Five Questions to Ottavio Dantone

DIVERDI: What place does Vivaldi occupy within your own repertory?
OTTAVIO DANTONE: Since I started directing the Accademia Bizantina in 1996, Vivaldi has been appearing in my repertory in an increasingly important way, to the point that at present something like half of my converts are given over to his music.

D: In your opinion, why has it taken so long for Vivaldi's work to be rediscovered?
O.D.: It's a real mystery; I find it difficult to explain. To me it seems inexplicable that even the works which are better known by musicians and the public the world over should at times be available solely through performances made in the 1950s and 1960s; for as much that these versions may well be respectable ones, they cannot be considered, of course, as being critical versions. Currently things are improving, but for many years concert programmers and record labels only used to be interested in a meagre portion of Vivaldi's overall output.

D: How did you come to choose Tito Manlio?
O.D.: This was an opera that was barely familiar to me when I came to it for the first time, but when I uncovered the score I was immediately taken by the diversity and range of its characters and its instrumental combinations, and I quickly realized the enormous potential of the work.

D: You have composed the da capos for the arias yourself. What were your reasonings here? What considerations did you take into account?
O.D.: Writing the da capos for the arias has been a delicate operation. In my opinion, the da capo was the most significant section of the aria, one which gave the singers an opportunity to show off their technical abilities, as much as from vocal and compositional viewpoints as from imaginative ones. In order to compose these variations I have kept in mind a number of matters. Firstly, the style of the typical Italian embellishments from the 16th and 17th centuries. In the second place, the particular vocal features relevant to each character, as well as the related stresses from the first part of the aria. In the places which had many notes a melodic section could be inserted and vice-versa. In actual fact, the typical musical rhetoric coupled with 17th century ornamentation practice allow us a good deal of freedom. On the other hand, it has been certainly been a highly-enjoyable task for me.

D: How would you define in two words the music of Vivaldi?
O.D.: Masterly imagination.

OTTAVIO DANTONE IN DIVERDI

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