Saturday, March 9, 2024, First Parish, Wayland and Online
Sunday, March 10, 2024, Old South Church, Boston

Concerto Grosso no. 6 in D Major                Charles Avison, after Domenico Scarlatti (1709 – 1770) / (1685 – 1757)
    Largo • Con Furia                    
    Adagio • Vivacemente

Sonata in C Major for flute and continuo, op. 1 no. 1    Anna Bon (1738 – after 1767)
    Adagio • Allegro • Presto                    
    
Trio Sonata in D Minor, RV 63 “La Folia”            Antonio Vivaldi (1678 – 1741)

Sonata in B-flat Major for cello and continuo, op. 5 no 4    Francesco Geminiani (1687 – 1762)
    Andante — Allegro moderato                
    Grave — Allegro

Concerto in D Major for flute and strings            Pietro Nardini (1722 – 1793) 
    Allegro moderato                   
    Andante
    Allegro

Suzanne Stumpf, traverso
Sarah Darling and Amelia Sie, violin
Marcia Cassidy, viola; Daniel Ryan, cello
Benjamin Katz, harpsichord

Program Notes

This program explores virtuosity in Baroque music by Italian composers through the sampling of five distinct musical voices spanning six decades. Part of the inspiration for the florid writing that evolved in Baroque Italy stemmed from modifications to string instruments made by  makers such as Stradivari that facilitated new pyrotechnics. Another factor was sociological: in contrast to music as an elite experience for royalty in France, the availability of concerts to a broader public in Italy incentivized composers to draw attention to their work through ear-grabbing technical feats.
    This program begins with a fascinating adaptation of harpsichord works by Domenico Scarlatti. The Naples-born Scarlatti, who was reputed to be an astounding harpsichordist, made a sensation in England in 1738 when his Essercizi per cembalo, a set of 30 harpsichord sonatas, was published there. These were among the most virtuoso of Scarlatti’s oeuvre and inspired the English composer Charles Avison to refashion them and other Scarlatti sonatas as concerti grossi for strings and continuo. Published around 1744, Avison’s concertos are extensively re-imagined versions of Scarlatti’s works that are idiomatic to the instruments and genre. The second and fourth movements of the Avison concerto heard on this program are taken from Scarlatti’s Essercizi collection, while the third movement is from a violin sonata. The source of the first movement has not been identified and may well be by Avison himself.
    Anna Bon’s parents were professionals in the theater — her father was a scenographer and librettist, and her mother was a singer. When Anna was a four-year-old in 1743, her parents entered her as a paying student into the famous Ospedalle della Pietà in Venice where Vivaldi had taught (though prior to her arrival). By 1756, she rejoined her parents in Bayreuth where they were in the service of Margrave Friederich of Brandenburg Kulmbach and his wife, Wilhelmine, the older sister of Frederick the Great. Anna was appointed to the newly created post of “chamber music virtuosa.” Her surviving works include harpsichord sonatas, trio sonatas, some vocal works, and a set of flute sonatas, including the Sonata in C Major featured on this program. 
    Believed to have been written when she was only 16, the work shows remarkable sophistication and creativity. The highly ornamented rhetoric of the opening Adagio has contrasting moments of tenderness and angst and includes rhythmically free flourishes. There are also opportunities for cadenzas at the end of each section, a feature uncommon in sonatas of the day. Triumph and determination are evoked through virtuosic writing in the Allegro, and the closing Presto is imbued with cleverness and humor in its scampering sequences and surprising harmonic turns.
    Antonio Vivaldi’s op. 1 set of twelve trio sonatas was published in 1705. The straightforward, concise construction of these works show similarities to those of his Venetian contemporaries Caldara, Gentili, and Albinoni. These sonatas are largely organized as dance suites, with the great exception being the single movement La Follia sonata, which consists of variations on a recurring chord progression. Possibly of Spanish or Portuguese origin, the chord progression (known as La Follia) was used as a basis for works by many composers including Corelli, whose opus 5 sonata of the same name may have served as a model for Vivaldi. 
    Vivaldi’s variations demonstrate the inventive prowess and exuberance that was to become a hallmark of his style. There is much variety of interaction among the three parts in the succession of the variations, including some lively motivic sparring between the violins and energetic passagework in the continuo. While not composed as a dance suite, this sonata contains variations that resemble dance movements, such as the sarabande, siciliano, and gigue.
    Franceso Geminiani was born in Lucca to a musical family and studied with Arcangelo Corelli. He traveled to England in 1714, arriving with the reputation of virtuoso violinist, and quickly established himself as a performer and teacher. In contrast to Corelli’s measured, rational compositional and performing style, Geminiani’s writing is spontaneous, with phrases of irregular lengths succeeding each other and very little repetition of material, a compositional technique that makes for dramatic story-telling. In Geminiani’s own words, “The Intention of Musick is not only to please the Ear, but to express Sentiments, strike the Imagination, affect the Mind, and command the Passions.” The B-flat Major sonata for cello and continuo from his op. 5 set is a stellar example of this aim.
   Pietro Nardini was also a renowned violin virtuoso. A star pupil of Tartini, he toured extensively before settling in Florence where he contributed to the musical life of that city.  Nardini excelled in beauty of tone, fluency in fast movements, and especially in expressive adagio playing. Nardini’s style straddles the Baroque and Classical eras, and his Flute Concerto in D Major is the latest work on our program having been composed after 1770. The scope of its first movement heralds the breadth of a Classical work while its remarkable plethora of varied thematic material is more late Baroque in its compass. A  sublime and tender middle movement yields to a playful finale, replete with jazzy syncopations and sinewy chromaticism. The ensemble gave this work its modern day premiere in 2010, and we are delighted to bring it to audiences again on this concert.
        — Suzanne Stumpf and Daniel Ryan