Giancarlo Simonacci - Stefano Golinelli: Piano Works (2019)

Outshined by opera, which ruled the fates of music in nineteenth-century Italy, many musicians – both composers and performers – devoted their energies to instrumental music. One famous representative of this group was Stefano Golinelli (Bologna, 1818-1891), a composer, pianist and pedagogue who attracted lively attention both in Italy and abroad. He was held in high esteem by Rossini, who gave him the post of Professor of Piano at the Liceo Musicale of Bologna in 1840; in 1842, composer and conductor Ferdinand Hiller (1811-1885) referred to him as to the best Italian pianist of the era on the Parisian Revue et Gazette Musicale. Hiller would later be the dedicatee of Golinelli’s 12 Studi op. 15 (1843), which would receive a positive review on Leipzig’s Zeitschrift für Musik in 1844. Golinelli’s output is mostly focused on piano music, even though it comprises a scanty (but significant) number of chamber music works, among which the three String Quartets op. 100 (1854) are worth mentioning. His piano works are in a variety of genres, including Etudes, Sonatas, Preludes, Toccatas, character pieces, album leaves, Reminiscences and Fantasies on operatic themes. The instrumental traits of Golinelli’s piano writing reveal his real awareness of the instrument’s idiosyncratic features of timbre and colour. His language demonstrates his attention to the aesthetic guidelines set out by the great Romantic composers of the time, such as Chopin, Liszt and Schumann, while, at the same time, it maintains a stylistic connotation of its own. There is, therefore, a great focus on the melodic tension (with belcanto influences), sustained by a refined harmonic texture which is not without a peculiar charm. The Melodia op. 179 n. 2, an intensely poetical piece, belongs to a triptych whose subtitle is Pensieri intimi (“Intimate thoughts”), aptly underpinning its spiritual and refined nature. The Sei melodie, dedicated to Nicola Vaccaj (Golinelli’s teacher) are pieces which, in their seeming simplicity, stand out for the delicate clarity of their melodic texture. While it would impossible here to point out the individual features of each piece, it is worth mentioning that Golinelli’s choice of their keys creates an interesting parallel between the first and the second group of three pieces each. The first piece, in fact, is in F major, the second in A major, the third in D major; the fourth is in F sharp major (enharmonically equivalent to G flat), the fifth in B flat and the sixth in E flat. There are twelve pieces among Golinelli’s Fantasiette; their formal structure is free but corresponds to expressive requirements, such as, for instance, the juxtaposition of at least two thematic groups. The Fantasietta n. 5, whose instrumental writing is very varied and appealing, features also a somewhat unusual tonal plan. The first thematic nucleus, in G major, points with increasing focus to the note B, which becomes the dominant of E major. In this key, the second thematic element flourishes generously, while in the third section, after a robust chromatic descent, the beginning of the first thematic kernel tenuously reappears (this time in E minor), immediately followed by a final Coda in a shining E major. The fluent singing style of the Barcarola op. 35 finds (both at the centre of its itinerary and in the concluding peroration) tones of dramatic tension, though the serenity of its principal theme is its qualifying trait, characterising the piece as melancholic and introverted.
The explicit emphasis of the Due canti patetici op. 142 employs an expansive and communicative declamation: here the operatic atmosphere is at work, with a plot and characters which are, at the same time, subtly perceived and elusive. The title of Ricordanze di un tempo che fu op. 231 (“Memoirs of a past time”) seems to allude to a past seen with nostalgia. It is composed of six scenes, connected to each other by thematic motifs found again and again, punctually and almost identically, throughout this Suite. The composer is very alert to the emotional conflict between one piece and the following, even though he delineates a single, overarching, evocative narrative. With his diptych Due pensieri affettuosi, Golinelli reaches a more elevated dimension, thanks to the nobility of the content, to the skilful elaboration of the two pieces’ only thematic fragment, to the notable relationship between melody and harmony (particularly in the Andante). This work, as a whole, is worth including in the ideal artistic sphere in which the pieces of the most famous European composers of the nineteenth century are found.