New Guitar Transcription: Alessandro Marcello, Adagio

I First heard the piece performed by my wife Belen on the piano. I was struck at the beauty of the piece and I was certain it was a Bach piece, probably because after so many years I associate being struck by a new piece of music as a synonym of Bach's music. I made my transcription of the Adagio using her piano transcription as a starting point. The Concerto in D minor, was published by Jeanne Roger in Amsterdam in 1717, as a Concerto a Cinque (concerto in five parts) for oboe (soloist), strings (two violin and one viola parts) and continuo composed by Alessandro Marcello. No publication date appears in the print: although the year of publication is, depending on author. The publication presents the melody lines unadorned, that is: it is left to the performing musician to embellish melodies with ornaments such as trills, mordents and grace notes. Alessandro Marcello published most of his works under a pseudonym (Eterio Stinfalico): the oboe concerto publication was an exception in that sense as it used his real name. In his Weimar period (1708–17) Johann Sebastian Bach arranged several concertos by Venetian composers, most of them by Vivaldi, for solo keyboard. In July 1713 Prince Johann Ernst returned to Weimar from the Netherlands with several compositions by Italian masters. Vivaldi's Op. 3, L'estro Armonico had been published in Amsterdam in 1711, and there is little doubt that the Prince brought this edition, containing twelve concertos, to Weimar in 1713, as Bach apparently used this print for five of his solo keyboard arrangements. The Prince, who also composed Italianate concertos, presumably encouraged Bach to produce solo keyboard arrangements of such works. As the Prince left Weimar in July 1714 it is estimated that most of Bach's solo keyboard arrangements of Italian and Italianate concertos originated in the period from July 1713 to July 1714. That is, at least those arrangements that could be performed on a harpsichord without pedalboard, while the Weimar court organ (which would be needed for arrangements including pedals such as BWV 592–597) would have been unavailable for undergoing repairs in this period. Visit the Masterclass HERE>>