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15 Jun
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Los Caprichos de Goya cycle for guitar by Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco

Exploring Los Caprichos de Goya

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

“Where can I find more information about Los Caprichos de Goya ?” is a question that often arises.

For those wishing to learn more about this cycle, which the composer himself described as his most ambitious guitar work, there are several primary sources (currently available only in Italian): the pages Mario dedicated to the work in his autobiography, Una Vita di Musica: Un Libro di Ricordi, published by Cadmo in 2005, as well as the letters of Andres Segovia to the composer, published in the volume Caro Mario: Lettere a Castelnuovo-Tedesco, edited by Angelo Gilardino and published by Edizioni Curci in 2018. Gilardino also discusses the work in the biography Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Un Fiorentino a Beverly Hills also published in 2018 by Curci In English, one can consult Lily Afshar’s 1989 dissertation, “Los Caprichos de Goya and their relation to Goya’s etchings” and several other doctoral theses, as well as the liner notes to Zoran Dukic’s 2009 recording of Los Caprichos  for Naxos.
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10 Jun
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Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco Suite 508 for viola and piano

Spotlight on Suite 508 for viola and piano

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco mused in his autobiography  that if by chance his name were still remembered 100 years hence, musicologists might hear the title Suite 508 and ask, “What happened to the other 507 suites?”

He explained the origin of the title: Suite 508 was the number of his apartment in the Kellogg Center at Michigan State University (MSU) when he spent a semester as Distinguished Visiting Professor in the autumn of 1959. His stay in Michigan took place at the height of his post-war career, after he had made international headlines when he won the International Campari Prize for his opera The Merchant of Venice.
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02 Apr
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IN CELEBRATION OF CASTELNUOVO-TEDESCO @ 125

In Celebration of Mario’s 125th birthday

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

On April 3, 1895,  Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco was born in Florence “in the shadow of the Duomo,” as he liked to say.  Although his guitar compositions have always been popular, his chamber music, works for solo piano, orchestral music, and art songs were rarely performed for many years. Fortunately, in recent times his catalog has been rediscovered by a new generation of artists and audiences, in an ever-expanding collection of marvelous recordings. This rediscovery due in no small part to the availability of new editions of his compositions, primarily The Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco Collection from Edizioni Curci, under the leadership of Angelo Gilardino, as well as from Ricordi, Theodore Presser, Alphonse Leduc, Carl Fischer, and others.  In honor of Mario’s 125th birthday, the composer’s family would like to thank all of the artists and scholars who have dedicated their passion, sensitivity, and energy into presenting this music, and the story behind it, to the public.
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20 Mar
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Exiles in Paradise

Emigre Composers in Hollywood

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

“During the war, the greatest names in music, both composers and performers, came to live in Hollywood and the surrounding area….Heifetz, Piatigorsky, Rachmaninoff, Rubinstein, Iturbi, Horowitz, Szigeti, Stokowski, Walter, Schönberg, Stravinsky, Toch, Tansman, and many others.”  — Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, A Life of Music: A Book of Memories.

In a new CD, Exiles in Paradise: Emigre Composers in Hollywood (Naxos), Brinton Averil Smith and Evelyn Chen explore, with artistry and finesse, the diverse output of the European expatriates through music for cello and piano. The recording includes Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s i Nottambuli [“The Nightowls”], a work written while the composer was still living in Italy and inspired by his evening strolls in Florence.
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24 Feb
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Castelnuovo-Tedesco Opera now on CD

Now Available: First Recording of The Importance of Being Earnest

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Boston’s Odyssey Opera recently announced the release of its latest recording, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco: The Importance of Being Earnest. Scored for a cast of eight singers, two pianos and percussion, this witty three act chamber opera brings Oscar Wilde’s most famous play to life with music that pokes as much fun at the opera world as Wilde does with Victorian society.
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21 Jan
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Nuovo volume su Castelnuovo-Tedesco

First Collection of Musicological Essays about Castelnuovo-Tedesco published in Italy

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

L’ignoto iconoclasta:studi su Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco [The Unknown Iconoclast: Studies about Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco], published in late 2019 by Libreria Musicale Italiana, grew out of an idea by Assonanze (The Association of Young Musicologists of Sapienza University of Rome) and was developed following the international conference of the same name, held at the University in 2018.

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29 Nov
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Three newly published chamber works 

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Three previously unavailable works by Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco are now published by Edizioni Curci in collaboration with CIDIM (Comitato Nazionale Italiano Musica): Three Shakespeare Duets for soprano, tenor and piano; the Second String Quartet, and Suite 508 for viola and piano.

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28 Oct
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80th Anniversary of the Première of Opus 99

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Exactly eighty years ago, on 28 October 1939, the Concerto in D Major for Guitar and Orchestra, Opus 99  by Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco had its world premiere in Montevideo, Uruguay. 

Written at the request of his friend Andres Segovia, the work was conceived in the shadow of  Italy’s anti-semitic campaign, a painful time which ultimately led the composer to seek exile in the United States.
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16 Oct
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At the Lyceum Club in Florence

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

Founded in 1908, the Lyceum Club Internazionale di Firenze was the first women’s club to be founded in Italy, dedicated to women’s emancipation, internationalism, and peace. In addition, cultural programs have been an objective of the Club since its birth more than 100 years ago.   As a young man, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco performed frequently at the Lyceum, and today the Lyceum continues to host concerts to raise awareness of Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s music among the Florentine public. 

In 2015 the composer’s family donated a collection of scores and books to the Lyceum which Castelnuovo-Tedesco had kept at his home in Florence. The collection includes more than 700 pieces of music, both manuscripts and printed music, which date from 1620 to 1964. More than 100 composers are represented, with texts in five languages and three Italian dialects! Most of the works date from the 19th and 20th centuries, and many also have dedications to the composer from teachers, friends, and colleagues.
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21 Aug
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una cantafavola del XII secolo per una voce, qualche strumento e qualche marionetta

AUCASSIN ET NICOLETTE RETURNS TO ITALY

Diana Castelnuovo-Tedesco / News /

On August 31, 2019, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s  Aucassin et Nicolette will premiere in its Italian language version at the Teatro Pergolesi in Jesi, Italy.

Written in 1938, just months before Castelnuovo-Tedesco left Italy to emigrate to the United States because of Mussolini’s racial laws, Aucassin et Nicolette is based on a 12th century French chantefable and was conceived for “one voice, some instruments and some marionettes”.
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