Did you know that VIVALDI was one of the first composers to rank the CLARINET as a solo instrument?
The fact that many violinists were about the only musicians mentioned in documents of the eighteenth century led eminent musicologists to exaggerate the very real supremacy of the violin during this time. Yet in one of the most famous letters from this period written by the French magistrate Charles de Brosses after a visit to one of the Venetian hospital schools for orphaned girls, there is a description of the girls as having played “flute, organ, oboe, cello and bassoon”. Thus it is not surprising that Vivaldi’s enormous output included several woodwind concertos, among them 16 flute concertos, 11 oboe concertos and 38 bassoon concertos. What is surprising however, is the fact that the clarinet appears in two of Vivaldi works as a solo instrument. It is known that Handel used two clarinets to accompany an aria in his opera “Tamerlano”- however Vivaldi was one of the first, if not the first, composer to rank the clarinet as a solo instrument. His use of the instrument is a reflection of the trends of the time where musical taste in Italy was tied to an almost boundless interest in novelty.
Leanne Nicholls, Chanannat Meenanan, Anthony Wong and Leanne Manning will perform Vivaldi’s Concerto for two oboes and two clarinets, RV 559 in the CCOHK’s upcoming Baroque Concertos 1 concert. Be sure not to miss it!
