Luogo e data di registrazione		-
	Registrazione: live / studio		studio
	Producer		-
	Prima Edizione LP		Telefunken - 6.42174 AW - (1 LP) - LC 0366 - durata 51' 44" - (p) 1977 - Analogico
	Edizione "Reference" CD		Tedec - 8.43774 ZS - (1 CD) - LC 3706 - durata 51' 44" - (c) 1987 - AAD
	Cover		Detail aus einem barocken Bilderrahmen mit König David, Musen, Tugenden und Lastem. Buchsbaumholz / Holland gegen 1670, mit freundlicher Genehmigung des Museums für Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg
	Note		-

The Italian composer Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583-1643) was admired and revered by his contemporaries as a brilliant singer, a powerful organ and harpsichord player and an extraordinary improvisor. If one can believe the chroniclers of yesteryear, his organ playing (Frescobaldi was organist at the famous St. Peters cathedral in Rome for the last 35 years of his life) attracted masses of listeners — sometimes as many as 30,000 people. Frescobaldi’s compatriot and contemporary Severino Bonini (1582—1663), one of the earliest exponents of the monodic style, testified to his considerable reputation as a practising musician with the pithy remark: ‘‘Nowadays anybody not playing according to his style is not appreciated”. Another indication of the considerable esteem in wich Frescobaldi was held also as a composer during his lifetime is the fact that the important composer and Vienna court organist Johann Jacob Froberger (1618-1667) — regarded as the founder of the piano suite — studied for four years with his older Italian colleague at the court’s expense. Although the image of a brilliant music personality might today appear to have paled somewhat, due to the enormous distance in time of three and a half centuries, the historical significance of the most important representative of early baroque Italian instrumental music is by no means underestimated by musicology. Thus Girolamo Frescobaldi is justifiably regarded as the great renewer of Italian instrumental music at the beginning of the 17th century, who combined the polyphonic techniques and instrumental forms of his predecessors Andrea Gabrieli, Claudio Merulo and Giovanni Gabrieli in his work and further developed them into new musical qualities. Together with Claudio Monteverdi, who in the field of vocal and operatic music achieved epoch-making significance, it was Frescobaldi with his brilliant creative spirit who led Italian instrumental music ‘‘from the academic strictness of form of the renaissance period to the strength of expression, liveliness and finely jointed structure of the early baroque style” (Claudio Sartori). Compositions for organ make up the most important part of Frescobaldi’s wide-ranging creative work. However, the works for harpsichord also play a major role, both as regards quantity and quality. Many of his works — which have been preserved in exemplary original printings in tablature form (i.e., in the six and eightline system) and partly also in copies — were expressly intended by Frescobaldi himself to be played by harpsichord and organ (“DI CEMBALO ET ORGANO") The range of forms to which Frescobaldi had recourse is also diverse. In addition to Ricecar, Canzon and Fantasia - predecessors of the fugue - there are the forms of the Toccata, the Capriccio and of the Partita. In his hands these traditional forms are developed into artistic formations of strong structural uniformity and major formal integration. In their occasionally rich chromatics and colourful harmony, their richness of inspiration and in their technical performance virtuoso style, these works have maintained their unbroken effective strength across the centuries. The present gramophone record spotlights Frescobaldi’s interesting piano style in the forms of the Canzone, Capriccio, the Toccata and of the Partita. Typical for Frescobaldi’s canzoni (examples): "Canzona Terza”’ from the “Second book of toccatas, canzoni...” and the “‘Canzon Terza detta la Crivelli” from "Canzoni alla Francese’’) are, in addition to the development of fugue expositions, a varied but nevertheless clearly structured overall form, evenly flowing motion, colourful harmony influencing the entire construction and the adherence to a single theme which returns in changing shapes in every section. This type of “Variations Canzone” developed by Frescobaldi now replaced the former “‘Contrast Canzone" of the renaissance. The Capriccio, which in form is related to the Canzone (example: ‘Capriccio sopra la Bassa Fiamenga'' from the ‘First Book of Capricci, Canzoni and Ricercare .. ."') displays greater independence in arrangement compared to the other forms. In content it is freer and more multifaceted, and at the same time clearly indicates varied compositional and performance practice intentions and emotions. In the Toccatas (examples: “Toccata Nona” and ‘Toccata Decima" from the “First Book of Toccatas and Partitas” and ‘“Toccata Nona” from the “Second Book of Toccatas and Partitas. . ."') Frescobaldi reveals his magnificent art of playing which was so greatly admired by his contemporaries, as already referred to. The frequent change from broad chordal surfaces, strongly figured and, in some cases, virtuoso set passages, as well as imitative sections results in wider emotional diversity and creates dramatic tensions. English and Dutch variation techniques, with which the young Frescobaldi became acquainted at first hand during his stay in Flanders (1607/08) are reflected in the Partitas (examples: “Cento Partite sopra Passacagli” and "Partite 14 sopra l'Aria della Romanesca'' from the ‘‘First Book of Toccatas and Partitas.... .""). A musical speciality is the *'Partite sopra Passacagli"' with its 14 variations. In this work elements of the variation, of the suite and of the passacaglia amalgamate to become music of grand formal compactness. A word on the interpretation of the Frescobaldi works. The composer prefaced his various books of organ and keyboard works which appeared in print with remarks which contain some revealing advice on the interpretation of his pieces. For instance he placed especial importance on a style of performance which accorded with the particular form and the appropriate tonal character. Among other things, he demanded that the “‘style of play . . . should not be rigidly subordinated to the measure”; which meant that ‘“‘the measure should now be played slowly and then quickly, or then even suspended, according to the expression or meaning. . .” In the demand for a “fully expressive’, “‘lively’’ and “tasteful” interpretation, Frescobaldi thus became the precursor of an interpretation style which was to find its most consistent realisation in the individual rubato playing of the nineteenth century. Siegmar Keil English translation by Frederick A. Bishop