Giuseppe Verdi - Les vepres siciliennes (1855) - The Four Seasons Ballet - II. Spring

"Scribe offends the French because Frenchmen are massacred; he offends the Italians by altering the historic character of Procida into the conventional conspirator beloved by the Scribe system, and thrusts the inevitable dagger into his hand. In any case, I am first of all an Italian, and whatever happens I will not become an accomplice in offending my country" - Verdi about "I vespri siciliani".

I have to admit that I have yet to go beyond my rather limited, to say the least, knowledge on the musician who is probably Italy's most celebrated composer - the beloved Giuseppe Verdi - though I am trying to slowly make up for this unfortunate omission. Thus formed this new series of four uploads that centers on one of the maestro's earlier works - the complete ballet sequence from the original French version of "Les vepres siciliennes" (better known in its' Italian setting as "I vespri siciliani").

Verdi's omnipresent melodic inventiveness notwithstanding, the main interest of the piece lies in its' nod in the direction of time-honored and beloved tradition of writing musical pieces themed around the constant changes of nature's seasons, putting Verdi alongside such luminaries as Purcell (among the many pageants that form the half-opera "The Fairy Queen" one can find a series of four songs attributed to each of the seasons), Haydn and, of course, Vivaldi.

The long ballet, set in five movements, including a short opening prelude (ending at 1:12 in the first part of the series), actually proved a bit unbalanced on the first few hearings: about half of the scene, I would estimate, is rather pedestrian and mostly added to bring the ballet to a full twenty minutes filled with unexceptional bass lines to simply suit the dancers' motions and the original company's luxurious production. However, after a bit of deliberation, one has to admit that it works quite well, especially considering the overtly Italianate character of Verdi's music and his relative inexperience at the time with the French style; moreover, each section of the scene conceals hidden treasures that make the whole more than worthwhile: the lovely, albeit painfully traditional, flute bird song which predictably opens "Spring"; the witty "ice-skating" episode set to a moderato vivace combination of winds and strings in "Winter" (3:40); the beautifully sustained andantino with a haunting oboe line of "Summer" (one of the shorter but musically most enjoyable sections) and the hunting motives of "Autumn". The extreme charm of these flashes of creativity and good humor herald the influence of the lighter works of Auber and Rossini on Verdi's composition: in particular, the above-mentioned winter episode brings me back to some of my uploads for the "Rare Belcanto" collection - the Allegretto of the first ballet from Auber's "Gustave III" (which would later be set by Verdi as "Il ballo"); the oboe obbligato - to the similarly languorous harp accompaniment of Boieldieu's stunning harp concerto. On a side note, the buzzing nature effects that form the background of the bird call remind one of the "Aviary" section from the Saint-Saens' later "Le carnaval des animaux". Curiously, Verdi discards most of the traditional sentiments linked with the specific seasons themselves: thus, winter, in part because it opens the concerto, is the jolliest of the four movements, while the dominance of the andantino in "Summer" makes it one of the most moving sections.

I am using the rendition of the ballet that appears on Opera Rara's exceptional recording of the complete French version of Verdi's first thoughts on the score played by the BBC Concert Orchestra which is conducted by Ashley Lawrence.

Hope you'll enjoy :).

P.S. All the musical quotes that I mention in the description can be found in my videos, so, if someone should find himself or herself curious to compare, I would urge you to browse through the various playlists displayed on my channel.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Verdi
• belcanto
• ballet
• romantic
• classical
• four
• seasons
• quattro
• stagioni
• vespri
• siciliani

[aprojoci]

thanks..:)