Italian ensemble creates intimacy

Italian ensemble creates intimacy

By Arif Suryobuwono

JAKARTA (JP): Italian food made in Jakarta may taste the same
as the original, but Italian music, especially string music, is
a different matter. To savor authentic Italian music one has to
listen to the original.

The Italian Embassy knows this very well and the result was a
concert by Nuova Cameristica on Monday.

"One of the youngest and the best chamber music ensembles in
Italy," said Italian ambassador Mario Brando Pesa at the Regent
hotel on Monday.

The hotel's grand ballroom was a splendid place to hear the
ensemble perform. The room's architecture is simple, yet mighty
and elegant. The gaudy anti-AIDS campaign slogan projected on a
wide screen seemed intolerable.

The concert was a charity gala held for the Indonesian AIDS
Foundation. The campaign was part of its programs to commemorate
the Dec. 1 World AIDS Day.

Only the violin family of the 10-year-old ensemble was present
Monday night. The 14 performers played the violin, viola,
violoncello and double bass.

Pizzicati added zest to the mechanical bowing which started
with Tomaso Giovani Albinoni's concerto seven opus number five
and ended with Luigi Rodolfo Boccherini's La ritirata notturna
per le strade in Madrid (The Night Retreat Through The Streets of
Madrid) in the first part.

The pizzicati, which contains Gaudeamus Igitur, the song
usually sung on graduation day, made for tantalizing breaks
during Antonio Vivaldi's concerto in G-major.

But the most refreshing pizzicati were performed on the cello
and double bass for Vivaldi's work and Boccherini's nocturne. The
cellos' low pitches interrupted the singing tones of their tenor
brothers.

Added to the thrill was the alternating lower sounds from the
double bass made by bouncing the bow. However, Bianca Fervidi's
dying strums on cello which closed Vivaldi's G-major seemed a bit
awkward. After all, fingers, especially when let loose, sometimes
go their own ways.

After the intermission, Alessandro Rolla's concerto for viola
in E-flat major on solo viola was played wonderfully by Emilio
Poggioni. St. Paul's Suite from Gustavus Theodore von Holst
closed the night with an invitation to dance. It started with a
jig and ended with a dargason, 16th century English country
dance. The finale blended Greensleeves into the folk music.

Intimacy

"We want to create an atmosphere of intimacy towards the
audience, as if we were playing among friends," one of the
ensemble's founders, Claudio Bellasi, told The Jakarta Post.

That was why he chose the lively St Paul Suite to invite the
audience to dance with the ensemble. Since intimacy can also be
evoked through the imagination of nights and dreams, he also
opted for Boccherini's favorite dynamic pianissimo in La ritirata
notturna.

Since Bellasi treats the audience as his friends, it is
logical for his ensemble to play without a conductor.

"By playing without a conductor we create informality," he
explained.

"Playing with a conductor is easier," he said, "You just
follow his command. In Italy, conductor-less ensembles are not
many. Only two or three," he added.

Moreover, "without a conductor, we have more freedom to do
what we want," said the violin lecturer of the Conservatory of
Milan.

And, of course, the Milan-based ensemble does not need a
conductor because it plays chamber music.

Chamber music has been Bellasi's speciality since he set up a
trio with Umberto Oliveti (on violin) and Emilio Poggioni (on
viola). The three founded the original group, Trio D'Archi Di
Como, in 1971.

The trio grew into a quartet with the addition of a cellist
ten years later before expanding into a 14-member orchestra in
1985.

Their repertoire spans 400 years, and usually includes the
works of Italian Renaissance composer Andrea Gabrieli (1510-
1585). The works of famous composers such as Handel, Bach, Mozart
and Beethoven are included, but the group also features works by
early 19th-century composers like F. Szabo (1902-1969).

Despite the ensemble's intimate knowledge of chamber music and
the fact that most of its members have played together for five
years, the ensemble took 20 days to prepare for the Jakarta
performance. The intensive preparation made them a very solid
team.

The younger members are recruited from the best students at
the Conservatory of Milan. Many have won the annual international
music competition in Stresa, a town in northwestern Italy.

The ensemble also serves as an orchestra for conductor
trainees. It set up a course for orchestra conductors, the first
of its kind in Italy, in 1993. Obviously, it is a far better
simulator than one or two pianos, with which would-be conductors
traditionally train.

Although members come and go, the ensemble always has a least
14 people. "It is expandable to 32, but no more than that,"
Oliveti conceded.

After all, intimacy isn't found among multitudes.