Re: [mascagni-interest] Score Inquiry

[Erik Bruchez]

All,

I have piano/text scores of Cavalleria Rusticana, L'amico Fritz, and I
Rantzau. The text is in Italian, except for I Rantzau, which is in
German - this may be the version you saw for rent! I also have a nice
piano/vocal score of I Rantzau in Italian. This is what you are
looking for! These must be all original editions, because I don't
think I Rantzau has been republished since the 1890's. I guess your
best bet is to find a copy of the original score.
The piano/vocal score of Parisina was reprinted in 1974 by Curci in
Milan. It is an impressive 328 page long score, which still falls
short of the length of Le Maschere. It looks like the original editor
was Sonzogno, but that somehow the ownership was transfered to
Curci. Anecdotally, I recently got from a friend a great picture of
Maestro Kees Bakels and the late Pr. Carlo Botteghi studying the
orchestral score of Parisina. They also have the vocal score at hand.
These scores definitely seem to be difficult to get by.

One cannot stress enough how amazing a work Parisina is. It obviously
went way over the heads of not only the audience, but also the leading
musicians of the time. The music is of incredible beauty, but
understanding the original text is essential to appreciate the
work. In Parisina, words and music are molded together. During the
composition, Mascagni not only had the beautiful original libretto
from D'Annunzio, but he had D'Annunzio himself handy to read and
explain the verses to him. This is narrated by Mascagni himself in an
article written in late 1913, "Come è nata Parisina":
  http://www.mascagni.org/books/

The Montpellier Parisina does not lack qualities. In particular, Denia
Mazzola's Parisina is very good and Enrique Diemecke is a very
convincing conductor. It is also the first time that it is possible,
on record, to really appreciate the quality of the orchestration. The
1914 excerpts were recorded with a reduced, sometimes sluggish
orchestra, and the RAI version is monophonic and the sound is of bad
quality.
On the other hand, not only is Act IV missing entirely, but the cuts
in the first three acts are huge. The a cappella chorus parts in Act
I, the "Sequenza delle tre donzelle" accompanied with the organ, the
entire battle scene, the end of Ugo's narration of the battle and the
orchestral "Intermezzo" in Act II are all gone!
-Erik

John Mucci wrote:
> I have been having the most difficult time finding vocal scores for some of
> the less well-known Mascagni works. Thanks to Erik and his message about
> SheetMusic, we have a good resource for some of them, but just try to find I
> Rantzau or Parisina.
>
> Actually, The Bagaduce Music Lending Library in Maine
> (http://www.bagaducemusic.org/) has a copy of I Rantzau for rent ($2 plus a
> $10 fee for the year, allowing you to borrow from all their many thousands
> of scores), and although it's a beautiful original 1893 edition--I am not
> sure if they change the date with impressions--it is a piano/text score, one
> of those volumes meant for the rehearsal pianist, not the singer or the
> enthusiast. Nonetheless it's a fascinating thing to see, but I'd like to
> find a vocal score somewhere.
>
> On abebooks.com there is a listing for Oper, "Die Rantzau", Oper von  Pietro
> Mascagni, 4 Szenen auf 1 Blatt,  Hst. 1893, 32x22 - which might have the
> vocal line, but in German! Having bought a copy of "Der Kleine Marat" under
> the same auspices, I know it is almost as frustrating as the piano/text
> score for an American. (The reason why it's so frustrating is that Sonzogno
> printed exclusive German editions, as the language required almost entirely
> different vocal lines in places, and would have been difficult to read with
> the Italian laid in above or below it).
>
> And Parisina? I can't find hide nor hair of it anywhere in any language.
> www.Sonzogno.it doesn't even list it (or I Rantzau) in its inventory on the
> website.  I am sure that if one approached Casa Musicale Sonzogno personally
> one might obtain a copy of each, but it is still quite difficult to get hold
> of.
>
> For operamusic subscribers, if you don't know Mascagni's Parisina, you
> really should try to get hold of the Montpellier recording of it, even
> though its last act is truncated.  I am not sure that even the several
> in-depth analyses of it have begun to scratch the surface of what it has to
> offer; and when it was performed originally (from 1912 to into the 1930s) I
> don't think the audience had a clue what was going on in it.
--
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