Night Music in the Streets of Madrid

From the madrigalists and Monteverdi to Corelli and Vivaldi, Italian musical style dominated Europe from roughly 1550 to 1750, affecting the tastes and practices of musicians in London, Paris, and the Austro-German lands. And well did they learn, too, for after 1750 the tide had turned. The most successful purveyors of a new galant style—what we call the “classical” style—were born north of the Alps: Haydn, Mozart, J. Christian Bach, Beethoven, eventually Schubert and Mendelssohn. The exception is Luigi Boccherini, perhaps the most prolific composer you’ve never truly heard. Son of a professional string player, Boccherini was born in Lucca and trained in Rome. He debuted early on the cello, which became his primary instrument and figures largely in his massive oeuvre: 11 cello concertos, 20 string symphonies, 100+ sonatas, 48 trios, 90 quartets, and over 120 string quintets!
One of these quintets offers a programmatic glimpse at “Night Music in the Streets of Madrid,” where Boccherini lived and worked from 1769 to his death nearly 40 years later. The work was published only posthumously because, in the composer’s words, “The piece is absolutely useless, even ridiculous, outside Spain because the audience cannot hope to understand its significance nor the performers to play it as it should be played.” Tempo changes mark out five distinct sections within the free-form, single movement structure. It functions as a series of vignettes, launched by a rhythmic tattoo imitating a street musician’s tambourine. The “Minuet of the Blind Beggars” radiates foot-stomping appeal (it appeared prominently in the Russell Crowe film, Master and Commander), whereas the subsequent Largo recedes into a violin-cello serenade, complete with bell-like pizzicato echoes from across the piazza. Next on the scene are Los Manolos, the vulgar street singers who amble along, singing to amuse themselves. Finally, Boccherini suggests the arrival and departure (ritirata or retreat) of the nightwatch, who impose curfew and bring the day to an end.

(c) Jason Stell