Review: Ornamentation Galore Author(s): Robert Donington Source: The Musical Times, Vol. 110, No. 1517 (Jul.

, 1969), pp. 738-739 Published by: Musical Times Publications Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/954067 . Accessed: 31/05/2011 13:36
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Ornamentation Galore
Robert Donington ANDEMTHE ART OFORNAMENTATION
AND BAROQUE Devised by Denis Stevens,with the cooperationof MartinBernstein;producedby SeymourSolomon
VANGUARD 0 VSL 11044-5 (57s 2d)

IN THE RENAISSANCE ornamentation'ssake; and if this is what we want BELLISHMENT

for curiosity. But it is, let us face it, ornamentation

Since Music is by common consent a woman, she cannot get very far without ornamentation. There are the structuralnotes, and there is the figuration. The structurecannot be much altered without significantlyaltering the music. But the figurationcan be, and often is. For the figuration, whoeverprovides it and however, is not structural but ornamental. It was the general 19th-centuryassumptionthat the composerwrote what he wanted, and got what he wrote. Not so with much of our best modern music; and not so in the 18th century and earlier. Our difficulty with early music is first to know enough, and then to be bold enough, and above all to be creative enough. In all this, the pair of recordsdevised by Denis Stevens should help many people.' Ornamentationis on the one hand part of the history of composition:especiallyof variationtechnique and variation form; for here it is above all true that the improvisationof today becomes the composition of tomorrow. Much of this recording is simply a useful study in music history. On the other hand, ornamentation is also part of the history of performance:ie now the practiceof performance,since we want to do it again. But here, too, there is a distinctionto be drawnbetween two brancheswhich, althoughthey overlap, are not the same. There was first that highly sophisticatedparlour game taught by Ganassi, Ortiz, Finck, Bovicelli, Morley,Simpsonand othersfor using givenmaterial more or less impromptu as a musical vaultinghorse; all very enjoyable for the performer, and perhapsfor a listenerwhose turn was coming next, but for the generallistener only enjoyable in those rare instanceswhere genius goes into it. Most surviving specimensare tedious, like those broad acres of German colouration on the organ, with so few green pastures: yet out of this came the great tradition of chorale variations. Important as history, therefore,but not as performancepractice. The same with Bovicelli'sornamentalreworkingsof Palestrinaand the like. Either a genius does them, and you get new compositions based on old ones, like the wonderfullypoetical divisions of Ortiz on existingchansons, or in the case of Simpson on his own ground basses. Or not, and you get old compositions spoiled by inferiorelaborations. We may wish to try this as a historical exercise or as a
'There is some comparable ornamentation on Denis Stevens's excellent recording of Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli, HMV HQS 1093 (described by Denis Stevens, MT Sept 1967, p.798). This ornamentation, added by Denis Stevens, is extremely good except in one particular: some ornamentation is used on the last notes of phrases, which should be points of arrival, and therefore left plain. Cf Giovanni Camillo Maffei, Delle lettere (Naples, 1562), pp.5-81, 3rd Rule: 'one ought to make the [ornamental] passage on the penultimate syllable of the word, so that, with the ending of the word, the passage is also ended'.

idiom we can perhapsbetterdo it in an avant-garde which has presentvalue. Second, there was ornamentationfor the music's sake. And this has present value because it is needed for the full performance of early music which has present value. But then everything depends on how it is done. Side 1 band 1 of this recording has an aria with written out ornamentation,composed by Antonio Archileifor his yet more famous wife, Vittoria;and the chief lesson to be learnt from it is that no singer much less magnificentthan, say, Joan Sutherland, who is our modernArchilei,can do full justiceto so brillianta branchof virtuoso bel canto. Band 2 has the Deller Consortsinginga four-part madrigal by Ciprianode Rore in that rather manneredbut sensitivestyle of theirs; and AlfredDeller, in whom the manner is very great artistry,singing Bovicelli's figurationof its top line so artfully,yet seemingly so spontaneously, that it sounds near perfect. I rememberTobin's written-outornamentation for Messiah: only Alfred Deller and Peter Pearssangsuchpassagesas if they weremakingthem up as they went along, withoutwhichornamentation (whetherimprovisedor written-out,and by whomsoever writtenout) never can sound right at all. Band 3 has a Merulocanzona in four plain parts on viols (Jaye Consort, a little reticent but a nice sound); then in Merulo's florid organ version (Anton Heiller, a little unflowingly):a fine piece; but it has more to do with composition than with performancepractice. Band 4 is a frottola, anonymous and ratherdull, both plain and coloured; and sung with a queerpushingon to the middleof notes which ratherspoils the line. Band 5 is a splendid four-part madrigal by Francescode Layolle, together with an ornamentation of it taken from the famous letter (1562) by that early champion of bel canto, Maffei. This fine specimen of written-outornamentationis remarkbeautiful. So is the ably like Ortiz, and remarkably singing by the Ambrosian Consort: sensitive, but also robust; not in the least mannered;and sounding to my ears very right and naturalin this music (both when plain and when coloured). Band 6 is a perfect peach of a four-part Lied by Hofhaimer, simple, exquisite and inspired. The moral here is how much worse it sounds on the organ with elaborate but uninspiredcolouration by Kleber. Side 2 Band 1 has some of Ortiz's truly inspired ornamentation to Sandrin's four-part Douce memoire;but this can sound better with viols (or at least the bass viol) kept going on the plain parts as well as on the ornamentingparts. The treble viol here (Francis Baines) is not quite bold enough, although the bass viol (JenniferRyan) gets strong and musicianlyhandling. Band 2 is Deller at his wonderfulbest, well supported in the plain version of Robert Parsons's by the WenzingerConsortof stage song, Pandolpho, Viols; and still better in the colouredversionby that fine lutenist, Desmond Dupr6. And here indeed is an excellentspecimenof ornamentation used not for

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its own sake, but for the music'ssake. There is not very much of it; and that little is entirelyexpressive. Deller's lightnessis a lesson in itself. with some Band 3 is from the Combattimento, ornamentationby Monteverdi, and more (a little too much,but all of it good and exciting)presumably by Denis Stevens. Edgar Fleet comes up as a finely impassioned Monteverdian tenor; and Harold Lester as one of the very few harpsichordists who know what to do in this kind of music,and have the imagination to do what they know. It makes a difference. Fleet sings again on Band 5: a song by Thomas Brewer,with contemporaryornamentation in the second verse. Band4 is a Frenchfour-partsong by Bodsset,and its ornamentation (in the sopranoline) by Moulini6. Who says the Frenchdid not do it? This must have been just after de Nyert's return from Rome as a very convincedand very influentialteacherin Paris of Italian bel canto. The performancehere rather the ornaments,insteadof slippingthem overstresses in lightlyand as if spontaneously. Band 6 gives a Corelli Adagio played first as printed, plain, in the ordinary editions. It is, of course, nothing but the structural notes for a melody thus far non-existent. So it generallygets playedtoday; and so it first gets playedhere, with a full measure of over-weightedmodern violin tone and a total absenceof the cadentialtrillswhicheven this bare notation implies. Then comes the ornamented version published by Roger around 1710, with ornamentalfigurationattributed(correctly,as Denis Stevens well argues-though in any case it would still be of the period) to Corelli. But the fiddling remains as modern as before: over-heavy, over-fussy, overdone in every way. Even the trills have their endings weighted bread-and-butter and sustained in the literal, old-fashionedmodern way. Odd, because the same fiddler (Eduard Melkus)does some good work later on. So does the harpsichordist(Anton Heiller); but here he gilds of his own for the lily with counter-ornamentation which there is just room, physically,but no place at all artisticallyin accompanyingthis already rather dizzily ornamentedsolo. The blackerthe notes, the lighterthe performance needs to be. You just want to hang the ornamentation casually between the stronger notes of the melody (mainly the harmonic notes). Pounding it out buries the structureand coarsens the ornamentation alike. Side 3 band 1 is a Couperinmenuetand double. The half-trills(tremblements before-the-beat lies) are due, of Couperin'srather I think, to a misunderstanding ambiguous table of ornaments in his Pieces de clavecin (other contemporary French tables are clearer). The performance sounds a shade too calculated for true French grace. The double is rightly played as a subsequent movement rather than as an ornamentationof the repeats (just the opposite of Bach's ornamentationfor sarabandsin the English suites, and indeed of the earlier ornamentationsin this Ordreof Couperin's). Band 2, with Bach's ornamentationof Marcello, so incrediblybetter than its plain original, simply proves what genius can achieve that talent cannot. A better performance:but too much is still being made of the ornamentation. You must make the least of it if you want to get the most out of it. Caccini'sword for this would have been sprezzatura: gentlemanly nonchalance. Band 3 is jolly Vivaldi ornamentedinto inspired Bach. Igor Kipnis plays the Bach extremelywell.

but the ornamental Band 4 is not ornamentation, realization,by Anton Heiller,of a Vivaldicontinuo. This instance needs imaginativelybut not melodically figuratearpeggiation,to keep up the interest without coming to blows with the pulsatingstrings. Instead, it is forced into cumbersome,concerto-like melody, misjudgedin style, in taste and in century. Band 5 is a Handel da capo aria to which a little ornamentationshould have been added the first time through; and more than is here given, the second time; but what is given(presumably by Denis of Stevens)is good. Band 6 reveals the inferiority Handel's (or anyone else's) ornamentationto J. S. Bach's;but it wouldsound muchbetterif it werenot made so pretentiously conspicuous in the performance. To paraphrase an improper Chinese is seen to be inevitable, saying: when ornamentation relax. The Nardini on side 4 band I is a furtherdemonstrationof fiddlingfreshfrom Tchaikovsky-where, do not misunderstandme, it would be very good. Band 2 is exquisitely innocent Telemann for flute violin (Stanic)and strings, (Meylan),oboe (Lardrot), with tactful and inventive ornamentation in the three solos, all played in fine and proper style. Band 3 is dullish Quantz, with his own dullishly elaborate ornamentation:but Stastny'sapparently baroquefluteis dead in tune and beautifullyplayed; is just right this time, with Heiller'saccompaniment a few felicitous touches of imaginativeornamentation to match the flute without impedingit. Band 4 has Berard'sslight but fascinatingornaments for a Rameau aria, with PatriciaClark here singing very well, and more good accompaniment from Harold Lester. On band 5, Anton Heiller again fails to get quiteenough of a naturalcantilena into C. P. E. Bach's sensitivelyornamentedreprise. Band 6 is the best treat of the set: the unusually inspiredGrave of a Telemanntrio sonata, with his own quitebeautifulornamentation, quitebeautifully played by Stastny (baroque flute), Eduard Melkus that partly what got (baroque violin and bow-is him so into style here?) and Anton Heiller (harpsichord). The baroque sonorities really do make a wonderfuldifference:even more than I would have expected. Thereis much here to be learntand much to be enjoyed. Band 7 is Gluck's 'Che faro' from CharlesMackerras's recordingof Orfeoed Euridice.2 Mackerras's championshipof the normal habits of 18th-centurymusicianship sounds right, is right, and is getting to be known to be right. A mixed bag then, but a good one, and I hope I may have contributedto making the best possible use of it.
2See

Ludwig Fischer, 'Che faro senza Euridice: Ein Beitrag zur Festschrift Hans Engel zum siebzigsten Gluck-Interpretation'. Geburtstag (Kasse!, 1964), pp.96-110, for a remarkable 18thcentury version of this justly celebrated aria with ornamentation as sung by Guadagni: a version known to and in part followed by Mackerras. The disputed 'inequality' is shown here, though as a matter of taste (not of authenticity) I do feel it may be a little too jerky for this idyllic context. See also Winton Dean's review, MT Aug 1968, p.733; and a letter from Charles Mackerras, MT Oct 1968, p.919.

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