Tomaso Albinoni

Concerto “San Marco” for Trumpet & Strings in B-flat major

Tomaso Albinoni was born in Venice in 1671 and died there in 1751. The composition and performance history of this concerto is unknown. The concerto is scored for solo trumpet and strings.

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Tomaso Albinoni was born to wealth and pursued his musical interests without having to worry about making a living at it. Nonetheless, he became such a success that he declined his share of the family business when his father died. His career turned out to be long and incredibly prolific, yielding over 50 operas and hundreds of other works. Alas, much of Albinoni’s music has been lost—we have only twelve of the operas, for example—and some of it survives only in fragments.

Albinoni apparently had little or no interaction with other composers or their works; not surprisingly, his music is rather distinctive.  His melodic gift was enough to inspire J.S. Bach to compose four fugues based on Albinoni melodies, and to use his music as teaching material—an enviable recommendation.

Some will wonder exactly why trumpet music from this period seems to live in the extreme high register of the instrument. In Albinoni’s day, the trumpet had yet to acquire valves. Now called a “natural” trumpet, it was the equivalent of a bugle, where notes were changed by lips alone and restricted to the notes of the harmonic series. Those notes are far apart at the lower end of the register, as they are in bugle calls. One cannot play a scalewise melody until the high register is reached, where the notes are much closer together. It must have taken a superior player to negotiate such parts in the Baroque, and while players today often select an instrument with valves for these works, they are still awesomely difficult.

“Melodically gifted” is certainly a phrase that comes to mind when we hear this trumpet concerto. The opening Grave is simply gorgeous, and thrilling in its vaults into the extreme high register. The Allegro that follows is bouncy, light, and invigorating. The third movement Andante is sweet and introspective, while the concluding Allegro is full of rhythmic displacements, including a few delightful spondaic items in the final phrase.

-Mark Rohr