The 20th Century Viola da Gamba

The 20th Century Viola da Gamba
Composer Alexander Tcherepnin, Christian Döbereiner, Giuseppe Selmi, Giacomo Nones, Riccardo Giavina
Artist Matteo Malagoli viola da gamba
Cristina Centa harp
Stefano Rattini organ, harpsichord
Trento Vocal Ensemble Laurence K.J. Feininger
Format 1 CD
Cat. number 97568
EAN code 5063758975681
Release November 2025

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About this release

The viola da gamba is not dead, despite a claim to the contrary in the Dictionary of Musicians by German composer, organist and cellist Ernst Ludwig Gerber (1746–1819). From the 16th century to the end of the 18th, the viola da gamba experienced a true apotheosis, becoming the favoured instrument for bourgeois entertainment, particularly in Germany, France, Italy and England, even if the instrument’s origins lie in the Spanish Renaissance. Because of these associations with the aristocracy, but also because of advances in musical style that demanded more from the role of the lower member of the string family, the gamba lost ground to the newer cello during the French Revolution.
Limited interest in the instrument persisted through the 19th century, until a rebirth occurred thanks to German cellists Christian Döbereiner (1874–1961) and Paul Grümmer (1879–1965), and later the Austrian Karl Maria Schwamberger (1905–1967) and Swiss cellist August Wenzinger (1905–1996), a pupil of Grümmer’s and a founder, in 1925, of one of Germany’s first early music ensembles. Wenzinger was appointed cello and viola da gamba teacher at Basle’s new Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, where Giacomo Nones (1929–2017) and Jordi Savall (b.1941) would become his pupils.
Döbereiner was one of the most important pioneers at the dawn of modern research into historical performance practice, considered to have revived both the viola da gamba and the baryton from obscurity. From his Sarabande, in Handelian style, only the solo part has survived, and the basso continuo has been reconstructed by Matteo Malagoli.
Alexander Tcherepnin (1899–1977) was an important Russian pianist and composer. He invented his own harmonic language, combining major and minor hexachords in a pentatonic scale that blended old Russian patterns and Georgian (Caucasian) harmonies. During a stay in France he became friends with Paul Grümmer and in 1969 published a lovely Sonata da chiesa for viola da gamba and organ dedicated to Grümmer and his daughter Sylvia.
Giuseppe Selmi (1912–1987) was a gifted concert cellist, performing both with orchestra and piano. As a composer, he wrote several works for solo cello, with piano and with harp (he played in a duo with his wife Maria Dongellini). Following the gift of a viola da gamba (built by Paolo Leonori in 1952) from his wife in the 1970s, he became a passionate advocate for the instrument, writing works for it with harp or solo.
Giacomo Nones (1929–2017) dedicated himself from a young age to classical music and the popular music from his native Trentino, studying violin, organ and viola da gamba, as well as musicology and organology. He has edited transcriptions and publications of Renaissance and Baroque music and has collaborated with various early music ensembles. Passionate about contemporary music, in particular ‘computer music’, he wrote his 10 small Algorithms for two viols with the use of a computer according to theories by the Russian mathematician Rudolf Zaripov. His only other viola da gamba works are the very different Partitas on the Lutheran chorale Was Gott tut, das ist wohlgetan for gamba and organ, and the Fantasia for solo viol on the Kyrie of the Gregorian ‘Orbis factor’ Mass.
Riccardo Giavina (1937–2019) was a Piedmontese pianist and composer, later a teacher and headmaster at the ‘Bonporti’ Conservatory of Trento and Riva del Garda. A friend of Giacomo Nones, in April 1977 he dedicated his three short pieces for three viols (soprano, tenor and bass) to the other composer. Written in late Renaissance style, they are aimed at extending the original literature for viola da gamba into the 20th century.

- Recorded April 2022 in Silvelle; July, August & December 2023 in Ponte nelle Alpi; and January 2024 in Trento (Italy)
- Booklet in English contains liner notes and a profile of each of the composers
- Matteo Malagoli plays a viola da gamba by Marco Salerno (Rome – Barcelona, 2004)
- Cristina Centa plays a Salvi harp
- Stefano Rattini plays a harpsichord by Fabrizio Acanfora (Naples, 1997) and at the Carlo Vegezzi-Bossi organ (1907; restored Mascioni, 2000) of the Trento Philharmonic Society

Track list

Disk 1

  1. Christian Döbereiner: Capriccio in Style of Marin Marais (from Method) for Solo Viol
  2. Christian Döbereiner: Sarabanda in A Major for Viola da Gamba and Harpsichord
  3. Christian Döbereiner: Menuett in D Major for Viola da Gamba and Harpsichord
  4. Christian Döbereiner: Bourrée in D Major for Viola da Gamba and Harpsichord
  5. Alexander Tcherepnin: Sonata da chiesa, Op. 101 for Viola da Gamba and Organ
  6. Giuseppe Selmi: Il trovadorico [The Troubadour]: I. Rhapsodic Impression
  7. Giuseppe Selmi: Il trovadorico [The Troubadour]: II. Short Toccata for Solo Viol (1977)
  8. Giuseppe Selmi: Allegro vivace all’ungherese for Viola da Gamba and Harp (1978)
  9. Giuseppe Selmi: Tirolese - Allegro brillante for Viola da Gamba and Harp
  10. Giuseppe Selmi: Marcetta cinese (1981) for Viola da Gamba and Little Harp
  11. Gregorian Chant: Kyrie from Mass Orbis Factor
  12. Giacomo Nones: Fantasy on Kyrie from Mass Orbis factor for Solo Viol
  13. Giacomo Nones: Partite Diverse on Choral Wass Gott tut, das ist wohlgetan for Viola da Gamba and Organ
  14. Giacomo Nones: Algoritmi for 2 Viols
  15. Riccardo Giavina: Prelude, Fantasy and Postlude in Old Style for 3 Viols