The double concerto
In the early eighteenth century the concerto was the favourite type of instrumental music across Europe. Concertos were played in the palaces of Rome and Venice, at the courts of the Moravian and Bohemian nobility, and at the concert rooms that were springing up in London. They were popular fare in theatres, particularly on days when stage performances were prohibited; and they were played even in some Italian churches, to celebrate feast days or to add drama to the religious ceremony. Baroque writers explained the appeal of the genre in several ways, usually by exploring different etymologies of the word ‘concerto’. Some theorists derived the term from the Latin concertare, meaning ‘to compete or struggle together’; others pointed to the notion of a harmonious agreement (concordare). By the start of the eighteenth century the concerto was increasingly seen as an exercise in friendly rivalry rather than a piece for a harmonious consort.
Concertos came in all shapes and sizes in the eighteenth century. Nowadays we think of the concerto as an orchestral piece where a solo instrumentalist takes the audience’s breath away by playing with particular virtuosity or beauty. Such concertos certainly existed in the eighteenth century, but tonight [24 January 2005] our focus is instead on pieces for two soloists. The texture of orchestra and multiple soloists could be used in numerous ways to give the effects of a consort or of competitive rivalry. The two soloists could play as one, doubling a line in sonorous thirds; or they might be used as in a trio sonata, weaving independent lines that yet also make up a convincing whole; or they might be fiercely opposed, trying to outdo each other via increasingly fiery figuration. Tonight’s performance shows the variety of techniques used in double concertos by three of the leading composers of the period — Antonio Vivaldi, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel.
Antonio Vivaldi
Concerto in B flat major for two violins RV524
Concerto in B flat major for oboe and violin RV548
Vivaldi was best known for his concertos for solo violin.
Here he combined his showy and passionate technique as a
player with the conventions of dramatic writing that he
learned from the Venetian opera. His pieces are therefore
full of stormy or outlandish figuration, and several (most
notably The Four Seasons) are explicitly programmatic. At
the same time he pioneered the use of the ritornello (a
repeating musical section) to hold together these otherwise
often quirky or quixotic pieces. Many of his concertos were
written for the Pietà delle Ospedale, the girls’ orphanage
in Venice where he worked as a violin teacher. At the
orphanage chapel the girls performed concerts from behind a
metal grille, in order to protect their modesty, and it is
easy to see how Vivaldi’s dramatic style of writing evolved
partly to engage and enrapture an audience who could not see
the players.
Among his output of over five hundred concertos, Vivaldi wrote about forty double concertos. In the Concerto in B flat major for two violins RV524 he initially treats the two soloists as equal partners, getting them to play a third apart in the opening movement. The central Andante thins the texture to just the soloists and continuo, setting the two violins in a dialogue with each other. A more competitive streak emerges in the finale, where the violinists dare each other to higher, faster, or more frenetic arpeggios. Different techniques are used in the Concerto in B flat major for oboe and violin RV548, built upon the contrast between the timbre of the soloists. In the first movement the oboist is in the lead, introducing new ideas for the violin to mimic. There follows a siciliano with a pastoral melody for oboe, adorned by a filigree of violin figuration; while the finale introduces unexpected short phrases and syncopations.
Johann Sebastian Bach
Concerto in C minor for oboe and violin BWV1060
Concerto in D minor for two violins BWV1043
Bach came from a strikingly different background from
Vivaldi. Whereas Vivaldi worked in the metropolis of Venice
and had connections with many of the leading courts of
Europe, Bach belonged to a provincial dynasty of church
organists and town fiddlers. In many of the small towns and
villages of central Germany, the name ‘Bach’ was synonymous
with the job of musician. The family had a ubiquity in the
province of Thuringia, but none of the international fame of
Vivaldi.
For Bach, however, one of the openings into a wider musical culture occurred in his early twenties when he discovered Vivaldi’s concertos. His patron in Weimar returned from a European tour with copies of Vivaldi’s latest concertos that Bach then excitedly transcribed for keyboard. Even though Bach may never have heard these pieces being played by Italian string players, he deduced all their essential qualities from his patron’s copies. Not only did he learn the dramatic, tempestuous string-writing of Vivaldi; more significantly, he learned that the ritornello was a way to structure a large-scale movement, and he henceforth applied this principle in almost all of his music. As his first biographer, Johann Nikolaus Forkel, would write, Vivaldi’s music taught Bach the crucial compositional principles of Ordnung, Zusammenhang and Verhältnis (order, continuity and proportion).
Proof of Bach’s absorption of Vivaldi comes in his Concerto in C minor for oboe and violin BWV1060. This double concerto comes down to us as a piece for two harpsichords, but its original form was almost certainly for violin and oboe. Vivaldian features include the constant forward momentum and the choice of ritornello that is memorable for its rhythmic buoyancy. Unlike Vivaldi, though, Bach does not focus on sheer instrumental virtuosity, instead placing the two soloists in dialogue with each other and also with the rest of the orchestra. The playfulness of this dialogue is brought to perfection in the first movement, where the oboe and violin cheekily echo the ends of phrases. In the slow movement, the two soloists spin out melodies that wrap around each other, while the finale adds a touch of fiery energy.
Bach again deploys the soloists in dialogue in his Concerto in D minor for two violins BWV1043. Here the first movement is relatively learned, starting with an absorbing fugue for the two soloists. The counterpoint relents in the Largo, a pastorale in the manner of Vivaldi. But it returns with a vengeance in the restless finale, where the soloists pursue each other closely and set up conflicting rhythms against the tutti. Here Bach shows another side to his compositional personality. He pushes his themes and his players to their utmost, almost as if a Protestant work ethic makes him ashamed of under-employment.
George Frideric Handel
Concerti Grossi Op.6 Nos.1 & 10
Whereas Bach was highly influenced by Vivaldi, Handel’s Op.6
concertos hark back to an earlier compositional style,
namely the concerto grosso of Arcangelo Corelli. This was a
style that Handel would have encountered during his
apprenticeship in Italy, and which was also immensely
popular in his adopted homeland of England. Corelli’s
concerti grossi set a trio sonata (for two violins and
cello) against a tutti backdrop of string orchestra. The
divided texture allows for dramatic contrasts between tutti
and soloists, often accentuated by shifts in tempo or
dynamics.
Corelli’s concerti grossi had been published in 1714 as his Op.6, so when Handel decided to write a set of concertos as his own Op.6 in 1739, his invocation of his Italian forebear could not be clearer. Indeed, the Corellian style is strongly evident in Handel’s Concerto in G major Op.6 No.1, heard in such features as the running bass-lines, the flurries of semiquavers and the brisk fugues on succinct themes. Also Corellian is the delight in clear harmonic progressions, sometimes repeated over and over again for sensuous enjoyment, and sometimes interrupted by sudden chromatic adagios. The piece, however, is on a much larger scale than Corelli’s concertos, as might be expected from Handel’s subtitle of Grand Concertos.
By contrast, the Concerto in D minor Op.6 No.10 starts as if it might be the overture to one of Handel’s operas or oratorios. There is a French overture, with dotted rhythms and sweeping violin flourishes; and a series of dance movements follows, including a sarabande. Admittedly, there are some subsequent passages of fugal writing; but the finale is another dance tune, now in the major key and with all the joie de vivre of Handel’s Music for the Royal Fireworks. Handel’s concerti grossi use musical ingredients of such immediate appeal that it is easy to understand why they gained instant success in eighteenth-century London, being played by the original Academy of Ancient Music among many other ensembles. They have also retained a central place in the repertory of the modern-day revival of The Academy of Ancient Music, featuring regularly on its programmes since 1973.
This article formed the programme note for The Academy of Ancient Music’s concert at the Wigmore Hall on 24 January 2005 (part of the 2004–2005 London Series).