Sunday Music with the Amici della Musica of Padua Carlotta Dalia guitar

Wonderful to know that Filippo Juvarra after his dedication to the piano for so many years is opening up the Amici della Musica di Padova to the much neglected world of the guitar.

After the opening concerts of the season dedicated to the piano we were now treated to another of the eight musicians featured in this series of Sunday morning concerts that gives a much needed platform to young competition winners

The wonderfully resonant acoustic of the historic Sala Dei Giganti are just perfect for these plucked instruments and I am much looking forward to hearing that dynamic young harpsichordist, Jean Rondeau, playing the Goldberg’s in this wonderful setting later in the season here too.

It was obviously no coincidence that today the eighteen year old guitarist Carlotta Dalia from Grosseto should present a programme of composers ranging from 1685 to 1872- Scarlatti,Sor and Regondi.

Finishing only with a final flurry into the 20th century with Castelnuovo-Tedesco. Hollywood style indeed for Castelnuovo -Tedesco born in Florence in 1895 emigrated to Hollywood in 1939 and wrote music for over 200 films for the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

He did though also find time to write concertos for his neighbours Heifetz and Piatigorsky as well as being a prolific composer for the guitar.

Nice to read that Carlotta is now studying with Frederic Zigante one of the many very fine guitarist who played in the Ghione Theatre in Rome.

Many now famous names were given a platform in Rome in seasons that still unbelievably neglect the guitar .

We had in Rome such artists as Oscar Ghiglia, Manuel Barrueco,Duo Assad,John Williams,David Russell ,Julian Bream,Yamashita,Andrea Vetoretti …..the list of great artists is endless and I just hope that here in Padua at least they might start to find a platform as they have in a little private theatre in Rome.

Frederic Zigante introduced to me in Rome by Griselda Ponce de Leon who organised for us memorable concerts and masterclasses with Zigante and Russell before being struck down by a banal minor operation where she never recovered from the anethestic.

How could I forget Zigante’s moving recital in her memory.

She will not be forgotten.

Some beautifully musical playing from Carlotta today that will grow in stature as her fingers mature and obtain that weight that is so essential, especially in the fast moving figures that alternate with touchingly expressive cantabile.

The guitar has a way of being even more expressive than the piano and  could that have been the reason of the myth that has grown around Schubert and Berloz writing with a guitar by their side?

Carlotta Dalia already at her tender age winner of First Prizes in the Giulio Rospigliosi and Uppsala Competitions last year showed all her professionality as we battled with a persistent cougher throughout the first half of the programme.

Thankfully we were able to listen without this interruption after an irate Filippo Juvarra asked the offending young lady to control or leave.

Some beautiful shading in the three Scarlatti Sonatas and a great sense of line in the Gran Solo op 14 by Fernando Sor.

Some very pleasing variations by Giulio Regondi a composer much appreciated by Sor when his father brought him as a child prodigy to Paris.

The Fantasia op 46 “Souvenir d’Amitie'” by Sor is dedicated to him.

His picture looks remarkably like David Russell with whom I was at the Royal Academy in London and who regularly came to the Ghione theatre in Rome for concerts and masterclasses.

Regondi abandoned by his father in 1831 fled to London and probably as a reaction took to the concertina!

The Castelnuovo- Tedesco of course showed off the remarkable credentials of this young player to the full.

Greeted by a peal of bells as she went into overtime she offered a single encore to an insistent and by now silenced audience! I look forward to hearing this young artist in the great music that abounds for this delicate instrument.

Even if she can turn baubles into gems it is sometimes nice in a programme to have a real genuine gem too.

A wonderful pork sandwich and glass of Merlot in the beautiful square was a sad farewell to Padua sharing the tables with the pigeons and our persistent cougher who seemed to have been miraculously cured by the sublime sounds from Carlotta Dalia‘s guitar.#

Arrivederci,as they say in these parts, a presto!