Antonio Vivaldi

Paper Summary:

Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741) wrote nearly 500 concertos of various types, composed at least 50 operas and other vocal and instrumental pieces by the score, strongly influenced the direction of violin technique and was a primary influence on Johann Sebastian Bach. The paper shows, however, that for two centuries after his death, Vivaldi and his music sank into oblivion and were only resurrected in the latter half of the twentieth century. Despite this long absence, Vivaldi's reputation has revived swiftly. Although his vocal works and other instrumental pieces are not, as yet, well known, his concertos such as "Le Stagione" ("The Four Seasons"), are among the most popular of all Baroque and classic music today. The paper traces Vivaldi's life and music career and discusses several of his works.

From the Paper:

"The works in L'estro armonico represented the concerto form "at its most balanced and typical moment" with only three retaining the old-fashioned slow movement at the beginning and the others in the quick-slow-quick form pioneered by Torelli (Palisca 165). Vivaldi wrote at least thirty concertos that retained this older form and, as Talbot notes, they were very often connected by title with the feast-day requirements of the Piet which seems to indicate that Vivaldi may have hoped "to add an extra touch of grandeur and solemnity by reverting to the four-movement cycle of the church sonata" (145). But, unlike the more sober magnificence of a Corelli concerto grosso or even Torelli's three-movement solo concertos, all of Vivaldi's writing in these early concertos unleashed a "torrent of emotions" that was "unlike anything ever written or at least published before" (Landon 43)."

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