Bella Italia

go to the webshop now!

Wonderful Italian Arias and more for euphonium and symphonic band

Steven Mead and the Italian Army Band (Banda dell'Esercito) - BOCC102

Steven Mead has for some years visited Italy regularly, bringing his instrument to this country of music lovers who, it must be said, seem to have fallen in love with the sound of the euphonium. Thanks to his numerous visits to Italy (including Aosta, Milan, Trento, Bolzano, Bologna, Florence, Rome, Ancona, Bari, Calabria and Sicily), he has developed a musical affinity with the country, the people and their music. This unique CD is another landmark in the relationship between Mead and this country and for the growth of the popularity of the euphonium in Italy.

It has always been part of the Italian band music tradition to play pieces from the operatic repertoire using instruments, especially those of the saxhorn family, to “imitate” the human voice. This tradition began in the nineteenth century when, given the lack of radio and records, the band was the medium of broadcasting the fashionable melodies of operatic music in the town squares. Today Italian bands are following many different musical paths, including the current extensive repertoire of original pieces. Dedicating almost an entire CD to operatic Romances and Arias therefore has a double meaning: on the one hand it pays homage to this genre, whose intrinsic beauty defies description and on the other hand it does that which virtuosi and instrumental soloists all over the world have always done, that is to give a ‘voice’ to these immortal works through their instruments. The unique, inimitable sound of Steven Mead, who for the first time has recorded a CD with an Italian military band, is certain to be enthusiastically received.

CD Contents

  1. Dulcamarata (Donizetti Variations) for Euphonium and Symphonic Band
    Karl - Heinz Koper 12’.55”
  2. Caro mio ben ~ Aria antica Giuseppe Giordani Arr. Antonella Bona 2’.20”
  3. Aria di chiesa "Pietà Signore" ~ attributed Alessandro Stradella Arr. Antonio Barbagallo 3’.33”
  4. Vaga luna che inargenti (Aria da camera) ~ Vincenzo Bellini Arr. Antonella Bona 3’.36”
    hear MP3 sound clip
  5. Vi ravviso, o luoghi ameni 2’.43”
    hear MP3 sound clip
  6. Ah, non credea mirarti 3’.27”
  7. Ah, non giunge ~ from the Opera "La Sonnambula" Vincenzo Bellini Arr. Antonella Bona 3’.13”
  8. A fors' è lui ~ from the Opera "la Traviata" Giuseppe Verdi Arr. Fulvio Creux 2’.53”
  9. Di Provenza il mar, il suol ~ from the Opera "la Traviata" .. 3’.49” Giuseppe Verdi Arr. Fulvio Creux
  10. Ave Maria ~ from the Opera "Otello" .. Giuseppe Verdi Arr. Fulvio Creux 4’.29”
  11. Vissi d'arte ~ from the Opera "Tosca" .. Giacomo Puccini Arr. Antonella Bona 3’.07”
    hear MP3 sound clip
  12. Serenata (Aria da salotto) Enrico Toselli Arr. Thomas Ruedi 3’.56”
  13. Preghiera ~ from the Opera "Lo Scudiero del Re" 4’.22” Francesco Feliciangeli Arr. Fulvio Creux
  14. Alla Czardas for Euphonium (originally for clarinet) and Band 6’.45” Giovanni Orsomando Arr. and new cadenza Fulvio Creux hear MP3 sound clip
  15. Variations on "Carnival of Venice" .. Jean - Baptiste Arban Arr. Donald Hunsberger 7’.52”
    hear MP3 sound clip

Steven with the

Banda dell'Esercito Italiano - Italian Army Band

Steve has just recorded a truly historic recording with the Italian Army Band, conductor Fulvio Creux.

Widely regarded as one of the finest wind orchestras in Europe the recording sessions followed in the three days following a magnificent live concert in the Teatro Massimo, to a capacity audience. The idea was a joint one between Maestro Creux and Steve Mead and one which further lifts the profile of the euphonium in Italy, which has seen a huge increase popularity in recent years. Steve's many concerts, workshops and teaching courses have raised awareness of the euphonium to Italian musicians and audiences and this CD is a culimination of about 7 years work since Steve's first ever visit to Italy at the Verso Il Millenio Tuba Euphonium Festival in Riva Del Garda.

This CD is to be called Beautiful Italy (Bella Italia) and will be the second CD to be issued on the Bocchino Music Label. Release date is set for mid June. Some photos from the live concert and recording are attached here. This promises to be a wonderful album that combines many beautiful lyric Italian arias, from composers such as Verdi, Bellini, Donizetti, Puccini with some truly remarkable technical solos at the end of the disc.

'Mead reminds us about the art of playing a melody'

Bella Italia CD Review

For several years euphonium virtuoso, Steven Mead, has been making regular visits to Italy and has built up a love affair with the country, its music and its bands. One happy outcome of this is a new CD, Bella Italia, featuring Steven and the Italian Army Band (La Banda Dell'Esercito), with its colourful conductor Lt.Col. Fulvio Creux. Not surprisingly, all 15 tracks have their origins in Italian music - predominantly operatic. Many of the pieces are relatively unknown and were chosen for their musicality rather than for their popularity.

The first track takes up themes from Donizetti's opera L'Elisir d'Amore. This was first performed in Milan in 1832 and, within five years, was available in Britain in a very early example of the operatic selection for brass band. Dulcamarata (Donizetti Variations) for Euphonium and Symphonic Band is an adaptation of a work for clarinet and band by the German-born theatre conductor and freelance composer Karl Heinz Koper, and is a fantasy based on themes from the opera, in which Dulcamarata takes the part of a 'quack' doctor. References to other themes also appear, including the familiar 'Napoli' and the Prelude to Wagner's Tristan und Isolde. This is no mere solo with band accompaniment; it lasts for almost 13 minutes, includes a beautiful section based on the opera's best-known piece 'Una furtiva lagrima', and establishes both soloist and band as being in the top class. It has many of the characteristics of a concerto, the band enjoying equal status with the soloist.

The heyday of the modern Italian opera was mainly in the 19th Century and was begun by Rossini, who wrote a staggering 40 operas between the years 1812 and 1829 - the year of William Tell. Rossini is not represented on this CD but his immediate successor Donizetti, provided the musical material for the first track. He, in turn , was followed by Bellini, nine years younger than Rossini and four younger than Donizetti. Bellini takes up four of the tracks, but two gems from earlier periods precede them.

The beautiful Caro mio ben was originally attributed to the Neopolitan composer, Guiseppe Giordani, but is now believed to be the work of his son, Tommaso. Although born in Naples in 1730, he spent much of his life in London, and would therefore be familiar with the music of Handel, in whose style this aria is written. Though few know of Tommaso Giordani these days, he wrote over 50 operas, many of them to English texts, before he died in Dublin in 1806. The well-chosen tempo and true Baroque style of playing make this piece one of the many gems on the CD. Pieta Signore, the second of the two older arias, though composed for performance in church, is not significantly different in style from the operatic aria. Attributed to Alessandro Stradella and, indeed, bringing fame to him, it is by no means certain than he was the actual composer. Its beauty and tenderness contrast sharply with the turbulent life of this somewhat wayward figure, involved in several scandals. He was murdered at the relatively young age of 37 when the brothers of one his mistresses hired an assassin to bring his philandering to an untimely end. Again, Mead and the Band portray the mood of this rather sombre aria excellently. It may be of interest to know that the Belle Vue test-piece of 1856 was an overture called Stradella that was in fact, from an opera by the German composer, Flotow (of 'Martha' fame), based on the life of Stradella. The mood lightens significantly with the first of the Bellini pieces not from opera but very much in an operatic style. Singing to the moon, the tormented lover in 'Vaga luna' anticipates Dvorak's infinitely better known aria by some 70 years. The other three Bellini arias are all from La Sonnambula (The Sleep Walking Girl), another work familiar to early bandsmen through the operatic selection. 'Vi ravviso, o luoghi ameni' and 'Ah, non credea mirarti' are both full of pathos and, in each Mead demonstrates sensitivity, with beautiful phrasing and immaculate intonation. The mood changes completely in the final extract from Sonnambula. This 'Ah, non guinge' forms the part of the opera's finale and, following several acrobatics in the high register the ending is obviously designed to bring the audience to its feet. Italian opera reached its high point with Verdi, represented here by three arias, two from La Traviata and one from the much later Otello. In 'A fors'e lui', the terminally ill Violetta soliloquises about her love for Alfredo. Later in the opera, in 'Di Provenza il Mar', Alfredo sings of his despair on finding that Violetta has abandoned him. Otello, based on Shakespearse's tragedy, is full of intrigue, hatred and murder. Despite all, the 'Ave Maria' sung by the ill-fated Desdemona is an aria of great beauty and serenity receiving a heart-felt performance here by Mead and the Italian Army Band.

Puccini arrived on the scene 45 years after Verdi and took Italian opera into the 20th Century. Tosca was first performed in Rome in 1900 and its 'Vissi d'arte', known in its English translation as 'Love and Music', demonstrates Puccini's great gift of melody and proves most effective as a euphonium solo.

Next comes Enrico Toselli's 'Serenata'. In its setting of 'Like a Golden Dream', it is the one piece by which this composer is now chiefly known. In contrast, neither Francesco Feliciangeli nor his opera Lo Scudiero del Re are likely to be known at all to the majority of British listeners. Though composed in the 20th Century, its style is undoubtedly of the 19th and it sits well in this collection, again giving Mead an opportunity to demonstrate his command of the upper register.

Following this splendid collection of vocal pieces transcribed for the euphonium, the CD returns to the instrumental idiom for the final two tracks. Giovanni Orsomando was dubbed 'The Godfather of Italian Band Music' (possibly because he conducted Mussolini's Presidential Band, Le Band del Duce, from 1938-43). His Alla Czardas, originally for clarinet and band, has been adapted as euphonium solo by Fulvio Creux, who also adds a highly spectacular cadenza, taking Mead up to a super-A, almost an octave higher than lesser mortals are expected to achieve. It is similar, in many ways, to the more famous Monti's Czardas - a czardas being a type of Hungarian dance. Here is a superb vehicle for Mead's incredible virtuosity.

The CD began with the Donizetti Variations and, giving it a symmetrical shape, turns to that most popular of all sets of variations, Carnival of Venice, for its finale. The well-known Arban version is here enhanced by the celebrated band arrangement of Donald Hunsberger, giving both soloist and band a great time - obviously relished by both in this definitive performance.

This is a CD with a difference. Whilst not without its virtuosic moments, it also proves that the art of melody playing is not yet dead. Many of our younger players would do well to listen to Steven Mead - in particular his phrasing, his expression and the manner in which he achieves the many changes of mood. For those interested only in musical fireworks this would probably not be the ideal Christmas present , but if your priority is music, go out and buy it, now !

Dr. Roy Newsome - British Bandman Magazine 10 July 2004