The Inner Light

Alessandro Rolla


Alessandro Rolla (22 April 1757 – 15 September 1841) was widely acknowledged in his time as a violin and, especially, viola virtuoso, composer and teacher. His contribution to technique, repertoire and history of music is greatly underestimated.[citation needed] His son, Antonio Rolla, was also a violin virtuoso and composer.
His fame now rests mainly as "teacher of the great Paganini", yet his role was very important in the development of violin and viola technique. Some of the technical innovations that Paganini later used largely, such as left-hand pizzicato, chromatic ascending and descending scales, the use of very high positions on violin and viola, octave passages, were first introduced by Rolla.


Life

Rolla was born in Pavia, Italy in 1757 and after his initial studies he moved to Milan where, from 1770 to 1778, he studied with Gian Andrea Fioroni, Maestro di cappella at Milan Cathedral, who was the most important musician in Milan after G. B. Sammartini. Charles Burney, in his musical tour in Italy, refers to Fioroni to acquire information about the Ambrosian Chant.
In 1772, at 15, he made his first public appearance as a soloist and composer performing “the first viola concerto ever heard”, as reported by a contemporary writer. However, this is in fact false, as the first ever viola concerto was written several years earlier by Telemann (Concerto in G Major for Viola and String Orchestra).
In 1782 he was appointed principal viola and the leader of the Ducale Orchestra in Parma, playing violin and viola until 1802. This was the most profitable period of Rolla’s life, his most serene and creative years, in a very stimulating cultural and intellectual atmosphere; he was allowed to travel to conduct and perform as a soloist, became known also abroad and his works were published in Paris and Vienna.
In 1795 he received a visit by the young Paganini wishing to study with him and from Paganini’s later letters there is evidence that they remained in contact and even played quartet together. This relationship must have had an influence on Paganini, as far as his love for the viola is concerned, which in his maturity led him to compose works of great interest for the instrument, such as the concert piece Sonata per la Grand Viola e Orchestra, the Serenata and Terzetto concertante, besides the Quartet n.15 for Viola Concertante, violin, guitar and cello.
After the death of the Duke of Parma, in 1802 Rolla was offered a position as leader and orchestra director of the La Scala Orchestra in Milan. Here the new governors, the French and later the Austrians, wanted to create the most important orchestra of Italy and therefore hired the best virtuosos of the time. Among his students during this period were Cesare Pugni, the prolific composer of ballet music, whom he taught the violin. Rolla would conduct many of Pugni's operas for La Scala, among them Il Disertore Svizzero (1831) and La Vendetta (1832).
At La Scala Rolla remained until 1833. There he conducted the first Milanese performances of Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte, Clemenza di Tito and Nozze di Figaro and Beethoven’s first Symphonies. During this period he also conducted about eighteen operas of the then most loved opera composer, Gioacchino Rossini, as well as operas by Donizetti and Bellini, whom he got to know personally.
Since 1811 he was also director of a Cultural Society where musicians used to perform chamber music works by Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, among others. In 1813 at this Cultural Society he gave private performances of Beethoven’s Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Symphonies. He also used to be in the aristocracy drawing rooms, meeting artists and poets, playing for them and dedicating them several compositions.
In 1808 the Conservatoire of Music in Milan was inaugurated and Rolla was appointed professor of violin and viola. In this capacity he composed many didactical works for his own pupils, graded in difficulty, many of which were published by the newly established publishing house Ricordi. Several of these esercizi are composed with progressive technical difficulties and in all keys.
It is also curious to note that Rolla was a member of the adjudicating commission that rejected another famous Parmesan, Giuseppe Verdi, at the entry examination in the Conservatoire of the city, although he was the only one who expressed a favourable judgement about the young student.
Although involved in opera conducting in a period when in Italy opera was dominating over instrumental music, Rolla continued to compose, maintaining the Italian instrumental tradition high. He wrote about 500 works, from didactical compositions to sonatas, quartets, symphonies, concertos for violin, not less than 13 concertos and other works for viola and orchestra. Significant was his contribution to the diffusion of Beethoven’s works in Italy and his familiarity with Beethoven and other Viennese composers is shown in his compositions. He continued to compose and play chamber music until few months before his death at 84.
His works and performances as a violin and viola player and conductor at La Scala were often reviewed and appreciated in the Leipziger Zeitung.
As an example of his fame in Italy and abroad, it’s worth noting that during his lifetime his compositions were published by publishers such as Le Duc and Imbault in Paris, Artaria in Vienna, Breitkopf & Hartel in Leipzig, Monzani & Hill in London, André in Offenbach, Ricordi in Milan from 1809, and many more.
This information about Rolla’s life and multifarious musical activity helps us interpret his work. He was a musician of European vision, an innovator in his own field who was also able to learn from the best of his contemporaries. Also being so deeply immersed in opera environment undoubtedly had an influence on his style as a composer. He often used themes from operas for his variations.
Because of the technical innovations introduced, his work might be considered helpful for the development of viola technique.
His style varies from the very melodic phrases, typically operatic in character, rich in fiorituras, to the extremely virtuoso writing, the style we are used to identify with Paganini. Ingredients of this technique are an ample use of double stops, fast passages in thirds and sixths, octaves from the first to the eighth position, very fast ascending and descending diatonic and chromatic scales, flying staccato, left-hand pizzicato. This intense virtuosity was a new innovation for viola technique, practically unheard of in previous times. Bertini, a historian of his time, in a dictionary of musicians reported that Rolla was prohibited to play in public because women could not hear him without fainting of being struck by attacks of nerves.
Some[who?] think Rolla deserves a more important position in viola repertoire. His didactical works, conceived especially for the viola, are of special interest for students and teachers. They are often conceived in form of duos, lending themselves to be used also for chamber music education purposes as well.
Many of his works have been published in modern times and are therefore available.




Mario Carbotta

Appreciated  by the  public  and  by the  international  critics (Flutist Carbotta is simply superb, Audiophile Audition Classical; Quant au flutiste Mario Carbotta il a des ailes, Repertoire; Carbotta plays the pieces with a nice tone and an excellent technique, Fanfares; Les interprètes sont d'une musicalité et d'un goût parfaits , Le Monde de la Musique) he has played all over Italy, in many countries of Europe, Middle East, North Africa, Asia, Mexico, Canada and the United Statesof America.
After  obtaining  a  full  marks  diploma  at  the  Conservatory  of  Piacenza,  he  attended  Mario  Ancillotti’s Postgraduate Courses  at the  School  of Music in  Fiesole, winning  in the meantime  a lot  of  prizes  in  musical competitions, the most important being the "F. Cilea" in Palmi.
He has performed in some of the most prestigious concert halls: Grosser Musikvereinssaal in Vienna, Rudolfinum in Prague,  Auditorium  of  the  Swiss  Radio in  Lugano,  "G.Verdi"Hall in  Milan’s  Conservatorio,  Glenn  Gould  Studios in Toronto, Tiara Koto Hall in Tokyo, Auditorium Manuel de Falla in Granada, Cairo Opera House, Poly Theatre of Peking, Lithuanian Philarmonica of Vilnius, and renowned events, such as the international Festival of Santander, Castel de Perelada, Torre del Lago Puccini, Ljubljana, Varajdin, Zagreb and Teheran.
As  a  soloist,  he  has  played  with  famous  chamber  orchestras  (Mannheim  Kammerorchester, Mainzer  Kammerorchester, DKO  Frankfurt, Silesian  Chamber  Orchestra  Katowice, Solisti  Aquilani,  I  Virtuosi  di  Praga,  Archi  della  Scala)  and symphonic  orchestras  (Tonkünstler-Orchester  Niederösterreich of  Vienna,  Karntner  Sinfonieorchester of  Klagenfurt, Thüringer Symphoniker, Südwestdeutsche Philharmonie Konstanz, Loh-Orchesters Sondershausen, the  Symphonette Orchestra of Israel, the Symphonic Orchestra of Istanbul, the Radiotelevison and Film Orchestra of the Popular Republic of China, Cairo Symphony  Orchestra,  the  Orquestra  do  Algarve and  Orquestra  Classica  de  Madeira in  Portugal,  the  Orchestra  I  Pomeriggi Musicali of Milano, Orchestra of the Provincia di Bari, the Symphonic Orchestra of Sanremo and in the United States with the  Symphonic Orchestras  of  Amarillo, Altoona, Garland, Las Cruces  and Longmont), with the  conductors  Philippe Bender,  Philippe  Bernold,  Elio  Boncompagni,  Alvaro  Cassuto, Diego  Fasolis,  Piero  Gamba, Hiroaki  Masuda, Matthias Maurer, Jan Stulen, Alberto Veronesi.
He has performed for the first time ever some pieces by a number of Italian contemporary composers - among them  Pieralberto  Cattaneo,  Roberto  Cognazzo,  Paola  Crisigiovanni,  Federico  Ermirio,  Vittorio  Fellegara, Gianluigi Gelmetti, Gianni Possio, Riccardo Piacentini, Alessandro Solbiati, Stefano Taglietti, Andrea Talmelli - some of which dedicated to him.
In addition to the artistic activity, Carbotta has constantly devoted himself to research on a lot of forgotten but important  authors  and  to  divulge  his  rediscoveries.  He  has  edited  the  sonatas  of  Gianandrea  Fioroni,  Pietro Nardini,  Peter  Lichtenthal  and  Alessandro  Rolla  for  the  publishers  Suvini  Zerboni,  Bèrben,  Carisch  and Rugginenti.
His discography  for Dynamic, Tactus, Nuova Era and Rugginenti includes the  first  recordings in  our times of Giuseppe  Sammartini,  Mario  Pilati,  the  whole  work  for  flute  by  Nino  Rota,  the  Lieder  by  Caspar  Fürstenau (recorded with the choir of the Swiss Radio of Lugano directed by Diego Fasolis), the integral duets for  flute and  violin  (with  Luigi  Alberto  Bianchi),  the  chamber  music  and  the  concert  for  flute  and  orchestra  by Alessandro  Rolla,  the  Triple  concert  "Degli  oleandri"  by  Raffaele  Gervasio  (with  the  Orchestra  Sinfonica Lucana),  "Memories  from  concert"  of  Gianni  Possio  (with  the  voice  of  David  Riondino)  and  the  whole concerts for flute and orchestra by Saverio Mercadante (with the Solisti Aquilani).
He has also  run courses and master classes in the USA at the Amarillo University (Texas) and at the Louisiana University, at the International Academy of music in Milan and in Poland at the Katowice Music School and at the International Summer Courses of musical interpretation in Nowy Sacz.