Following last Sunday’s event with Museo svelato (The Museum Revealed), the CSAC continues its Oltre le Opere / Dentro alla Musica (Beyond the Works / Inside Music) series with three chamber concerts and narration, a project in which music meets

On Sunday, 16 November, at the Abbey of Valserena, starting at 10:30 a.m., the second event is scheduled, with free admission: Intrecci / ‘Le parole ivi raggrumate’ (The words gathered there), a concert performed by the Quartetto Dedicato, formed by Daniele Ruzza and Camilla Mazzanti on violins, Behrang Rassekhi on viola, and Adan Alejandro Gomez Dominguez on cello, with narration by Faustino Stigliani.

A highly regarded theatre actor and beloved radio voice, Stigliani will give voice to Luigi Magnani, here in the role of scholar of the Conversation Notebooks (the writings Beethoven used to communicate despite his deafness), which he himself commented on in the book Beethoven nei suoi Quaderni di Conversazione (Beethoven in his Conversation Notebooks, 1975). Part of these writings, with Beethoven’s reflections, will be read by Stigliani, particularly those relating to the music in the programme: the Quartet in A minor, Op. 132, and Große Fuge in B flat major, Op. 133, composed by Beethoven in the last years of his life, when he definitively chose the quartet as his privileged and exclusive means of intimate expression, experimentation and constant formal work. Beethoven entrusted these quartets with his most extreme thoughts, his anxieties, his deepest reflections, and a humour that was at times dark and sardonic, at times genuine and good-natured.

In Op. 132 in particular, he manages to reconcile sonata form, Gregorian chant (the Lydian mode of the Canzona di ringraziamento, the evocative title of the third movement), variation, folk dance (in the formidable trio of the second movement), march and rondo. The Fugue Op. 133, on the other hand, is an extraordinarily complex, even mysterious piece: ignored for a century and rediscovered in the 20th century, it is now considered one of the greatest and most surprising musical creations of all time.

The musical event will be preceded by a meeting dedicated to the venue, Intorno allo CSAC (Around the CSAC), curated by Mariapia Branchi, head of the CSAC’s Archival and Museum Unit. The topic will be Migliaia di Collezioni (Thousands of Collections), closely linked to Luigi Magnani, a great collector.

Info: csac@unipr.it ; tel. 0521.903649