To conclude my series of posts on the Baroque period of music, I couldn’t possibly leave out one of my all-time favourite keyboard composers. Domenico Scarlatti was born the son of the Alessandro Scarlatti, himself a renknowned opera composer, in Naples, Italy, in the same year as both Bach and Handel (1685). This little-known composer (at least to the modern dilettante, I would think) was in fact one of the leading figures in developing early Classical period music, the style that would later culminate in the works of Mozart and Beethoven. He is in my opinion one of the underrated geniuses of the era, a true innovator, who although admired by such Romantic greats as Brahms and Chopin, never gained the legacy of either of the two.
Of the 555 sonatas he wrote for keyboard (typically harpsichord or fortepiano), I have (unsurprisingly) listened to but a small fraction of them – a few of which I can happily call true masterpieces. Quite possibly my favourite is his Sonata in D major, K. 491, which I have chosen to share today.
This wonderful recording by Raffaele Terlizzi, is again of very high quality and free to download. Although I’m hardly informed to judge, it would seem that this performance was made on a fortepiano (an instrument of Scarlatti’s day, as opposed to the more modern pianoforte) – either way, it gives a feeling of contemporary authenticity. On the subject of online recordings, you can find a immense number of great recordings of piano/keyboard music available for download from the Piano Society website (which I somehow managed to miss out from my previous list of resources for free clasical music).
Let me conclude with a interesting anecdote of Scarlatti’s meeting with Handel. Most unfortunately to the world of music, Handel never did manage to meet the other giant born in 1685, despite several attempts.
It was in 1708 or 1709 that Handel and Scarlatti, then in their early twenties, were involved in a celebrated keyboard contest in Rome. According to the surviving (and not always reliable) account, Handel was declared to be superior on the organ, while Scarlatti matched or perhaps even surpassed Handel’s skill at the harpsichord. Scarlatti is said to have realized the musical possibilities of the organ only after hearing Handel play; regardless of the reliability of such a statement, it certainly confirms Scarlatti’s love for the instrument. In any case, the two became good friends and Scarlatti followed Handel throughout Italy in order to listen to him and learn from his mastery of the organ.
(Extracted from the text of The Great Contest: Bach, Scarlatti, Handel.)
Update: It seems that hot-linking to the MP3 hosted on the Piano Society website isn’t liked. I’ve updated the link now to point to a copy of the file on my own server.
