VIVALDI AND THE ORPHAN VIOLINIST

posted by James Reel

    For some reason I haven’t bothered to link to my reviews for Fanfare magazine that happen to show up online (only a small portion of the print edition is available via the Web site). In the last issue, I wrote about a collection of Vivaldi violin concertos described as “for Anna Maria”:

You’ve heard of the "Anna Magdalena Notebook," but how about the “Anna Maria Notebook”? Anna Maria was an orphan without an official last name, educated at Venice’s Ospedale dall' Pietà, where Antonio Vivaldi taught music. Born in 1696, she seems to have entered the music program earlier than usually allowed, owing to her apparent talent. When Anna Maria was 16, Vivaldi saw to it that she received her own violin at institutional expense, and over the years he wrote some 30 violin concertos for her, as well as a couple of works for viola d’amore with her initials worked acrostically into the titles.

    You can read more about Anna Maria and the recording by Federico Guglielmo and L’Arte dell’Arco here. The site also includes my review of the SACD reissue of an underappreciated performance of Mahler’s “Resurrection” Symphony by Leonard Slatkin and the St. Louis Symphony.