Giuseppe Torelli and the birth of the Violin Concerto

Pietro Battistoni

Giuseppe Torelli (1658-1709), a violinist and composer famous all over Europe during his lifetime, has not received much attention in today's concert programs and academic environments. This research has a twofold intention: reconstruct the life of Torelli and investigate the origins of a genre of which he is considered to be the father, the soloistic concerto. As a case of study, an in-depth analysis is been drawn of one violin concerto, which has a debated authorship nowadays, poised between Torelli and Vivaldi. The results are presented in three chapters: the first one contains the biography; in the second one it is outlined how Torelli redefined the form of the pre-existing Concerto Grosso, thanks to the activity of his predecessors and to the peculiar context in which he was active. This process resulted in the arise of the concerto for solo instrument, which already presented all the characteristics that made this musical form so popular and successful amongst his contemporaries and the following generations. The third chapter consists of an analysis of the Concerto for violin in D minor A.2.3.9/RV813. Through the examination of the primary sources, its transcription for solo keyboard made by Johann Sebastian Bach and the stylistic patterns used, I intend to demonstrate that the attribution to Torelli is more plausible. The inquiry about this repertoire through a musicological and historical contextualization can bring to a more grounded awareness in how to approach this music as a performer and, hopefully, it will lead to a rediscovery of musical treasures.

I still remember the first time I heard about Giuseppe Torelli. I was a teenager, in the class of Music History at the Conservatory “E. F. Dall'Abaco” in Verona. The teacher, prof. Laura Och, was telling us about the evolution of the different compositional forms during the Baroque period and she pointed out that the so-called 'inventor' of the soloistic concerto was claimed to be Giuseppe Torelli, from Verona. I remember I started questioning myself: why had I never hear anything about this composer before? Why is his music not performed more nowadays? Why did his city not give him any credit for such a crucial innovation in the history of western music? In fact, Verona seems to have lost track of this illustrious citizen: not a street is named after him, not a statue adorns the middle of a roundabout.

When, one year and a half ago, I had to choose the topic for my Master Research I decided to finally investigate about the figure of Torelli: who was this man? Which role did he actually have in the evolution of the orchestral musical forms?

I started to collect information about him and, as soon as I began to immerse myself, I realized that a fascinating world of musical treasures and historical information was just waiting to be explored. Then, during this process of discovery, I stumbled upon a violin concerto, which figures in Torelli's catalogue, the concerto in D minor A.2.3.9, for which the attribution continues to be debated for a long time, divided between Torelli and Vivaldi. Suddenly discovering that J. S. Bach also made a transcription for solo keyboard of this same composition, my attention was completely caught: I wanted to know more about this piece.

In order to do so, I collected as much biographical information as I could about Giuseppe Torelli and the environment in which he lived. The results of this first process are presented in Chapter 1.

Then I focused on the genre of the concerto and I tried to delineate its evolution, with particular attention to Torelli's activity and production, in order to understand what has really been his role and his contribution to this field. The results of this are presented in Chapter 2.

Once I got more confident with the style and the musical production of Torelli, I focused on the concerto A.2.3.9 – for which I produced the edition included in the Appendix. Using this concerto as a case study, I wanted to challenge myself by trying to apply the knowledge I built for myself about this composer on a concrete composition, in order to discover possible new evidences regarding this mysterious concerto or at least to have a personal opinion in this debate. My reasoning is presented in Chapter 3, before coming to a conclusion about the entire process.

Introduction

Table of contents

Tip

Tip