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Sebastián RAVAL (c1550 - 1604): "Ricercari & Canzonette"
La Violondrina
Dir: María Saturno
rec: July 16 - 18, 2023, Saelices de la Sal (Guadalajara), Ermita de la Sal
Brilliant Classics - 97226 (© 2024) (53'12")
Liner-notes: E; lyrics - no translations
Cover, track-list & booklet
Spotify
Chiari zaffir son gl'occhi;
Corri alma mia;
De stelle nelle chiome;
Dimmi se cieco sei;
E come veggio la mia morte;
Ondeggiavano a l'aura;
Qual fenice morendo;
Ricercar del 1º tuono;
Ricercar del 1º tono, trasportato in quattro fughe d’accordo;
Ricercar del 2º tono, trasportato in quattro fughe d’accordo;
Ricercar del 3º tono naturale;
Ricercar del 6º tono naturale;
Ricercar del 9º tuono;
Ricercar del 10º tuono;
Ricercar del 11º tono, trasportato in quattro fughe d’accordo;
S'el fuoco me lontan;
Se per un solo scherno;
Valor heroico son;
Viderunt te aque Deus per Organum
Sources:
[1] Il primo libro di canzonette, 1593;
[2] Il primo libro di ricercari … 4 o 6 opere con parole spirituali, in canoni ad echo, 1596
Victoria Cassano, soprano;
María Saturno, Xurxo Varela, María Barajas, Sara Ruiz, viola da gamba;
Jorge López-Escribano, organ
In the course of music history several composers have been involved in a contest with colleagues. The most famous of these contests is the one between Domenico Scarlatti and George Frideric Handel in Rome. It went out undecided, and therefore did not harm the reputation of either of them. Another famous contest is that between Johann Sebastian Bach and Louis Marchand, which in fact did not happen. Although the story of Marchand's being afraid of the confrontation and sneaking off is probably not authentic, it certainly has damaged Marchand's posthumous reputation. The composer to whom the disc under review is devoted, is another one whose reputation has been damaged by a contest, in this case Achille Falcone.
Raval was born in Cartagena in Spain. He entered the military as a young man, and participated in the war of Spain against the revolting Netherlands. In 1579 he was severely wounded during the capture of Maastricht, which left him crippled. He therefore entered a convent; in 1592 he was accepted by the order of St John of Jerusalem (also known as the Knights of Malta).
Apparently nothing is known about his musical education, but that must have been thorough, as in the 1580s he seems to have been active as a musician at the court of Duke Francesco Maria II della Rovere in Urbino. In 1592 he went to Rome, where in the next two years he published a book of madrigals and one with canzonettas. At the same time two collections of sacred music - motets and Lamentations of Jeremiah - came from the press in Venice.
The present disc consists of selections from the above-mentioned canzonettas and a book with ricercares respectively. The latter was published in 1596 in Palermo. There he entered the service of a Sicilian nobleman, Giovanni Battista Tagliavia, Duke of S Giovanni and Count of Cammarata. In 1595 he was appointed maestro di cappella at the royal chapel of San Pietro. He took advantage of his Spanish origin, as he received bonuses and salary increases from the Spanish viceroys.
It is there that he got involved in a contest with his colleague Falconi, who at the time was maestro di cappella of Caltagirone. "The adjudicator decided in favour of Falcone, whereupon Raval appealed to the viceroy and demanded a new examination. The second time Spanish favouritism apparently decided the victory for Raval, but Falcone prepared to appeal to Nanino and Soriano for still another competition in Rome, which, however, never came to fruition, owing to the death of Falcone" (New Grove). It was not the first time Raval had challenged colleagues. During his time in Rome he challenged Giovanni Maria Nanino and Francesco Soriano, but was defeated.
These defeats seem not to have damaged his reputation during his life, but in historiography it has given him a bad name. "Only with the influential publication of Giuseppe Baini's work, Memorie storico-critiche della vita e delle opere di Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1828), did the image of a musician with an arrogant personality and little talent solidify. This has been the majority view in Italian historiography; conversely, in the Spanish narrative, there has been a tendency simply to ignore the composer (most likely due to the lack of connection with his home country)" (booklet).
There can be little doubt that Raval suffered from too much self-esteem, but the suggestion that he was a man of little talent is challenged by the performers. The programme is a mixture of canzonettas and ricercares - selections from the two collections mentioned above. They are performed in alternation.
Canzonettas are secular pieces, comparable with madrigals, but of a more light-hearted character and content. Unfortunately the latter is impossible to check for those who don't understand Italian, as the booklet omits English transpations of the lyrics. The nature of the music comes much better off, thanks to the performance by Victoria Cassano, who has a nice and flexible voice, which is perfectly suited to this repertoire. The canzonettas are scored for four voices, but performed here in a combination of solo voice and instruments. This was a very common way of performing polyphonic secular music. Each canzonetta consists of just one stanza, usually divided into two sections, each of which is repeated. There is quite some imitation between the parts.
Ricercar is the name given to a variety of instrumental pieces for various scorings, from a solo instrument, such as the keyboard or the lute, to an ensemble of instruments, like a consort of viols. The latter is the line-up in the performance of ricercares by Raval. Generally ricercares come in two types: the preludial or rhapsodic ricercar and the imitative ricercar. Raval's ricercares are of the second type. They use several subjects, which are mostly augmented and used as cantus firmus; the Ricercar del 1º tuono is the exception. A special case are the four ricercares in quattro fughe d'accordo, three of which are included here. Whereas Raval's vocal music is considered rather conservative, here he shows his "innovative spirit", as Andrés Cea Galán puts it in his liner-notes. "In these pieces, there are four subjects combined, with each voice introducing a different subject from the start. Throughout the ricercar, the four subjects migrate from one voice to another in different combinations until, in the end, the four subjects appear d’accordo, that is, superimposed. This final structure is undoubtedly the origin of the entire composition, from which the four subjects initially exposed independently are extracted."
Another innovative feature is the rhythmic modification. "Raval submits each and every one of his subjects to constant rhythmic mutation. Each subject, with each new entry, retains its melodic profile but appears 11with a different rhythmic pattern." As far as the performance practice is concerned, it needs to be noted that they can also be performed vocally; the title mentioned in New Grove indicates that the texts are spiritual.
A consort of viols was still very common in Italy; it would quickly become obsolete during the 17th century. Performing them on viols, mostly in combination with organ, turns out to be a pretty much ideal way of bringing these ricercares to life. Especially in the pieces in quattro fughe d'accordo the polyphonic fabric is rather dense, but the playing and recording are such that it is possible to follow the various voices and notice the process of imitation.
This recording is intended as a kind of revaluation of the oeuvre of a composer who suffers from a rather bad reputation. Musically that seems to be without foundation. The music performed here suggests that Raval was a man of talent. He could not have wished for better advocates than La Violondrina.
Johan van Veen (© 2025)