Vitali: Artificii Musicali, Op. 13 Andrea Coen

• Giovanni Battista Vitali (1632 - 1692): Artificii musicali, Op. 13:
• 1 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: I. Canone à due alla quinta bassa 00:36
• 2 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: II. Cantilena à quattro 00:29
• 3 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: III. Canone à due all'unisono 00:39
• 4 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: IV. Canone à tre all'unisono 00:32
• 5 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: V. Canone à tre all'unisono 00:41
• 6 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: VI. Canone à tre all'unisono 00:30
• 7 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: VII. Canone à tre all'unisono 00:51
• 8 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: VIII. Canone à tre all'unisono 00:35
• 9 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: IX. Canone à tre all'unisono 00:33
• 10 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: X. Contraria contrariis curantur 00:51
• 11 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XI. De minimis non curat praetor 00:21
• 12 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XII. Canone à due alti all'vnisono sopra il canto fermo 00:25
• 13 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XIII. Canone à tre all'unisono senza nota 00:28
• 14 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XIV. Canone à tre all'unisono senza nota 00:29
• 15 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XV. Canone à tre 00:44
• 16 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XVI. Canone à due alla quarta sotto 00:30
• 17 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XVII. Incipies sequeris non errabis 00:57
• 18 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XVIII. Canone, nella replica si tralascia il sospiro 00:31
• 19 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XIX. Canone 00:36
• 20 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XX. Canone à due 00:34
• 21 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXI. Canone à due 00:36
• 22 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXII. Canone alla quinta 00:32
• 23 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXIII. Canone à due all'unisono 00:37
• 24 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXIV. Canone à due all'unisono 00:37
• 25 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXV. Canone à due alla quinta sopra 01:10
• 26 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXVI. Canone alla quinta sotto (a 2) 00:48
• 27 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXVII. Canone à due all'unisono 00:35
• 28 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXVIII. Canone à due all'unisono 00:37
• 29 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXIX. Modulatione cancrizzata à due 00:32
• 30 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXX. Modulatione à due 00:44
• 31 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXI. Modulatione à due 00:29
• 32 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXII. Canone (a 2) 00:19
• 33 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXIII. Canone à quattro 00:41
• 34 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXIV. Canone à quattro 00:40
• 35 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXV. Canone à quattro 00:48
• 36 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXVI. Canone à quattro 00:46
• 37 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXVII. Canone à quattro 00:27
• 38 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXVIII. Modulatione (a 4) 00:39
• 39 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XXXIX. Canone à quattro all'unisono 00:37
• 40 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XL. Canone à quattro all'unisono 00:24
• 41 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLI. Canone à quattro all'unisono 00:24
• 42 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLII. Canone à quattro bassi all'unisono 00:39
• 43 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLIII. Canone à sei soprani all'unisono 00:59
• 44 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLIV. Canone à otto bassi all'unisono 01:14
• 45 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLV. Canone à dieci bassi all'unisono 00:49
• 46 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLVI. Canone à dodeci bassi all'unisono 00:55
• 47 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLVII. Sinfonia à due violini in canone all'vnisono 01:08
• 48 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLVIII. Fuga in contrapunto doppio 00:32
• 49 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: XLIX. La controscritta fuga in contrapunto doppio riuoltata 00:31
• 50 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: L. Contrapunto doppio 00:26
• 51 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LI. Contrapunto doppio 00:24
• 52 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LII. Contrapunto doppio 00:36
• 53 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LIII. (Balletto) 02:03
• 54 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LIV. (Balletto) 01:12
• 55 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LV. Capricio primo 00:51
• 56 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LVI. Capricio secondo 03:24
• 57 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LVII. Capricio terzo 03:10
• 58 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LVIII. Capricio quarto 04:13
• 59 Vitali: Artificii musicali, Op. 13: LIX. Passagallo 08:13
• Prima suonata à violino solo:
• 60 Vitali: Prima suonata à violino solo: I. Largo 01:16
• 61 Vitali: Prima suonata à violino solo: II. Allegro 01:20
• 62 Vitali: Prima suonata à violino solo: III. (Grave) 00:59
• 63 Vitali: Prima suonata à violino solo: IV. (Allegro) 00:33
• 64 Vitali: Prima suonata à violino solo: V. (…) 01:52
• Seconda suonata à violino solo:
• 65 Vitali: Seconda suonata à violino solo: I. Grave 01:11
• 66 Vitali: Seconda suonata à violino solo: II. Prestissimo 00:26
• 67 Vitali: Seconda suonata à violino solo: III. Grave 00:57
• 68 Vitali: Seconda suonata à violino solo: IV. Allegro 01:00
• 69 Vitali: Seconda suonata à violino solo: V. Largo 02:08
• Total Runtime 01:07:55

Info for Vitali: Artificii Musicali, Op. 13

Born in Bologna, Giovanni Battista Vitali (1632–1692) spent all his life between his birth city and Modena, where he moved in 1674. There is something noteworthy in this geography of the composer: Vitali’s move from Bologna, then part of the Papal States under the administration of Rome, to the smaller but significantly more secular and artistically stimulating Modena, under the rule of the splendid Este family, is suggestive of a desire to achieve greater expressive freedom. All composers must tackle the dilemmas of their times, and Vitali’s legacy is his ability to use his great skill to achieve that ideal synthesis between tradition and innovation.

Artificii Musicali (Modena, 1689) has given Vitali a respectable place in music history, particularly if one considers the oft supposed idea that it served as inspiration for J.S. Bach’s Musical Offering, J. Fux’s Gradus ad Parnassum (1725) and G.B. Martini’s Saggio Fondamentale Pratico di Contrappunto sopra il Canto Fermo (1774). Vitali’s Artificii Musicali appeared at a historical crossroad, during the final decades of the 17th century, when there was an explosive rise in instrumental music. The sprout of creative freedom for composers of instrumentalmusic was immensely liberating, as the previous generations of musicians were often limited in their artistic endeavors by the rigid structures of choral polyphony or the madrigal form. Artificii Musicali is a unique pedagogical music handbook, a theoretic treatise of canonic science, and ultimately a testament to the originality and genius of its author.

There are 40 canons in this work and interspersed among them there are 4 that can be classified as riddle-canons or enigma-canons. These intriguing pieces are accompanied by a brief Latin motto containing the key for their realization, which is left to the reader to decipher (of note, Bach also included two riddle-canons with Latin mottos in the Musical Offering). The final 9 pieces in the Artificii are an eclectic collection of balletti, capricci, a passagallo, and 2 violin sonatas, representative of the main forms of instrumental music at the end of the 17th century. Although Artificii was originally written for violin and bass, Andrea Coen performs here on a harpsichord, and furthermore a harpsichord in equal temperament. Such a choice is not the result of simplification or trivialisation, but is based on confirmed historical evidence reportedby Patrizio Barbieri: 'For the entire fifty years in the middle of the 17th century, concrete attempts were made in Europe to tune harpsichords, organs and harps no longer with the usual mesotonic, but with equal temperament'. Furthermore, the recording choices on this album were of tantamount importance, and Riccardo Cimino has shaped and spatialized the sounds with great musical sensitivity and powerful sound engineering. The finalisation of the recording in Dolby Atmos gives many possible ways of listening to the Artificii, depending on the chosen media: from the three-dimensional Atmos music audio down to a binaural stereo. This, compared to traditional stereo, presents much greater depth.

The Artificii Musicali Op.13 (1689) is one of the most comprehensive studies of counterpoint before Bach’s Die Kunst der Fuge and Musicalisches Opfer. The sixty pieces are an impressive display of contrapuntal technique for a variety of scorings, arranged in order of increasing difficulty. The collection contains canons for two to twelve voices, many incorporating additional compositional devices (e.g., canon 25. Canon à 2, at the fifth above, which ascends a step on repeating). Vitali also employs similar compositional devices in the non-canonic pieces in the collection – for example, a balletto in three different meters simultaneously, a passacaglia which modulates from E flat major to E major through the cycle of fifths, and another Balletto for two treble instruments which has one line written in G and the other in F.

The present recording is unique in that everything is performed only with one harpsichord, artfully multiplied by working in multitrack and using other sophisticated technological 'artifices' in order to do justice to the fascinating and complex nature of this work. For this the artist collaborated with one of the major Italian sound designers, Riccardo Cimino, who, besides being a composer and guitarist, owns a studio equipped with cutting-edge technologies of the highest level, including "ambisonics".

Andrea Coen is an organist, harpsichordist, and fortepianist, who has studied with such distinguished artists as Ton Koopman and Alan Curtis, and has collaborated with such figures as Christopher Hogwood and Monica Huggett. His recordings of Baroque and early-Classical keyboard repertoire for Brilliant Classics have attracted glowing reviews. Coen recorded the “Kleine Kammermusik” (BC 95683) and made the first complete recording of Telemann’s “100 Menuets” (BC 96249) and Telemann’s Fantasias (94228). According to MusicWeb International: ‘Coen, an experienced, insightful instrumentalist with a profound knowledge of historical performance practice and a sackful of important recordings under his belt, could make Telemann sound special even on a typewriter.’

Andrea Coen, harpsichord

Andrea Coen
b. 1960, Rome, Italy, graduated in musicology at the La Sapienza University (Rome) with a dissertation on the long-neglected unpublished keyboard works of Domenico Cimarosa. He received his degree in harpsichord from the Royal College of Music in London, to which he has been an associated musician from 1987. After a period of research and study of Renaissance, Baroque and Classical performance techniques with such acclaimed musicians like Ton Koopman, Daniel Chorzempa, Alan Curtis, David Collyer, Glenn Wilson and Emilia Fadini, Andrea Coen dedicated himself to an intense concert carreer in Italy, Europe and USA performing as soloist of harpsichord, organ and fortepiano and in various chamber and vocal ensembles. He is responsible for the first complete critical edition of the D. Cimarosa's keyboard Sonatas and two Piano Sextets , and of the Intavolatura di Ancona (1644). At present he is in the scientific committee of the Opera Omnia di Muzio Clementi (60 vols), in the advisory board of Ad Parnassum (Journal if Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Instrumental Music), and he will realize the first critical edition of B. Marcello’s L’estro poetico-armonico (Brepols, Belgium). In 1991-1992 concert season, sponsored from Italcable in the prestigious Teatro Sistina in Rome, Coen's critical edition of G. B. Martini's Don Chisciotte celebrated its modern première representation. A. Coen regulary collaborates with artists like Christopher Hogwood, Monica Huggett, Aris Christofellis, as well as the Ensemble Seicentonovecento (Rome) and L'Arte dell'arco (Padua). In 1992 he was responsible for the instrumental section, harpsichordist and organist for the Primo Festival di Musica Antica at the Teatro dell'Opera of Rome, a role that earned him the very important Golden Key for artistic merits. His most recent invitations for solo recitals include the Festival de St.Cerè (France), Festival Ciudad de Granada , Hochschule (Zürich), I Pomeriggi musicali di Milano , Bratislava Festival , Accademia B.Cristofori in Firenze for the inaugural concert for the recently restored Rosenberge fortepiano of 1790, Université de Fribourg (CH), 12th Biennial International Conference on Nineteenth-Century Music (Leeds, UK), UCLA - University of California (Los Angeles). He is in the scientific committée of the Foundation “Le Colonne del Decumano ” of Naples (early music research).

Andrea Coen worked as a musical consultant for the Italian Broadcasting (RAI-Radiotelevisione Italiana ) since 1986 and for the Vatican Broadcasting (Radio Vaticana ) and Stream TV ; he teaches fortepiano at the “Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia” in Rome and harpsichord in L’Aquila's State Conservatory, and is the First Organist in the Basilica di San Giacomo in Augusta (Rome).

His solistic recordings can be found on the Stradivarius, Dynamic, EMI (with Aris Christofellis), Deutsche Harmonia Mundi (with Christopher Hogwood and L'Arte dell'Arco), Denon (with I Solisti Italiani), Musicaimmagine Records (with Ensemble Seicentonovecento) and Bongiovanni labels. In 2001 he was invited in the jury of Premio Bonporti (Rovereto) with Bart Kuijken, Chiara Banchini and Gustav Leonhart. In march 2007 he was invited by Prof. Plantinga at Yale Univ. and by Prof. Bilson at Cornell Univ. for his solo recital “Grand Tour a rébour: from Florence to Shillelah ”.

This album contains no booklet.