Gabrieli

Matt:
Yes, Giovanni Gabrieli (c.1553/56-1612) is famous for his "Canzoni da sonare"
canzonas for brass choir. He wrote 36 of them which were published between
1597 and 1615. Although he specified ecclesiastical modes for them,
the tonality approaches the major/minor concept. He was organist in
the San Marco of Venice and pupil of his uncle Andrea Gabrieli.
I can recommend performances of Hesperion XX (on EMI Reflexe though
it may be out of print) and also the Netherlands Wind Ensemble.
The Italian composer Luca Francesconi (1956) is also crazy about
these canzonas and has them influence his compositions, for example
Risonanze d'Orfeo.
And I suppose I don't tell anything new when I mention that Purcell has
a beautiful canzona in Music for the funeral of Queen Mary.

Manuel Op de Coul coul@ezh.nl

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Bill Alves wrote:

''It is my understanding (which is limited to pre-revolutionary Iran...''

>From what I have heard from Iranian friends here in Germany, the situation
for Persian classical music, although now removed from broadcast and print
media, is remarkably stable. It seems that classical musicians have been
the beneficiaries of protection available through Sufi groups, from whom
the theocratic regime has maintained a cautious distance. As in Turkey, the
Sufi argue convincingly that the Koranic objection to music is to music as
an object of commercial activity, thus music continues to be made but sale
and purchase of recordings or notation would be objectionable. Borrowing or
receiving notation as a gift is presumably possible, but commercial
printing of notation is not..

In Iran, fretted instruments follow two patterns, either a 17 tone scale
(Pythagorean, but - skhismas ignored - practically 5 limit just
intonation) or in quarter-tones. The latter, I presume, were an urban
development, chiefly to facilitate unlimited transposition for radio and
recording use, and were initially used as a tempered version of the 17 tone
scale. In the US, I have heard both frettings used, in Germany (albeit in a
more folk than classical context), only the 17 tone version.

If we can get by the censors, it would be very interesting to establish
some Internet connection with musicians in Iran.

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