Luogo e data di registrazione		Kirche, Séon (Svizzera) - 5-7 giugno 1978
	Registrazione: live / studio		studio
	Producer / Engineer		Gerd Berg / Johann-Nikolaus Matthes
	Prima Edizione LP		EMI Electrola "Reflexe" - 1C 065-45 642 - (1 lp) - durata 50' 04" - (p) 1979 - Analogico
	Prima Edizione CD		EMI "Classics" - 8 26517 2 - (1 cd) - durata 50' 04" - (c) 2000 - ADD
	Note		-

DUETTI ITALIANI The art of duetting is certainly as old as music itself for what could be more satisfying than one’s own instrument but two ofthe same? The resulting interaction of two performers and their exchange of musical ideas creates an intensity and vitality that is perhaps unique in the world of chamber music. Two equal instruments allow the possibility of alternating the musical functions of melody and accompaniment, challenging each performer to match the other, often in quick succession. Considering the popularity of the lute in the Renaissance, it is hardly surprising that the lute duet became so important and influential. The size and diversity of this repertoire, over five hundred extant pieces representing nearly every style and form of Renaissance music, is remarkable. The duet literature contains many works of great musical sophistication and profundity, such as Terzi’s Contrapunto sopra Petit Jaquet and Piccinini's Toccata à dui Liuti, and many with no pretense to more than entertainment or instruction. These latter, including heterophonic dances and short contrapuntal exercises, make up in spirit what they may lack in loftier characteristics. Renaissance duets thus provide the lutenist with a literature of extraordinary energy and challenge. Within this repertoire, Italian duets stand apart in terms of variety and virtuosity. While most European countries treated the lute duet as ‘Gebrauchsmusik’, in Italy it was part of the professionals standard repertoire. Whereas in England, for example, duets were frequently used as individual display pieces, one performer executing spectacular variations over the chordal accompaniment of the other, in Italy the same high degree of technical proficiency was often demanded of both players, elaborate flourishes being tossed back and forth. Not intoxicated by sheer virtuosity, however, the Italians made numerous tonal experiments, combining lutes of various tunings and sizes to create special timbres and to help distinguish polyphonic lines more clearly. The duets on the present recording represent seven distinct types:     1. counterpoint against a chanson or madrigal     2. melody over a drone     3. counterpoint over a "cantus firmus"     4. intabulation of a pre-existing vocal or instrumental work     5. melodic variations over a repeated harmonic pattern (ground)     6. a solo fantasia with a new, superimposed second lute part     7. entirely original compositions not based on any pre-existing material. Early duetting was an improvisatory art, as Johannes Tinctoris explained in his De Inventions et Usu Musicae of 1484: “Thus some teams will take the treble of any piece you care to give them and improvise marvellously upon it with such taste that the performance cannot be rivalled. Among such, Pietro Bono (Avogari), lutenist to Ercole, Duke of Ferrara, is in my opinion pre-eminent.” Bono, the most renowned virtuoso of the fifteenth century, was assisted by a ‘tenorista’, who supplied either a drone, cantus firmus, or the lower voices of a chanson, over which the master improvised fanciful disivions. Early sixteenth century duets in the “counterpoint against a chanson” style maintain a clear separation of the roles of soloist and accompanist, the treble lute ornamenting the cantus line or improvising a new discantus, while the tenorista provided a simplified version of the lower two parts. Later in the century, the accompaniment was expanded to include all the voices of the vocal model. The resultant fuller texture delegated more interest to the accompaniment, leaving the counterpoint less exposed, and thus reassigning its earlier solistic role to one of commentary, sometimes taking melodic initiative, sometimes supplying a textual background to the now selfsufficient accompaniment. The master of this new style was Giovanni Antonio Terzi, whose books of 1593 and 1599 contain some of the most sophisticated lute music ever published. His Contrapunto sopra Petit Jaquet covers an incredible three and one-half octave range, including breath-taking leaps and jazzy syncopations. The Saltatello and Piva of Dalza represent the last remnants of the medieval tradition of improvisation over a drone. The repetitive nature of a drone allowed the improviser to utilize his extensive "bag of tricks", including hemiolas and dissonances. The main responsibilities of the tenorista were rhythmic drive and solidity, although he certainly added a few cross-rhythms and ornaments of his own. La Spagna was the most popular cantus during the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. In Francesco da Milano’s setting it is concealed in the middle of a chordal accompaniment over which he composed a graceful, flowing countermelody. Although not one of Francesco's more involved works, it makes a pleasant contrast to the complex polyphony for which he is primarily known. The skill of a lutenist was often judged by his ability to devise imaginative arrangements of chansons, madrigals, motets and canzonas. In making these intabulations, a lutenist rarely maintained the precise notes of the original, but usually employed a certain amount of ornamentation rendering them more idiomatic for his instrument. The lute cannot sustain the long notes commonly Found in vocal music, as the sound of a plucked string dies rapidly. These long notes were replaced with scale passages through which the lutenist could crescendo or decrescendo as a singer would do on a sustained note. Three contrasting approaches to intabulation are represented on this recording. The Gloria from Lassus' Missa Super Dixit Joseph is mostly unembellished, runs having been added only as was deemed necessary to facilitate phrasing. Canti di voi le ladi and Amor e gratioso are somewhat more elaborately embellished, but the basic structure of the originals remain. Claudio da Correggio’s two Canzone on the other hand, are barely recognizable through Terzi’s flamboyant ornamentation. The new works which result, however, attest to the artistry oflan imaginative intabulater. Such artistic license was as controversial then as it is today. Writers such as Ganassi and Zacconi contended that performers who didn't ornament were not thought well of by their colleagues, while Josquin and Zarlino, among others, argued that ornamentation was unnecessary and served only to disrupt the counterpoint. Contrasting the complexities of vocal music are the simple repeated harmonies of the ground bass dances. The two most common Renaissance grounds were the Passamezo antico and the Passamezo moderno: Borrono’s Pavana Milanese and Saltarello are based on the former, Pcoloni's Passamezo and Saltarello on the latter. The chord progressions of Chi passa are derived from a street song ofthe same name. Although the Contrapunto secondo begins like a Passamezo moderno, there are no repeated paterns, and, in fact, both of the so-called “grounds” to B.M.'s Contrapunti are through-composed in a madrigalesque manner, These pieces are essentially ricercars, one lute functioning in a predominately harmonic fashion, the other providing rhythmic and melodic impetus. In 1559, the Flemish lutenist Johannes Matelart published several of Francesco da Milano's solo fantasias, to which he had composed a second lute part. These new parts, while partly obscuring the original compositions, enrich the texture with additional points of imitation, parallel thirds, and parallel sixths, creating a lushness of sound immatched at this early date. The latest surviving Renaissance duet, and perhaps the most spectacular, is the Toccata à dui Liuti by Alessandro Piccinini. Not content with the strict separation of melody and accompaniment roles, Piccinini at times supplies passagework in both parts simultaneously. Moving either in parallel or in contrary motion, this device builds energy and aids in gathering momentum. Although the contrapuntal style is that of the Renaissance, the contrasting sectionalism ushers in the world of the Baroque. The grand dimensions of this piece bring to a close the era of the Renaissance lute duet and serve as an appropriate finale to this recording. Paul O'Dette
EMI Electrola "Reflexe"