M. Toffetti
'Lucino è un lampo, e la sua voce è un tuono': Francesco Lucino cantore a Milano nel primo SeicentoFrancesco Lucino was a singer, composer, and editor of vocal music collections. Information available until recently suggested that he were a major figure in the early 17th-century Milan scene. We can now fill gaps in his biography, identify a few towns where he lived, point to istitutions he worked for—either regularly or on occasion—and better understand his correspondence with cardinal Federico Borromeo. Lucino was born in Caravaggio ca. 1545. He had been a Humiliated friar since perhaps the 1560's until 1571, when the male section of the order was abolished. By 1579, he entered the chapel of the Milan Duomo. Here he worked till his death (1617), although offers came from other first-rank institutions. One of these was the Santa Maria chapel by San Celso. Lucino collaborated with it on a regular basis between July, 1604 and September, 1617. He was ordained a priest probably after 1589. On January, 1592 he got the caplainship at San Sebastiano, a parish church the Milanese founded in 1577 as a vow during a plague. Lucino won exceptional fame as a singer. This is proven by several accounts from printed sources—Borsieri, Picinelli, and Magistri, besides many dedications. We learn from such authors that musicians of fame traveled to Milan from afar to hear him sing. Lucino's fame is also suggested by his being the dedicatee of compositions (by Borgo, Andrea and Giovan Paolo Cima), collections (by Scarabelli and Scaletta, plus the compilation Lucino himself edited, which publisher Lomazzo dedicated to him in a reprint), and poems (by Ferrari and Guarini in Magistri's revision). Besides his popularity as a performer, Lucino's most significant contribution seems to be his influence on Milan musical taste, as his sacred music compilations clearly show.
U. Kirkendale
Il Re dei Cieli e il Re di Francia: su un 'topos' nella maniera di LullyThe imitation of Versailles, much studied in the history of architecture, gardens, portraits, fashion, etc., was no less present in music. Many composers, also outside of France (Purcell, Handel, Bach …), imitated Lully, the principal composer of the Sun King, particularly in the 'French overtures', which, in ballets and later in operas, surpassed in splendour and dignity everything hitherto heard. But this prominent manifestation of musical Versailles must be understood not merely under its formal aspects, as an abstract genre of instrumental music, but also as a vehicle for a powerful rhetorical function. The characteristic scalar motion, dotted rhythm, and grave tempo were absorbed into vocal music, where they became a topos for the 'king', for his glory and majesty. Numerous examples illustrate the use of this style not only for the King of France, other earthly sovereigns, the profane Jupiter, and in the second half of the 18th century simply for 'aristocracy' (also in a negative sense), but also for the King of Heaven. Modern immanent interpretations have impeded the rational understanding of this historical topos; one spoke of «dark [!] majesty» and vague psychological sentiments of «solemnity».
The gesture has at least three roots: 1) dotted rhythm which had for some time been considered 'French' (its use in German countries is analogous to the pretentious 'franzparlieren'), and the solemn rhythm of the paean. The latter was adopted already by Lully from Aristotle, Quintilian etc.; but the paean as a hymn had been associated since Homer with divine healing. 2) The scalar motion coincided similarly with the official prerequisites of French classicism. 3) The very slow tempo – normally indicated as «grave» or «maestoso» – corresponded to the motion of the sovereigns as it was prescribed in the kings' mirrors, court ceremonials, and manuals of etiquette ever since Antiquity, based on both Stoic and Christian principles (tranquillitas, temperantia, constantia).
It is significant that Louis XIV and the King of Heaven were musically identical. Music thus joined the last phase of 'political theology'. The association can be traced back to the assignment of imperial attributes to Christ by early Christian writers, and, on the other hand, is evident in the later diffusion of the myth of Louis as 'Dieu en terre' and 'healer' (cf. theatrical roles, emblems, panegyrics) and the ancient theological, legal, and historical foundations of the 'divine right of kings'. The topos disappears after the Revolution, when the King of Heaven lost his powerful earthly image.
One of the most grandiose presentations of the topos, Mozart's «Rex tremendae majestatis», is discussed in detail.
F. Dilaghi
Pedagogia, didattica e retorica nelle 'Invenzioni a due voci' di J. S. BachThe Two- and Three-Part Inventions were composed just before the more complete and complex work The Well Tempered Clavier and can be considered Bach's first organic pedagogic work for keyboard. The pedagogic concept, common in Bach's time, that integrates the purely instrumental element with the skill of musical composition is intrinsic to both works. The different succession of 15 pieces in the first version of the 'Invenzioni' (that which we find in Clavier-Buchlein von Wilhelm Friedmann Bach) achieve a consistent progression of difficulty. The more concrete didactic intention is quite clear in this example compared to the general pedagogy of the final version, proposing a practical tool which can clearly be used for teaching purposes. This article, also based on studies in the field, aims firstly at highlighting all aspects to achieve this progressive difficulty of composing and instrumental skills on two levels: parallel and concomitant. Secondly, it aims at showing that the use of classical rhetoric (then considered an essential element of pedagogy given its prime importance in all discourse be it musical or verbal) influenced the choice in Two-Part Inventions of certain models of formal articulation.
L. Conti
La 'Evolving Tonality' di Joseph Yasser: una teoria microtonale tra le correnti dello sperimentalismo newyorcheseIn 1932 the Polish-Jewish theorist and organist Joseph Yasser (1893-1981) published in New York A Theory of Evolving Tonality, in which he described a 19-tone equal temperament. He predicted the use of this microtonal system in Western music as a future development of the 12-tone equal temperament. The nucleus of Yasser's book is the reconstruction of an historical process – the evolving tonality – that leeds from the pentatonic system (infra-diatonic, 5 tones per octave) to the diatonic (7 tones per octave) till the chromatic (supra-diatonic, 12 tones per octave). In the music of his contemporaries, like Skrjabin, Debussy and Schoenberg, Yasser recognizes the affirmation of the chromatic scale as a system of 12 indipendent tones. The next step will be the introduction of 7 new auxiliaries tones, that will create a new microchromatic scale (supra-diatonic scale, 12 + 7 tones per octave). The indirect influence on Yasser's theory of microtonal experiments in New York during the 1920s is supposed. Furthermore, in this essay other 19-tone equal temperament experiences are put in relashionship with the evolving tonality.