Enrico Euli

Roberto Valentini (1671–1747) was born in Leicester and most likely remained in England until his 21st birthday, when he emigrated to Italy, settling in Rome. A multi-instrumentalist, Valentini began his career in the papal city as a violinist, cellist and oboist, but is best known as a composer for the recorder, an instrument at which he excelled as a performer.

Born in Rome in 1678 to a family of German extraction, Nicola Francesco Haym was employed (from 1694 to 1700) as a violone and cello player by Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni in the orchestra led by Arcangelo Corelli. In the final years of this period the 2nd Duke of Bedford (Wriothesley Russell, 1680-1711) visited Rome and invited the violinist Nicola Cosimi to follow his entourage back to London. Cosimi in turn invited Haym to come with him as continuo cellist. Haym therefore moved to London in 1701 and would serve as the Duke of Bedford’s ‘master of chamber music’ until the patron’s death in 1711. A significant number of Haym’s compositions were produced during this first period in his life, among them diverse instrumental music for concerts at the ducal residences.

The idea to make this recording took Enrico Fagnoni back to his childhood, and his first musical experiences of the US. He left Italy with scores of Bach, Mozart, Chopin and Rachmaninov, but found himself listening to the best jazz and ragtime musicians. He was astonished by the rhythm of their music, the acoustics of the clubs and the spontaneity of their jam sessions. He offers this new recording of the Songbook as a tribute to Gershwin’s genius.

Small size, four gut strings, a short bow were at beginning the ingredients of the magic. Such magic happened in Italy, the cradle of the violin, during the seventeenth century. “Seicento!” is therefore a multifaceted time-travel through the Early Baroque, from Venice to Sicily, exploring the wonders of the first violin virtuosos and their dexterous-passionated playing. A collection of music born looking at Caravaggio, Bernini and Borromini’s masterworks.

The musical partnership of violinist Enrico Gatti and harpsichordist Rinaldo Alessandrini now goes back a number of decades to when this pair of Italians, both with a voracious appetite for early music, were setting out on their careers. The years pass and both artists make fabulous recordings, often directing their own ensembles.

There is always poetry as well as virtuosity coursing through Enrico Gatti’s violin playing, and nowhere more so than when he turns to Italian early Baroque music, as here in Mille consigli with his Ensemble Aurora: the album title reflecting the multiplicity of emotional ideas and colours possible in violin music from this time (Gatti’s earlier recordings of similar music have recently been re-released by Glossa as L’arte del violino in Italia).

The influence of the music by Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583-1643) on contemporaneous composers and on those who worked even between the seventeenth and eighteenth century was truly important. For the necessarily synthetic itinerary delineated in this CD I was inspired by four exemplary compositions excerpted from “Fiori Musicali”. This collection was printed in 1635. In it, the composer proposes works conceived for liturgical use (plus two pieces without a precise collocation within the Mass). These pieces are excerpted from the so-called “Messa della Madonna”, and are a Toccata avanti la Messa, Canzon dopo l’Epistola, Recercar dopo il Credo, Toccata per la Levatione.