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One halfstep at a time: Tonal transposition and ‘split association’ in Italian opera

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2008

Harold Powers
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Extract

In a recent number of 19th-Century Music, Allan Atlas offered a complex analytical reading of Puccini's Madama Butterfly, hinging on a pair of keys forming what he called ‘crossed tonal areas’. The tonality G flat major in the second-act trio ‘Io so che alle sue pene’ plays a crucial role in Atlas's reading, and he had to account for the fact that the trio was originally conceived a halfstep higher, in G major, and was so performed at the première in Milan. He asked:

can we assign a significant role to the Gb of the trio when it represents not Puccini's original – and presumably well-reasoned – intention, but what might be little more than a compositional accident necessitated by the practicalities of performance, and a specific one – Brescia, May 1904 – at that?

And in his footnote 13 to the foregoing, Atlas listed six studies discussing halfstep transpositions, three in Verdi and three more in Puccini.

Type
Research Article
Information
Cambridge Opera Journal , Volume 7 , Issue 2 , July 1995 , pp. 135 - 164
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

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References

1 Atlas, Allan W., ‘Crossed Stars and Crossed Tonal Areas in Puccini's Madama Butterfly’, 19th-Century Music, 14/2 (Fall 1990), 190.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Ibid.

3 Ibid.

4 Parker, Roger and Atlas, Allan, ‘A Key for Chi? Tonal Areas in Puccini’, 19th-Century Music, 15/3 (Spring 1992), 231.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5 Parker, ibid.

6 The concept of vocal ‘sonority’ was introduced by Pierluigi Petrobelli and Martin Chusid, independently, in conferences in the summer of 1970. See Petrobelli, Pierluigi, ‘Per un'esegesi della struttura drammatica del “Trovatore”’, in Atti del terzo congresso internationale di studi verdiani (Parma, 1974), 387–400Google Scholar; translated into English by Drabkin, William as ‘Towards an Explanation of the Dramatic Structure of Il trovotore’, Music Analysis, 1 (1982), 129–41Google Scholar; ‘sonority’ is defined and discussed on pp. 132–5. See also Chusid, Martin, ‘Rigoletto and Monterone: A Study in Musical Dramaturgy’, in Report of the 11th Congress of the International Musicological Society, ed. Glahn, Henrik et al. (Copenhagen, 1972), 325–36Google Scholar; reprinted in Bollettino dell'istituto di studi verdiani, III/9 (1982), 1544–81; see esp. pp. 1552–6.Google Scholar

7 Ashbrook, William and Powers, Harold, Puccini's Turandot: The End of the Great Tradition (Princeton, 1991).Google Scholar

8 Atlas, in Parker, and Atlas, (see n. 4), 233.Google Scholar

9 Hepokoski, James A., ‘Verdi's Composition of Otello: The Act II Quartet’, in Analyzing opera, ed. Abbate, Carolyn and Parker, Roger (Berkeley, 1989), 125–49.Google Scholar

10 Atlas (see n. 1).

11 Hepokoski, , 146–9.Google Scholar

12 Some of what follows is refinement of some of the analysis and interpretation in Chapters IV and V of Ashbrook, William and Powers, Harold, Puccini's Turandot, esp. pp. 102–11 and 119–28Google Scholar, with some reference to Chapter III, pp. 65–72, on the original Act I that subsequently became Act I and Act II set 2.

13 ‘Averto il M° Zuccoli che bisogna trasportare un [1/2] tono sotto il finale primo, perchè così com'è [è] troppo acuto. Ma non è una cosa difficile perchè da Mi [naturale] si porta a Mi bemolle.’ Carteggi pucciniani, ed. Gara, Eugenio (Milan, 1958), 548.Google Scholar

14 See Ashbrook, and Powers, , 143.Google Scholar

15 ‘Turandot è lì col 1° atto fatto senza vedere luce per il resto che è oscuro e forse tenebre fitte, eterne! … Credo che Liù va sacrificata di un dolore ma penso che non può svilupparsi – se non si fa morire nella tortura. E perchè no? Questa morte può avere una forza per lo sgelamento della principessa …’ Epistolario Giacomo Puccini, ed. Adami, Giuseppe (Milan, 1928/1958/1983), letter 206.Google Scholar

16 ‘Ora che m'ero rimesso a scrivere quattro note mi mancano i versi per far morir Liù. La musica c'è tutta, mancar da metter giù le parole sul già fatto.’ Epistolario Giacomo Puccini, letter 219.Google Scholar

17 Ashbrook, and Powers, , Example 35 (p. 106).Google Scholar

18 So far no written document showing how Puccini communicated his wish to make the transposition at that particular place has surfaced. The only evidence is the fair-copy pencil autograph in the Ricordi archives on the one hand and the engraved orchestral score on the other.

19 See Ashbrook, and Powers, , 72.Google Scholar

20 Ashbrook, and Powers, , 65–9.Google Scholar

21 Ashbrook, and Powers, , 72.Google Scholar

22 Budden, Julian, The Operar of Verdi, II (London, 1978), 70.Google Scholar

23 Petrobelli, , ‘Towards an Explanation’ (see n. 6), 136–7.Google Scholar

24 Rosenberg, Jesse, ‘A Sketch Fragment for Il trovatore’, Verdi Newsletter, 14 (1986), 29–35.Google Scholar

25 L'abbzzo del Rigoletto di Giuseppe Verdi, ed. Gatti, Carlo (n. p., 1941), if. 17r–20rGoogle Scholar (modern nos.) for Act II nos. 9–11, and ff. 12v–13r for no. 6. See in this connection Martin Chusid, , ‘Rigoletto and Monterone’ (n. 6), 1552–6.Google Scholar

26 Gossett, Philip, ‘New Sources for Stiffelio: A Preliminary Report’, this journal, 5 (1993), 199–222. See pp. 216–22Google Scholar, and esp. Example 6 (p. 222).

27 Numbers in Verdi operas are designated according to his autographs, as shown in Chusid, Martin, A Catalog of Verdi's Operas (Hackensack, 1974).Google Scholar

28 The recomposition of ‘Quel vecchio maledivami’ from abozzo to score has been discussed many times, for the first time (so far as I know) by Pizzetti, Ildebrando in his ‘Insegnamenti del “Rigoletto”’, in Verdi e la Fenice [ed. Valeri, Diego] (Venice, 1951), 68–72.Google Scholar It is taken up by Joseph Kerman as one of several instances of ‘Verdi's Use of Recurring Themes’, in Studies in Music History: Essays for Oliver Strunk, ed. Powers, Harold (Princeton, 1968), 495–510.Google Scholar It is claimed as an important piece of evidence for a long-range tonal plan for Rigoletto by Chusid, Martin in his ‘Rigoletto and Monterone’ (see n. 6).Google Scholar ‘Quel vecchio maledivami’ is examined yet again as part of my study in Verdian vocal characterisation, ‘Il “do del baritono” nel “gioco delle parti” verdiano’, in Opera e libretto II (Florence, 1993), 267–81Google Scholar; see pp. 271–6.

29 That same soprano sonority e″ is discussed with reference to Desdemona in the Otello love duet in Powers, , ‘Il “do del baritono”’, 277–80.Google Scholar

30 ‘Nel secondo Atto se l'aria è troppo alta per Pancani, può abbassarla di mezzo tono, ma soltanto l'ultimo tempo. L'agitato con quel movimento dei Violini deve restare come è – il trasporto si può fare così.’ Ghisi, Federico, ‘Lettere inedite dall'epistolario Verdi-Mazzucato appartenute a Frank V. De Bellis’, Associazione Amici della Scala: Conferenze 1968–1970 (n.p., n.d.), 169.Google Scholar In the copy of this publication at the Istituto nazionale di studi verdiani in Parma, the date of the letter has been corrected by Marcello Conan so that it reads 30 November 1858.

Pancani, Emilio (1830–1898)Google Scholar sang the role of Gabriele Adorno in twelve performances of Simon Boccanegra at La Scala in the Carnival season of 1858–9. See Gatti, Carlo, Il teatro alla Scala nella storia e nell'arte (Milan, 1964), 50.Google Scholar