Composer: Quirino Gasparini (1721-1778)

 

​Gasparini was born in Northern Italy. He was a priest as well as a composer and cellist. He became the maestro of Turin's cathedral. He wrote some operas and a lot of sacred music. He died in Turin.

He has a pretty light footprint online.​

​

Date: ?

 

Original Instrumentation: 2 violins, cello

​

Movements:    

1. Allegretto

2. Minuet

​

Why this one:

 

This was part of the bundle of Baroque music I found for my aborted "Baroque July." plan.   

​

Description:  

 

Movement 1 - Allegretto

Key:  G

Time: 4/4  BPM = 1o5

 

This movement is split roughly in half into what I'll call part A and part B. Part A is also roughly divided in half, with the first half being violin 1 playing the theme with the violin 2 and cello in support. The second half of Part A shifts to the key of D, with both violins playing together in the same rhythm, either doubling or harmonizing with each other. The section starts with both violins harmonizing on a descending sixteenth run over an A pedal. The cello stays in support.

Part B begins like part A, now playing the theme in the key of D. After the theme restatement and a brief and loud 3 against 2 passage, with the violin 1 playing eighth notes and the other two instruments playing triplets, Gasparini starts to experiment with the theme. The main thyme pattern and opening intervalic leaps remain, but it jumps around the staff. The movement then goes back to the harmonized descending sixteenth notes from Part A, this time around a D pedal in the home key of G. The violins double / harmonize with each other in G until the end of the movement.​

​

Performance:

​

This one was pretty easy. I did the cello in one session and both violins in a second. The score has both halves of the piece repeating, but I opted not to do that.
​​

Errata:

​

This movement is listed as being in cut time (i.e. 2/2) but the way the notes were subdivided in the score, with lots of sixteenth notes coming in on off beats, made it really hard for me to count and / or feel out. I just recorded it in 4/4.​​​

​

Movement 2 - Minuet

Key :   G

Time: 3/4   BPM=112

​

This minuet is also broken into two parts. I don't have too much to say about this movement, except that the beginning of part B is interesting harmonically, shifting into some minor bit I can't put my finger on.

Violin 1 is doing most of the work, but violin 2 gets to join in a bit. The cello here is again in support, mostly playing dotted half notes and eight note drones.

​

Performance

​

The cello part was easy, though there are some long breaks, which meant I couldn't let my attention wander, especially as it was the first instrument. I made sure I ended where I thought I did, so I wouldn't trainwreck on the violin parts.

The violins weren't very hard. I actually played the repeats on this one.

​

Errata:

​

I left out a lot of grace notes. The string tension is so high on a mandolin and pull-offs difficult enough that they often sound like mistakes.

​

Album Art:

 

I didn't have any Gasparini adjacent photos.  (I've never been to Northern Italy).  So this a random photo of me at the Dali museum in St. Petersberg, FL.