Squalid and Obscure: Timbral Word Painting at the Arpa Doppia

Hannah Rose (Kit) Spencer

Name: Kit (Hannah Rose) Spencer Main Subject: Baroque Harp Research Supervisor: Kate Clark Title of Research: Squalid and Obscure: Timbral Word Painting at the Arpa Doppia Research Question: Can timbral refinement, through synthesized notation and subsequent technical exercises, enhance contrast and word painting in arpa doppia continuo realisations of Seconda Prattica songs? Summary of Results: While functionally versatile, the arpa doppia, an Italian harp of imposing size with multiple layers of resonating strings, revealed its nature as fondamento, in the subtle art of continuo. Direct contact with the open strings gave singers, accompanying themselves on the harp, unparalleled control over the instrument’s timbral potential. This is reflected in the role of the instrument within musica secreta, private concerts at the courts of Ferrara and Modena stylistically favouring word painting and chromaticism, in ensembles such as the concerto delle donna and Baroni sisters. The expressive freedom of their art influenced poets and composers and contributed to the development of the seconda prattica at the turn of the sixteenth century. Indeed, voice and harp were held up as the ideal way to perform epic poetry, a reflection of the mesmerising contrast and colour their combined forces could deliver. How do we find this unique skill-set today from a broken line of tradition, contending with limited, conflicting primary resources? There is very little surviving repertoire specific to the instrument, and other sources such as paintings are static representations with considerable variation in position and placement of the instrument, body and hands, making it hard to replicate. In the years dedicated to exploring the arpa doppia, we harpists uncover these insights through shared motions and motivations of our forebears— finding a way to play like them by trying to vividly colour the text as they did. This is a way artistic research can bring to life the spectrum of lost practice and technique. My research has resulted in the creation of timbral notation for the arpa doppia, easily added to music notation and publishing software. This notation is designed to help recreate as much as possible all the timbral refinement found by the hands of masterful singer-harpists. It documents, builds upon and preserves the invaluable research of historical practitioners, using visual, contact-based diagrams to provide clarity in understanding this evocative and highly specialised art form. With this foundation of timbre and text, it aims to reconstitute the virtuosity, influence and innovation of the original arpa doppia players, through our shared practice today.  Biography: While playing as the Australian Youth Orchestra's Principal Harpist, and as a fellow of the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, Kit Spencer's Honours degree culminated in studying Berio's infamous Sequenza II with its foremost interpreter, Alice Giles. Her passion for colour, gesture and bass lead her to arpa doppia, beginning with Andrew Lawrence King's St. Petersburg production of Landi's La Morte d'Orfeo and Monteverdi's L'Orfeo in Bauska Castle, Latvia.

1.3 Stylistic Terminology

Musica Secreta or musica reservata are terms used to describe the style developed in private concerts of chamber music commissioned and held by courts in Germany and Italy during the mid to late 16th Century. Noted characteristics of the style were its predilection for word-painting¹ and chromaticism². This paper primarily refers to the Musica Secreta of Modena and Ferrara, specifically the ensembles the Baroni sisters and concerto delle donna.

Seconda Pratica was a term coined by Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643) for innovations breaking from compositional style lead by rigorous counterpoint and polyphony of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina towards music driven by text. This resulted in more harmonically focused monody, and gave rise to basso-continuo, where only the bass and harmonic indications are given, allowing instrumentalists to accompany while focusing on the lyrical or melodic exertions of the soloist. The style began at the start of the 16th Century, with Monteverdi and Guilio Caccini (1551-1618), but drew influence from composers such as Cipriano de Rore (1515-1565) and his pupil Luzzasco Luzzaschi, (1545-1607) a composer of Musica Secreta at Ferrara.^₃

Word Painting or Madrigalism is the colouring of lyric text through the manipulation of elements. This may be employed by the composer through harmony, such as in Monteverdi’s madrigal “Cruda Amarilli”, where he used an unprepared dominant seven chord on the word cruda, meaning ‘cruel’, to support the meaning with a harsher dissonance.⁴ It may also be used by performers, in ornamentation, diminution, or in this case, the change of tone colour.

1.4 Anatomy of the Harp 101 and Other Harp Terminology

FOOTNOTES

1. Pantaleon, Heinrich. Prosopographia Heroum Atque Illustrium Virorum Totius Germaniae. Vol. iii. Basileae: Brylinger, 1566, pp. 541

2. Vicentino, Nicola. L'antica musica ridotta alla moderna prattica. Rome: Antonio Barre, 1555

3. Monteverdi, Claudio. "Dichiaratione Della Lettera" Scherzi musicali. Ed: Monteverdi, Giulio Cesare. Venezia: Ricciardo Amadino, 1607, pp. 2

4. Decker, Gregory J. “Strategies for Opposition, Ambiguity, and ‘Amarilli’ in the ‘Seconda Pratica’ Italian Madrigal.” Intégral, 28/29, 2014, pp. 192., www.jstor.org/stable/24713637

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