Gian Francesco Malipiero - Il Finto Arlecchino; Vivaldiana; Invenzioni (Peter Maag)

Information

Composer: Gian Francesco Malipiero

• Sette Invenzioni
• Quattro invenzioni
• Symphonic Fragments from "Il Finto Arlecchino"
• Vivaldiana

Veneto Philharmonic Orchestra

Peter Maag, conductor

Date: 1992

Label: Marco Polo

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Review

If an authority as discriminating and as reluctant to overstate as Luigi Dallapiccola described Malipiero as ''the most important Italian composer since Verdi'', we're bound to sit up and take notice. But where should we begin? None of his 11 symphonies or 34 operas is available on record at present and besides, he has the reputation of being disconcertingly uneven as well as alarmingly prolific. But when a complete cycle of his eight string quartets appeared last year (ASV, 2/92) AW didn't find himself obliged to swallow one or two of them and spit out the remainder: ''never dull … a consistent warmth of expression … unduly neglected'' was his reaction. However, the present compilation, though almost always entertaining (even so, for reasons that will become apparent later, I wouldn't listen to the whole of it at a sitting if I were you) doesn't really add much more to the revaluation process.

Those of Malipiero's larger orchestral works that I've heard make an interesting attempt to forge a distinctively Italian symphonism, abandoning the developmental structures of sonata form for a more urbane 'conversation' (Malipiero's own word) between contrasting or related ideas, you might say that in his discourse 'by the way' or 'and that reminds me' replace the 'and therefore' and 'but on the other hand' of the Northern European symphony. Something similar, but more like a chat than a discussion, seems to take place in the two sets of Inventions, both of them derived (though the touchy composer irritably denied it) from a film score. The very first of them is wholly characteristic: a brief and steely introduction (steel manufacture was the subject of the film) gives way after only a few seconds to a light-textured, deftly scored moto perpetuo, elegantly neo-classical; then, with hardly any transition, a lyrical pastoral mood arrives, the moto perpetuo becomes more capricious, there is some charming solo string writing, and the movement is over in under three minutes. There are frequent hints of the eighteenth century (busy neo-baroque toccata figurations) and of folk music (a village fiesta seems to be brightly evoked in the last movement of the second set) and the whole is cleanly scored, tuneful and engaging. It is light music, without any pretension to it, but long before the 18 movements on this CD are over you may well be longing for something more substantial.

For the other two suites are lightweight too. The Symphonic fragments from Il finto Arlecchino (the comic middle panel of an otherwise serious trilogy of one-act operas set in Malipiero's native Venice) are not much more than agreeable pastiche—mock-Pergolesi, mostly, with a few wrong-note seasonings. And Vivaldiana is simply a sequence of eight movements from Vivaldi concertos, joined together in pairs and efficiently re-scored for an orchestra incorporating wind instruments as well as Vivaldi's strings. Pleasant, undemanding stuff listening to it, unwisely, all in one go I found myself scribbling 'so what?' in the margin. The orchestra is small and not the world's greatest, but Maag has their measure and the music's and the results are clean and neat, so is the recording.

— Michael Oliver

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Gian Francesco Malipiero (18 March 1882 – 1 August 1973) was an Italian composer and music scholar. Educated in Vienna, Venice and Bologna, he was later influenced by modernist trends in Paris. A key figure in 20th-century Italian music alongside Alfredo Casella, Malipiero rejected verismo and revived interest in pre-Romantic Italian music. His major works include operas, symphonies, chamber music and cantatas. As a scholar, he edited the complete works of Monteverdi and contributed to editions of Vivaldi, Corelli and Frescobaldi, significantly shaping the modern understanding of early Italian music.

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Peter Maag (10 May 1919 – 16 April 2001) was a Swiss conductor. He studied in Zürich, Basel and Geneva, and trained under notable mentors including Ernest Ansermet and Wilhelm Furtwängler. His career began in German opera houses before he gained international recognition with debuts in London, Glyndebourne and the U.S. in 1959. In 1962, he paused his career for spiritual reflection, spending time in a Buddhist monastery. He later held leadership roles with major European orchestras and opera houses, including the Vienna Volksoper and Teatro Regio. Maag recorded extensively for major classical music labels.

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