ardo per te, Tu piangi, Ardita zanzaretta, Luci serene e chiare ; IV. A. Two Arias by Claudio Monteverdi (Lasciatemi morire, Partenza amoroso) Miss. Horne; B. Solo Ballata by Heinrich Isaac (Mostrarsi ardita di fore) Mr. Robinson;
C. Four Madrigals by Gesualdo (Ecco
moriro dunque, Tu m’uccidi o crudele,
Io tacero, Itene o miei sospiri). See. Robert
Craft, A Stravinsky Scrapbook 1940 –
1971, illustrations chosen by Patricia Schwark,
[13] In the following season, more precisely in November of 1957, some motets transcribed by Ruth Adams were performed. See Crawford, Evenings on and off the Roof, op. cit., 171 and 275.
[14] See Robert
Craft, A Stravinsky Scrapbook, op. cit., p. 61 photo 128: the
five madrigalists were holding the above edition in their hands.
[15] William
Lichtenwanger, the librarian in charge, must have sent the photostatic copy to Morton:
see Crawford, Evenings on and off the Roof, op. cit., p. 274. The
names of Craft and Morton as copyists are also specified in Stravinsky, Selected
Correspondence, op. cit., vol. II, pp. 333 n. 14. See also Robert Craft, Stravinsky. Chronicle of a Friendship,
revised and expanded,
[16] See Robert
Craft, A Stravinsky Scrapbook, op. cit., p. 61 photo 129.
[17] Quoted in Crawford, Evenings on
and off the Roof, op. cit., p.150.
[18] See
Vera Stravinsky, Robert Craft, Stravinsky in pictures and documents,
[19]
[20] See also Vera Stravinsky, Robert
Craft, Stravinsky in pictures and documents, op. cit., p. 456.
[21] See also the
letter from Stravinsky to Nadia Boulanger of
[22] «
[23] See also
Craft, Chronicle of a Friendship, op. cit.,
[24] The date appears at the end of the
draft: PSS, Tres sacrae cantiones [2] (Microfilm 122.000 / 903-
907: 907). See Robert Craft, A
Stravinsky Scrapbook , op. cit., pp. 62- 63 photos 130-133 about
which Craft comments: «On
[25] See Glenn E. Watkins, introduction
to Gesualdo di Venosa, Sacrae Cantiones. Für sechs und sieben Stimmen. […], edited by Glenn E. Watkins, Hamburg, Ugrino Verlag, 1961 (SW IX).
From the Editorial Notes it comes out that it was Robert Craft who
loaned the copies of the originals upon which the edition was based.
[26] “Composed
with remarkable artifice, they are sung with the greatest pleasure for ear and soul.” ] Pirrotta,
“Gesualdo, Carlo, principe di Venosa,» Dizionario Enciclopedico Universale
della Musica e dei Musicisti, directed by Alberto Basso, Torino, UTET,
1983-1988 (Le Biografie III, 1986), pp. 174-78, explained: «writing
around 1627, Vincenzo Giustiniani clarifies what Gesualdo means, if only with
respect to the madrigals: “full of much artifice and exquisite counterpoint,
with elusive and difficult fugues .. which, despite the compositional
difficulty, were light and came out soft and flowing».
[27] See the letter from Craft to Watkins of the 19th of July 1959, preserved by the recipient and published in Glenn Watkins, “The Canon and Stravinsky’s Late Style”, Confronting Stravinsky, edited by Jann Pasler, 1980, pp. 217-246: 234. See also Watkins, Gesualdo, op. cit., p. xxiii-xxiv.
[28] See the letter from Watkins to Stravinsky of the11th of September 1959 (PSS, Igor Stravinsky - Glenn Watkins Correspondence). A reproduction of the transparency with the new voice in Stravinsky’s hand is found among the facsimiles in the first pages of SW IX.
[29] See the letter from Craft to Watkins of 16th of August 1959,
preserved by the recipient and published in Watkins, “The Canon,” op. cit.,
p. 235. See also Watkins, Gesualdo, op. cit., xxiii-xxiv.
[30] See the letter
from Craft to Watkins of
[31] Commercial receipt of Alexander Broude (Scholarly and Rare Music Publications) dated the 23rd
of November 1959 archived at the PSS, Igor Stravinsky - Ernst Křenek
Correspondence.
[32] Mario Labroca
(Rome, 1896 - Rome, 1973) directed the Festival of the Venice Biennale from
1959 to 1972, succeeding Alessandro Piovesan.
[33] PSS,
Monumentum pro Gesualdo di Venosa ad CD Annum (Microfilm 122.000 /0847)
reported only «in March 1960 ».
See the letter from Craft to Watkins of the first of March 1960, preserved by
the recipient and published in Watkins, “The Canon,” op. cit, p. 235 n.
12: «The big news I have, however, is
that I. S. has just completed a Gesualdo Monumentum - all unbeknownst to me - are you sitting
down… instrumentations of certain madrigals with additions.» See
also the letter from Stravinsky to Roth of the 28th of March 1960, published in
Stravinsky, Selected Correspondences op. cit., vol. III, p.
[34] See Charles M. Joseph, Stravinsky
& Balanchine. A Journey of Invention, New Haven: Yale University Press,
2002, pp. 292 and 294. The author does not specify the date of the absolute
premiere of the ballet and would seem to have anticipated by one month that of
the review in the New York Times. The
world premiere took place at the New York City Ballet on the 16th of
November 1960. The three choreographed madrigals were subsequently programmed
along with the ballet for Movements
which Balanchine had premiered on the 9th of April 1963.
[35] The precise date of
the birth of Gesualdo still remains obscure.
According to Antonio Vaccaro Carlo Gesualdo
[36] In
a final note in Craft’s preface it reads: «This
edition is based on the edition of Professor Glenn E. Watkins published by
[37] Craft’s idea of a new text was presented to
Roth in Stravinsky’s letter of
[38] Pirrotta, “Gesualdo,” op. cit., p. 175. See the letter from Stravinsky to Roth of June 1960 (PSS, Igor Stravinsky Correspondence - Boosey & Hawkes).
[39]
[40] The bibliographic reference to the printing of 1603
had already been found in the Catalogo
generale delle opera musicali teoriche e pratiche di autori vissuti sino ai
primi decenni del secolo 19. esistenti nelle biblioteche e negli archivi
pubblici e privati d’Italia. Città di Napoli Archivio dell’Oratorio dei filippini [“General catalogue of the theoretical and practical works by authors who
lived up to the first decade of the 19th century existing in the
library and public and private archives of Italy. City of Naples Archive of the
Oratory of the Fillipini ], edited by Salvatore Di Giacomo, Parma, Off. Grafica
Fresching, 1918, but it went completely unnoticed until the publication of La Polifonia Cinquecentesca, op. cit.,
xxx and lxxvii (A).
[41] Recording (b): See note 10.
[42] Underlined
copy PSS IS B 1463.
[43] Underlined
copy PSS IS B 1527.
[44] See the letter from Stravinskij to Edgar Bielefeldt, published in Stravinsky, Selected correspondence, op. cit., vol. III, p. 395.
[45] PSS IS B 1157.
[46] PSS IS B 90.
[47] See the letters from Watkins to Stravinsky of the 15th of September, 1960 and the 17th of September 1962 (PSS, Igor Stravinsky - Glenn E. Watkins Correspondence) as well as Watkins, Gesualdo, op. cit., xix, xxiii-xxiv. It appears that the monograph was in its final state in 1968 and that a first version was presented to Stravinsky in August of 1965. One note to the preface in the Retrospectives and Conclusions, p. 107 (I) announces the release of Watkins’ monograph in 1970 (Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press). The fact then that Watkins’ analyses «vacillate between an avowed interest in contrapuntal procedure and an apparent enthusiasm for harmony and more recent analytical methods», as Roland Jackson noted, (The Musical Quarterly, 61/2 (April 1975, pp. 300-308: p. 301) could reflect the change of perspective recorded in the second half of the ‘50s and the beginning of the ‘60s.
[48] This
explains Craft’s
recollection (Chronicle of a Friendship, 1963, p. 387): «In 1954 he fell under the spell of Gesualdo di
Venosa, whose madrigal scorebooks I had transcribed and whose texts he
translated for me; in fact he twice introduced my concerts of this music with
racy public lectures on life in the North Italian courts of the time.» For
a portrait of Aldous Huxley see, aside from the various passages of the Dialogues
and Diaries, Robert Craft, ‘With Aldous Huxley,’ Encounter, XXV/5 (November 1965), pp.
10 -16, then reprised with numerous other data pertaining to the years of
friendship with Stravinsky in Vera Stravinsky, Robert Craft, Stravinsky in
pictures and documents, op. cit., pp. 389-
[49] Aldous Huxley,
“Gesualdo: Variations on a Musical Theme,” in Tomorrow, Tomorrow and
Tomorrow, New York, Harper & Brothers, 1956, originally published under
the title “The Marriage of Poetry and Music Can Produce a Versatile Child:
Variations on a Musical Theme,” Esquire (January 1956) and later in On
Arts and Artists, edited and introduced by Morris Philipson, London, Chatto
and Windus, 1960, part II: Criticism, pp. 286-302. Copy dedicated by the author
«For Vera and Igor with my love, Aldous 1961. After the fire.» PSS, IS B
1123. The volume contains, among other articles, “Variations on Goya,”
“Variations on El Greco” and “Variations on the Prisons” [of Piranesi] - the
term Variations will appear in the title of Stravinsky’s 1963 orchestral
piece in homage to Huxley, Variations in memoriam Aldous Huxley.
[50] See the correspondence between Stravinsky and Craft (PSS), as well as the Letters
of Aldous Huxley, edited by Grover Smith, London, Chatto and Windus, 1969,
n° 722, 723, 724 and 792.
[51] Stephen Walsh,
“Stravinsky, Igor (Fyodorovich),” The New Grove, op. cit.
[52] See Claudia Vincis, “Stravinskij ricompone Bach: le Choral-Variationen
über das Weihnachtslied ‘Vom Himmel hoch da komm’ ich her’”, [“Stravinsky
recomposes Bach: the Chorale Variations
on ‘Vom Himmel hoch da komm’ ich her’ ”]
Album Amicorum Albert Dunning. In Occasione Del Suo LXV Compleanno, edited by Giacomo
Fornari, Turnhout, Brepols, 2002, pp. 689-712.
[53] In connection
with this see Lorenzo Bianconi, Il Seicento, Torino, E.D.T., 1991 new
edition revised and corrected (Storia della Musica, edited by the
Italian Society of Musicology, 5), p. 9.
[54]
[55] Apart from the differences in Gesualdo’s madrigal production, this
correspondence would not be completely untenable if text painting devices were
not interpreted in light of the composer’s biography. See instead Pirrotta’s
lecture, in his “Gesualdo”, op. cit., p. 176.
[56] See Cecil
Gray, Peter Warlock. A memoir of Philip
Heseltine. With Contributions by Sir Richard Terry and Robert Nichols,
[57] «I think the
character of the music [Ma tu, cagion] is transformed by the timbre and
articulation of the brass and double-reed instruments in my version, so that
the madrigal has become a purely instrumental canzona.» (H, 105)
[58] «Once the
workable pieces were found, my first problem was to choose and to block out
instrumental registers and tessituras. Instruments must move here and there and
then again over here, and not keep to the same pasture of the five vocal parts.
My second problem was concerned with the differences between the vocal and
instrumental palettes; the music could not simply be ‘written out for
instruments,’ of course, but it had to be imagined anew.» (H, 105).
[59] Watkins, Gesualdo,
op. cit., pp. 201-202: «Gesualdo’s
art, like that of his predecessors, was indebted to functional harmonic
principles. In the interior of the phrase, as well, we can find harmonic
progressions which either confirm a sense of key or endorse a logical sequence
of events without unsettling details. A succession of dominant relations
is by no means uncommon even in the last volumes.» Three examples follow
including the beginning of Ma tu, cagion.
[60] Bianconi,
“Gesualdo”, op. cit., p. 782 : «In
the opening phrase, played by the strings, the horns are given only the
chromatic chords, corresponding to the syllables ‘-tà, -ti, -me, por-, cor’,
and thus by accentuating the implicitly vertical nature of modern
chromaticism, Stravinsky obliterated the contrapuntal relationship which
justified those chords in the original madrigal.»
[61] Bianconi, “Gesualdo,” op. cit., p. 781. Carl Dahlhaus, “Zur chromatischen Technik Carlo
Gesualdos,” Analecta musicologica, 4 (Studien zur italienisch- deutschen
Musikgeschichte 4 , edited by Friedrich Lippmann, 1967), pp. 77-96.
[62] Watkins, Gesualdo, op. cit., pp. 206-207.
[63] «In the final madrigal (Beltà poi, Book VI, a
piece that must have seemed in its time the saturation point of chromaticism)
no modification in Gesualdo’s own rhythmic plan seemed to me possible.
Therefore, to effect a greater sense of movement – as well as to show a
different analysis of the music - I divided the orchestra into
groups of strings, brasses, woodwinds, and horns (hermaphrodites), and hocketed
the music from a group to group; the hocket is a rhythmic device after all.» (H, 105-106).
[64] Colin Mason, “Stravinsky and Gesualdo,” Tempo. New
Series, 55/56 (Autumn/Winter 1960), pp. 39-48. Colin Mason (1924-1971)
directed Tempo from the issue 93,
Winter 1962-63, to issue 95, Winter 1970-71. He replaced Donald Mitchell under
whose auspices he published five contributions between 1957 and 1962, on the
most recent works of Stravinsky. His post was taken over by David Drew.
[65] Pierre Souvtchinsky, notes for the record Les
Concerts du Domaine Musical. (Petit Théâtre Marigny). III° Concert - Saison 1956, Disques Vega C
[66] «I have not
tampered with the rhythm or added other developmental work of my own in the
second and third madrigals.» (H,105).
[67] Mason, “Stravinsky and Gesualdo,” op. cit., pp. 39-40.
[68] «Gesualdo’s
mastery of phrase-building is evident even here, as an examination of bars 10 -
17 of the soprano part - considering the development of the motive, the
interval construction, and the rhythmic variation - will show.» (H,105)
[69] Marshall,The
Harmonic Laws, op. cit., p. 39.
[70] «In the age of
monody Gesualdo’s continued practice of an older polyphony, his compression and
economy, his harmonic complexity against the tendency to simplification and
cliché, his princely indifference to the fate of his music in print compared to
the monodists’ efforts at self-delation, would have earned him from a
Banchieri, and with some of the same meaning the judgment ‘outmoded’ that we
fancy many of Mozart’s contemporaries would have passed on J.S. Bach.» (A)
[71] «In the first
of the three reworked pieces (Asciugate i
begli occhi, Book V) I have compressed the music to phrases of three plus
two, in two instances, where Gesualdo has written three plus three.» (H, 105)
[72] Mason,
“Stravinsky and Gesualdo,” op. cit., pp. 42-43.
[73] Keiner, Die Madrigale Gesualdos von Venosa, op. cit., pp.
35-37. Lowinsky, Secret Chromatic Art, op. cit., pp. 11-13: the
paraphrased affirmation are underlined by Craft in the copy PSS, IS B 1157.
[74] Watkins, introduction to Gesualdo di Venosa, Sacrae Cantiones, op. cit.
In the Editorial Notes it reads finally: «The editor is grateful […] to Mr.
Igor Stravinsky, whose completions of three of the pieces has focused an
attention on this portion of Gesualdo’s music which it was destined otherwise
not to have had.»
[75] See the letter from Křenek to Craft of the third of June 1957, published
in Stravinsky, Selected Correspondence, op. cit., vol. II, p.
329: «Here is my attempt at
translating those lines: Enlighten us, God of mercies, by the seven fold grace
of the Paraclete so that, through it, liberated from the darkness of sin, we
may partake of the glory of life. The only word I am not sure of without the
aid of a dictionary is “delictorum.”
I have just guessed at its meaning. Within a few days I might be able to check
on it, if you can wait that long. In the tradition of the Church, the Holy
Ghost has always been associated with the figure of “seven” (this is, by the
way, why in my electronic piece I have based the music of the “Spirit” on a
seven tone pattern). The source of it seems to be Isaiah, XI, 2, where the
“seven gifts” are attributed to the Spirit of the Lord.» See also
Huxley’s card written the 3rd of May, 1955, published in Vera
Stravinsky, Robert Craft, Stravinsky in
pictures and documents, op. cit.,
p. 392 : «Septiformis – adjective, in ecclesiastical Latin. ‘Sevenfold.’ Used
by
[76] Einstein, The Italian Madrigal, op. cit., pp. 694- 95: «Gesualdo, on the
other hand, as a member of the high nobility had received the education of his
class and had undoubtedly read and understood Vincenzo Galilei’s mocking
diatribes against “eye-music” and other forms of symbolism. In all his work
there is hardly a single example of this sort. When in his Languisco e moro
(III, 3, 1595) all voices but one are silent at the word solo, it is no play of
words, but a reflection of genuine feeling. He is a pure expressionist.»
[77] «The voices
narrow to three (I am sure Gesualdo has done something similar) then at the
words ‘sevenfold grace of the paraclete’ spread to seven full polyphonic
parts.» (B, 34)
[78] See for example
[79] See Craft’s
letter to Watkins of the first of August,1959, preserved by the recipient and
published in Watkins, “The Canon,” op. cit., p. 234.
[80] The corrective
suggestions for inexactly retained readings prove that Stravinsky certainly had
an idea of the stylistic and prescriptive theoretical horizon within which to
place the work of the Prince. See Watkins’s reply to Stravinsky of
[81] See
in this respect Pirrotta’s version, in his “Gesualdo”, op. cit., p. 176
: «Apart from any motive of pious edification (and perhaps, but not as
decisively as others might insist, of personal atonement) there is a specific esthetic
intent which in this turns to religious composition where the tradition of
contrapuntal polyphony was much more profoundly rooted. At this time Gesualdo
attempted to emulate in
[82] Lowinsky, Secret
Chromatic Art, op. cit., Examaple 7.
[83] Ernst
Křenek, “Atonality Retroactive,” Perspectives of New Music, II/1 (Fall/Winter
1963), pp. 133-36: 134.
[84] Claude Palisca "Scientific
Empiricism in Musical Thought," in H.H. Rhys, ed., Seventeenth Century Science and the Arts, (Princeton, 1961),
pp.91-137.
[85] The reference in the first madrigal of the
fifth book is obviously in relation to the fundamental: Carl Dahlhaus, “Gesualdos manieristische Dissonanztechnik,” Convivium
Musicorum. Festschrift Wolfgang Boetticher zum sechzigsten Geburtstag am 19.
August 1974, edited by Heinrich Hüschen and Dietz-Rüdiger Moser,
[86] See the
examples selected by Watkins, in his “The canon,” op. cit., pp. 233-34.
[87] Letter from Craft to Watkins of
the 27th of September, 1959, preserved by the recipient and
published in Watkins, “The Canon,” op. cit., p. 235.
[88] For chronological reasons a sketch of A Sermon, A Narrative and A Prayer (1960
-1961), showing the twelve-tone series of the piece with an unused rhythmic
profile, is found on the back of the short score of the third movement of the Monumentum:
PSS, Monumentum pro Gesualdo ad CD annum (Microfilm 122.000/0872).
[89] See the doctoral thesis of
Christoph Neidhöfer, “An Approach to Interrelating Counterpoint and Serialism
in the Music of Igor Stravinsky, Focusing on the Principal Diatonic Works of his
Transitional Period” (Harvard University, 1999), pp. 13-28. Other scholars fall
instead into the trap: see for example Thomas Kabisch, “Zwischen Gesualdo und
Reihentechnik. Alte Musik im Kontext der Poetik des späten Strawinsky,” Alte Musik im 20. Jahrhundert.Wandlungen und Formen ihrer Rezeption, [“Between Gesualdo and Serial Technique. Old Music in the Context of Late Stravinsky’s Poetics” Old Music in the 20th Century: Transformations and Forms of
their Reception] edited by Giselher Schubert, Mainz, Schott, 1995, pp.
113-30.
[90] Paul
Hindemith, Fünfstimmige Madrigale [on texts by Joseph Weinheber],
[91] Massimo Mila, “Anthem.
A Sermon, a Narrative and a Prayer,” Compagno Strawinsky, Turin,
Einaudi, 1983, pp. 161-63 (already published in 1962).
[92] Igor
Stravinsky, Robert Craft, Memories and Commentaries,
[93] See for example Robert Craft, “Trois oeuvres anciennes recomposées,” Avec Stravinsky, Monaco, Éditions du Rocher, 1958, pp. 116-135: 128. At the Monday Evenings Concerts and according to Morton the trombone quartet became almost a rage. See Crawford, Evenings on and off the Roof, op. cit. 149, 159 -160.
[94] «I don’t think I am reading myself into Gesualdo in this instance [the so bass-ic Bassus of the Illumina nos] , though my musical thinking is always centered around the bass (the bass still functions as the harmonic root to me even in the music I am composing at present.» (B, 33)
[95] Robert Wangermée, “Specchi di Stravinsky [Stravinsky’s Mirrors],”
introduction to Igor Stravinsky, Robert Craft, Colloqui con Stravinsky [Conversations with Stravinsky], Turin,
Einaudi, 1977, xi-xxiv: xxiii [Nuova Rivista Musicale Italiana, III
(1971)]. The article was translated into Italian by Domenico de Paoli and dated
Bruxelles, February, 1971.
[96] Manuscript dedication by Stravinsky on the
first page of the clean copy of the Monumentum. A reproduction is published in
Robert Craft, A Stravinsky Scrapbook , op. cit., p. 89 photo 186.
[97] See Walsh, “Stravinsky,” op. cit.
[98] The expression is from Pierre Boulez, “D’une conjonction - en trois
éclats”, Points de repère I. Imaginer, texts compiled by Jean-Jacques
Nattiez and Sophie Galaise, Paris, Bourgois, 1995, pp. 161-163: 163 (Avec
Stravinsky, op. cit., pp. 97- 99 ; Pierre Boulez, Relevés
d’apprenti, edited by Paule Thévenin, Paris, Seuil, 1966, pp. 275 -77). A preceding version appeared on the jacket of the record Vega C
[99] See Morton, Monday Evening Concerts, op. cit., p.
213 paraphrased by Crawford, Evenings on
and off the Roof, op. cit., p. 275.
[100] Watkins, Gesualdo, op. cit., xxiv.
[101] Einstein, The
Italian Madrigal, op. cit., pp. 705-706.
[102] However, among
the outstanding composers, those who were interested in Gesualdo’s music were
rare, if not only two: Luigi Dallapiccola (G,
54) and Paul Hindemith. See the letter from Stravinsky to Hindemith of the 11th of
August,
[103] On
the categorical extension of historical expressionism see the entry of Gianfranco Contini,
“Espressionismo letterario”, Ultimi esercizî ed elzeviri (1968- 1987),
Turin, Einaudi, 1989, pp. 41-105 (Enciclopedia del Novecento, Roma,
Istituto dell’Enciclopedia Italiana, tomo II, 1977, pp. 780 - 801).
[104] Einstein,The
Italian Madrigal, op. cit., p. 695. Lowinsky, Tonality and
Atonality, op. cit., p. 77.
[105] As to how this very inscribed trajectory
could be understood we can read from Aaron
Copland’s summary wrap-up, “The World of A-Tonality”, New York Times
Magazine, November 27,1949, a review of the American translation of Schoenberg
et son école, which Craft cut to shreds and commented on
mischievously. See also the review of Schoenberg
et son école and Qu’est-
ce que la musique de douze sons of Milton Babbitt, JAMS, 3/1 (1950),
pp. 87-60, republished in The Collected Essays of Milton Babbitt, edited
by Stephen Peles with Stephen Dembski, Andrew Mead, and Joseph N. Straus,
Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2003, pp. 10 -15.
[106] The expression is from Pierre Boulez, “Moment de Jean-Sébastien Bach”, Points
de repère I. Imaginer, op. cit. pp. 65-79: 65 (first published as
“Moment de J.-S. Bach”, Contrepoints, 7 (1951), pp. 72- 86 ; reprinted
in Pierre Boulez, Relevés d’apprenti, op. cit., pp. 9 -25).
[107] Ernst
Křenek, Music Here and Now,
[108] Longtime friend and for the time being,
neighbor of Stravinsky, member of the ’Emergency Commitee
of the Monday Evening Concerts, Ernst Křenek was an important
reference for the last Stravinskian output as well as for matters of ancient
music (he was a valuable scholar of Ockeghem), Latin and liturgy (in June of
1957 and in June of 1958 he was entrusted with the translation of the Illumina
nos and the verses of Psalm 70 for the concert and recording notes). See
the letters from Křenek to Craft of
[109] Massimo
Privitera, “La musicologia simpatetica di Edward E. Lowinsky,” Musica del
Rinascimento. Tre saggi [“Edward
E. Lowinsky’s Sympathetic Musicology” Renaissance Music. Three Essays],
edited by Massimo Privitera,
[110] Křenek,
“Atonality Retroactive”, op. cit., p. 136.
[111] Lowinsky, Secret
Chromatic Art, op. cit., p. 90.
[112] « Puisque Leibowitz s’étend quelque peu sur
le chromatisme, n’aurait-il pas dû chercher auprès des Italiens des exemples
assez singuliers de coloration chromatique? Mais n’importe quel sujet auquel il
s’attache, Leibowitz s’assure immédiatement d’un nom allemand.». André Schaeffner, “Halifax R G
[113] After
Boulez’s Stocktakings from an
Apprenticeship where following
”Bach’s Moment,” “Schoenberg is dead” and “Stravinsky remains.” ed.