Veneziana n. 1 per Luigi Nono (2007) electroacoustic music [8’40”]
Premiered at EMUFest, Sala Accademica del Conservatorio “S. Cecilia”, Roma, November 14th 2010
Veneziana n. 2 per Mario Messinis (2007) electroacoustic music [17’ 10”]
Premiered at Sala Tartini del Conservatorio “Giuseppe Tartini”, Trieste, November 24th 2010
Veneziana n. 3 per Alvise Vidolin (2007) 6 tracks electroacoustic music [8’ 40”]
Premiered at Conservatorio di musica “F.A.Bonporti”, Riva del Garda, May 3rd 2008
The “Veneziana” series rises from my unconscious as a symbolic farewell to Venezia and to three persons who played an important role in my professional development.
March 2007: I am preparing the “choirs” for the revised version of Un avatar del diavolo, a musical theatre work based on Antonin Artaud text and commissioned to me by the Biennale di Venezia in 2005. The idea is to add vocal tonal harmonies to three scenes in order to evoke the image of the bourgeoisie, who judges and finds Artaud guilty. These “choirs” are randomly broken into atonal gestures by the passion of the male actor voice on the scene. It is natural for me to take inspiration from Jean-Philippe Rameau who set the rules of tonal harmony. On the other hand he is already present in the 4th interlude (called “xilophonie”) to mention Artaud love for XVIII Century French dances.
The starting point for these choirs is the recording of Marianne Pousseur singing – extremely slow as I asked her – the melodic line of Vénitienne, an harpsichord piece by Rameau. “Veneziana” (Vénitienne) was the name for a composition form of satirical and burlesque content, a form practised also by Andrea Gabrieli.
As I am working on this sound material using some of the techniques experienced by Nono for his last compositions with live electronics – delays, resonant filtering, riverberation – I feel more and more the results as a nostalgic farewell to Venezia. As a matter of fact after 30 years I am leaving this incomparable town to come back to my birthplace, Genova. So I decide to select three different structures from the obtained materials to be arranged ad libitum according the desired “harmonic” stream.
A deep sense of gratitude to Luigi Nono goes with Veneziana n. 1, to Mario Messinis with Veneziana n. 2, to Alvise Vidolin with Veneziana n. 3.