Giovanni Battista Viotti
Cantate, canzonette, romances
edited by Mariateresa Dellaborra
(Musica Vocale da Camera, 5)

XXXII, 60 pp.; 29,7 x 21 cm
Italian/English Introduction and apparatus

Dating from the first decade of the 19th century, when the composer lived in London, Viotti’s 12 vocal compositions (Wvii:1-12) are written in the forms of the cantata, the canzonetta, the aria and the romance, for one or two voices, to Italian and French texts, and call for the accompaniment not always of piano but also either of guitar, violin or cello.

Presumably conceived for private performances, these works reveal the composer’s more intimate and spontaneous vein. They are the first and only Viotti examples of vocal chamber compositions, offering, at the same time, an interesting insight into the contemporary vocal production of Italian composers.

Il volume contiene: 
Au fond d’une sombre vallée, per due voci e pianoforte
Li zingarelli, per due voci e pianoforte
Les souvenirs, per voce e pianoforte
Privez l’amour de sa flèche, per voce, violoncello e pianoforte
C’est la verdure, per voce e pianoforte
Dis moi ce que j’éprouve, per voce e pianoforte
Vo tristo e tacito, per voce e pianoforte
Le tems nous passe, per voce e pianoforte
Cara semplicità, per voce e violino
Stanco di pascolar, per voce e chitarra
J’aimais, j’étois aimé, per voce e pianoforte
Ah rammenta, oh bella Irene, per voce e pianoforte

Mariateresa Dellaborra teaches Music History at the Conservatory "G. Nicolini", Piacenza. An authority on 18th- and 19th-century Italian music, she published books and essays for Olschki, Ets, Brepols, L'Epos, Lim, Ut Orpheus, Rugginenti, and Marsilio, wrote entries forThe New Grove (2nd edition) and MGG, and edited instrumental compositions by Niccolò Paganini, Giovanni Battista Viotti, Alessandro Rolla, and Saverio Mercadante, as well as operas by Giovanni Battista Sammartini, Tommaso Traetta, Niccolò Jommelli, Marcos Portugal, and Alessandro Stradella. A board member of Arcadia Foundation, Milan, she coordinates the Monumenti Musicali Italiani section at SIdM, and participates in the ITMI (Indici della Trattatistica Musicale Italiana) working group, Franceschini Foundation, Florence.