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News

14 Mar
Castelnuovo-Tedesco and Segovia Correspondence

Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s guitar repertoire via his correspondence with Andrés Segovia

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s 36-year collaboration with the legendary guitarist Andrés Segovia resulted in 35 works featuring the guitar. The correspondence between these two artists provides an unprecedented source of information for performers and scholars. Beginning in 2014, for his PhD thesis at the University of Surrey, the guitarist Benjamin Bruant began a six-year journey that led him to eventually gather and translate into English (from the original French) Segovia’s letters to MCT  as well as the extant letters by Castelnuovo-Tedesco, held in the Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco Papers at the Library of Congress. Published in 2021, his doctoral thesis, From Commission to Publication: a Study of Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s Guitar Repertoire Informed by his Correspondence with Andrés Segovia, presents his annotated translations of decades of correspondence along with commentary on each of Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s compositions discussed in the letters. Benjamin kindly agreed to tell us more about his project in this recent interview. 
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20 Feb
Happy Birthday Andres Segovia

Happy Birthday Andrés Segovia

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

21 February 2023 marks the 130th birthday of Andrés Segovia.  In celebration of this milestone and the friendship and artistic collaboration between Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco and Segovia,  we would like to share some extracts from the essay Mario wrote for Segovia’s 3-LP box set, Segovia: The Golden Jubilee, released in November 1958 to honor the guitarist’s fifty year career.  Mario’s essay recognizes Segovia’s unique artistry and chronicles their artistic relationship, as well as highlighting some of the dozens of works Segovia commissioned from other composers. The boxed set was met with critical success. Not only did reviewers praise the quality of the recording  and the addition of newly recorded compositions to Segovia’s discography,  but they also drew attention to the important contributions presented in the booklet.  The Golden Jubilee boxed set was awarded a Grammy Award in 1959.
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04 Feb
Musicologist Fernando Liuzzi was Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco's brother in law and close friend

Rediscovering the life of Fernando Liuzzi

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s brother-in-law Fernando Liuzzi (1884-1940) was also a close friend and colleague. A composer, musicologist, music critic, and professor of aesthetics, Liuzzi had a successful career in Italy that abruptly ended when Mussolini’s racial laws came into effect. Like Mario, Liuzzi found his way to New York just before World War II. However, he soon returned to Italy after suffering a serious heart attack at age 55; he died a few months later, in October 1940. In the intervening years, Liuzzi’s life and work have remained in the shadows. Professor Patrizia Guarnieri, historian at the University of Florence and director of the digital history project Intellectuals Displaced from Fascist Italy, has just published an in-depth and meticulously researched exploration of Liuzzi’s life and career. It is available on the English version of the site here.
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31 Jan
Stein-Erik Olsen explores Castelnuovo-Tedesco Quintet on new CD

Guitar Chamber Music: Stein-Erik Olsen Interview

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

As part of our occasional series of interviews with performers about their experiences recording Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s chamber music, we posed some questions to Stein-Erik Olsen, the esteemed Norwegian guitarist and professor at the Grieg Academy of the University of Bergen. He has a long-standing commitment to guitar chamber music,  demonstrated once again by his latest release: Stein-Erik Olsen: The Fifties and NOW (Simax Classics)
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10 Dec
Castelnuovo-Tedesco Greeting Cards Interview C. Porqueddu

Greeting Cards: Cristiano Porqueddu Interview

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Cristiano Porqueddu is recognized as one of the major interpreters of 20th and 21st century guitar music. His activities encompass live performances, recording projects and composition work. In November 2022 he released his latest project, a double CD that represents the first complete recording of Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s Greeting Cards for guitar based on the 2019 Ricordi edition edited by Frédéric Zigante. Cristiano kindly agreed to tell us about his experiences studying and recording these intimate and sometimes illusive pieces.
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01 Dec
Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco The Importance of Being Earnest piano reduction cover

Newly Published: The Importance of Being Earnest

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s 1962 chamber opera The Importance of Being Earnest is now available from Edizioni Curci and ready for the stage!  This pure divertissement based on Oscar’s Wilde’s celebrated play is scored for the unusual ensemble of eight voices, two pianos, and percussion, with a libretto by the composer. Both the voice and piano reduction and the full score are available from the publisher.
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29 Nov
Concert Nov 13, 2022 at Wilshire Boulevard Temple of Castelnuovo-Tedesco String Trio Op. 147

String Trio returns “home” to L.A.

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

The String Trio op. 147 was performed in Los Angeles, Mario’s adopted city,  on November 13, 2022 in a concert presented by the Wilshire Boulevard Temple and the Holocaust Museum of Los Angeles, under the auspices of the Ziering-Conlon Initiative for Recovered Voices. This work was composed in 1950 at the composer’s home in Beverly Hills, just a few miles from the Temple. However, this concert was the first time the Trio had been heard live in Los Angeles since 1968, when it was performed at a memorial service for the composer.
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18 Nov
Musicisti Contro l'oppressione - Milano Novembre 2022

Musicians Against Oppression in Milan

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Musicisti contro l’oppressione [Musicians Against Oppression] is the title of a two part concert series in Milan this month, created and led by Italian composer Carlo Boccadoro under the auspices of the Teatro alla Scala in collaboration with the Fondazione Giangiacomo Feltrinelli. The first concert, which took place on 6 November, featured Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s Ballade op. 107, performed by Andrea Pecolo, violin and Andrea Rebaudengo, piano. The work was very well-received by the audience at the sold-out Sunday morning event.
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19 Oct
New CD by Puerta Vazquez Duo - Appunti - 2022

New CD: Interview with the Puerta-Vázquez Duo

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

—In the early 1960s, at the request of the legendary Presti-Lagoya Duo, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco composed his first work for two guitars,  the Sonatina Canonica, op 196 (1961). He went on to write three more: Les Guitares Bien Tempérées  op. 199 (1962), the Concerto for two Guitars and Orchestra, op. 201 (1962), and, after Ida Presti’s untimely death in 1967, he composed the Fuga Elegiaca in her memory. In 1967 he also began work on the Appunti op.210, an ambitious project dedicated to young guitarists. Conceived as a four-volume collection of solo guitar pieces based on the fundamentals of modern guitar music, only the first two books were completed before the composer’s death in 1968. On their their new recording, Appunti (Contrastes), the Arizona-based duo of José Luis Puerta and Alfredo Vázquez explore some of these late guitar works. The title of their CD reflects the heart of the project: transcriptions for two guitars by the late Prof. David Grimes of ten short pieces from the second volume of the Appunti, which Mario had based on dances of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.  The Duo kindly agreed to tell us more about themselves and the realization of their recording project.
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