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FAGIOLINI
Carnevale Veneziano: The Comic faces of Giovanni Croce
2001
CD
Chandos CHAN 0665
75:34
I Fagiolini - a leading Early Music ensemble directed by Robert
Hollingworth - perform two sets of comic carnival masquerades by the
Venetian composer, Giovanni Croce (1557-1609): 'Mascarate piacevoli et
ridicolose per il carnevale' (1590) and 'Triaca Musicale' (1595). Croce
was a singer at the Basilica of St Mark, the private chapel of the Duke
of Venice, but was also author of secular music and a director of popular
entertainment.
The masquerades were performed in costumes and masks, probably as banquet
entertainment or insertions into theatrical productions, and were full
of wit and satire. They featured commedia dell'arte characters
such as Pantalone and Dr Grazziano, "a bumbling old Bolognese professor
whose mispronounced words result in coarse gaffes". Shrill women and oafish
foreigners with stereotypically thick accents are the butt of natural,
but now politically incorrect, humour.
The masques are themselves here interspersed with lute and other instrumentals,
and are delivered with theatrical effects such as the sound of rolling
dice which capture the nature and purpose of the originals.
Translations of the Italian give some indication of the verbal wit, but
this is more certainly and cleverly captured for English ears by the inclusion
of a bonus track featuring a version of 'O, Gramo Pantalone' by
Timothy Knapman which aims to mirror - as opposed to translate
- the original.
Rik - 21 August 2001
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