----- Original Message -----
From: "David Tayler" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "lute-cs.dartmouth.edu" <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, August 02, 2008 2:25 PM
Subject: [LUTE] Re: Giacomo Gorzanis' musical circle?
| Arthur Ness is the one to ask, it is from a manuscript from 1567.
| dt
|
| At 10:48 AM 8/2/2008, you wrote:
| >A while ago I came across a reference to a suite of pieces for lute
| >written in the mid 16th c by Giacomo Gorzanis, which I think is a
| >musical circle (in that it progresses through all 24 keys).
| >
| >Does anyone know the title of this suite - and if there is a
| >recording anywhere - or a publisher of the music?
| >
| >Many thanks if anyone can help...
| >
| >Andrew
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
To respond to David's comment, I can add a bit.
This "dance cycle" is from Mus Ms 1511a in the Bavarian State Library,
Munich, titled,
Libro de intabvlatvra di livto, nel qualle si
contengano vinti quatro passa mezi ...
nouamente composte con alcune
napolitanae de Jacomo Gorzanis lautanista [1567].
As Monica commented it contains 48 passamezzo and saltarello dances
alternating "minor" (passamezzo antico) and "major" (pasamezzo moderno).
The pieces have received some sensational notoriety as the
"well-tempered-lute book of the 16th century." The manuscript is
unusually carefully copied to resemble printed tablature. Therefore, it
has been suggested that the manuscript was a paradigm for the printer's
layout for a printed volume. Or it was copied from a print. There is,
however, no record of any such print ever appearing.
The manuscript which includes some Napolitanas was probably copied out in
Munich (the paper was manufactured in Munich) when a "blind lutenist"
appeared at court. This lutenist was most likely Giacomo Gorzanis (b. ca.
1520 d. between 1575 and 1579), a blind lutenist from Bari. He travelled
through Carinthia, the Tyrol and Bavaria before settling in Triest. The
dedicatee is Ulrich Herwarth, a cousin of Hans Heinrich Herwart, an
Augsburg patrician and financier who compiled one of the largest music
libraries of the 16th century. Ulrich was an emissary for Rudolf II, for
a while served an official at the Bavarian court, and probably oversaw the
purchase of Hans Heinrich's library by the duchal library, forming the
basis for today's Staatsbibliothek.
There is a modern edition that most good music libraries will have due to
its inclusion in the series of published Munich dissertations:
Gorzanis, Giacomo de, 16th cent.
Ein Tanzzyklus des 16. Jahrhunderts : für Laute /
von Jacomo Gorzanis, ed. Issam El-Mallah.
Tutzing: H. Schneider, c1979.
Munchner Editionen zur Musikgeschichte; Bd. 1)
Edited from the holograph <<sic!! Gorzanis was blind,
so probably did not copy the manuscript--ajn>> in the
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek (Mus. Mss. 1511a)
Tablature and staff notation.
There is also an edition for guitar made by Bruno Tonazzi for
Suvini-Zerboni.
The pieces are all similar in texture and (obviously) harmonies, that they
would not make a good recital item if all 24 pairs were to be played. So
the
indication Dance-Cycle is not accurate. Probably pm/saltarello pairs in
the same tonal center might work in a program. I agree with Sean when he
suggests the most interesting music by Gorzanis is in his other books. He
is an important figure in the history of the variation-dance suite. One
passamezzo is in 14 partes, in which each successive part is more virtuoso
in character..
Gorzanis was not the only lutenist to explore all modes or keys,
Francesco Spinacino (1507) has a Recercare de tutti li Toni" (the 8
modes).
Vincenzo Galilei has two sets of dance suites on each of the 12 notes of
the chromatic scale, and 24 ricercars in all the "major/minor keys."
John Wilson the English 17th-century composer has 26 preludes including 24
in all the major/minor keys. There is an edition by Matthew Spring, which
is alas not too satisfactory because the facsimile of the tablatures is
too small it can hardy be read from a music stand. We may soon see an
adequate edition from A-R Edtions.
I think one of the French 17th-century lutenists wrote a work in all keys.
Bocquet???
Adam Falkenhagen has a "Preludio nel quale sono contenuti tutti I Tuoni
Musicali" that lasts for 25 minutes on Paul Beier's CD (Stradivarius
33448), making it one of the longest single movements in the baroque
period. I'm tempted to call it the prelude "himmlische Lange," but that
might anger Schubert fans.
Weiss also composed a prelude similar to Falkenhagen's, but the work is
lost. Which is particularly to be lamented because of Weiss's interest in
adventure some harmonic relationships.
=====AJN (Boston, Mass.)=====
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