Rachmaninov and Villa-Lobos Explore Commedia dell'Arte

How is it that a buffoonish, conniving, misshapen, cultural icon of Western and Eastern European culture since the Renaissance, worked its way into music? In this post, I present a brief exploration of one of my favorite cultural figures, and how that figure manifests musically, especially in Western and Eastern European musical traditions. Of course, we're talking Pulcinella.

For my purposes, from a pianistic standpoint, I'm focusing on the French version of the original Italian character, Polichinelle, and I'll have two wonderful piano pieces in the video at the end of this blog that really highlight the importance of the Pulcinella character.

*Pulcinella in a nineteenth-century print*

Let's look into a little background, a little history of Pulcinella.

The Pulcinella character first originated in Neapolitan Italian puppetry in the 17th century. This character's versatility in terms of how it would show up in various guises, in situations, and also depending on the crowd that was being entertained, really has inspired me to do a little digging into this.

Out of the Italian Commedia dell'Arte tradition, we have the puppet master and actor/artist Silvio Fiorillo in 1620 to thank for the creation of the original Pulcinella character. Regardless of where this character shows up in terms of time and place over the last number of centuries in Western and Eastern Europe, he always has somewhat similar attributes such as a humpback, a crooked nose, crazy gangly, spindly legs, a pot belly, big, fat cheeks, a really oversized mouth, and boy does he tend to use it! He typically wears a cone shaped hat in most depictions. His characteristics and personal attributes, really do vary according to the audience.

If it's a more highbrow audience that he was playing to, he would act more as a cunning and scheming thief, very much self serving. If he was playing more to a blue collar crowd, it would be more like the slightly perverted bumpkin character. Really buffoonish, and usually hilariously so.

Regardless of which version of Pulcinella would show up, he's always acting as an opportunist and self serving. His self interests always come above everything else, and he tends to be a real social climber. He also is so strongly interested in his own self interest and self preservation, it tends to trump all other concerns. However, this trait is one of the depths of character in the Pulcinella figure that I find to be very interesting.

*Etching by Nicolas Bonnart (France, 1637-1717)*

He also tends to act as the savior figure for other characters. Just think about Stravinsky’s Petruska. Stravinsky loved to work with this Pulcinella character. Or think of Suite Italienne, based on, in part, the music of Italian composer Giovanni Pergolesi, from the early part of the 18th century. Stravinsky loved this Pulcinella figure. It would make its appearance in his music. Claude Debussy has a little bit of this Commedia dell'Arte flair to his music in his Cello Sonata. So we find some different aspects of this Commedia dell'Arte tradition showing up in many guises in Western and Eastern European music.

Despite Pulcinella's character flaws, there is something in his acting as a somewhat highly flawed, heroic figure that I find really interesting. Over time we see this Pulcinella or Polichinelle character showing up in England as Mr. Punch, in Germany as Caspar, in the Netherlands, as Jan Klaassen, in Denmark as Mr. Yakoo, in Romania as Mester Jakel, and in Hungary as Paprika Jancsi. It's different versions of the same character and almost like a musical composition. This character, over time, showing up in these various cultures has evolved and taken on his own particular attributes and special qualities specific to the country and specific to the audience that he's playing to.

In the video at the end of this blog I have shared two examples of Pulcinella / Polichinelle inspired music that I really, really like as a pianist. The first is from Rachmaninoff, and this is an early work. It is from his fantasy pieces that Rachmaninoff composed in 1892, his Opus Three, and this is the second. And yes, that is the same opus that gives us the beautiful elegy. Then also the C Sharp Minor Prelude that, Rachmaninoff, I think later on in his life was to rue the day that he ever composed that prelude because he was constantly asked to play it as an encore during his recital tours. I think there were big eye rolls coming from Rachmaninoff!

I find the Rachmaninoff Polichinelle to be the most refreshing piece in the salon tradition of this Opus Five set. And I think it's absolutely wonderful. I think it explores the more playful side of the Pulcinella character, but also it's showing me that Rachmaninoff really knew the music of Edvard Grieg because if you listen closely during the course of this Polichinelle, you're hearing a lot of harmonic shifts that are very reminiscent of the music of Grieg, especially shifts by thirds, sort of moving by third to third to third, so skipping around and there's just a wonderful coloristic quality to that, but also a somewhat chaotic quality that really mirrors the personality of the Pulcinella character.

Now let's fast forward to 1918 Brazilian composer, Heitor Villa-Lobos. He composed a series of three sets of character pieces, three books of character pieces in his first set Book One, he writes, set of seven pieces about different dolls, and this is the seventh piece, the O Polichinelo. It's the Pulcinella character, and it's really a wonderful means of trying to encapsulate the craziness that we often find and the chaos that we often find brought into a good puppet show by the Pulcinella character.

Heitor Villa-Lobos actually dedicated that first Book of Seven Pieces to his wife, Lucilia Villa-Lobos, and I thought that was really sweet. If you're not familiar with the Suite Italienne by Igor Stravinsky, or if it's been a while since you've listened to the score from Petrushka, please do, because Stravinsky was enthralled with the Pulcinella character. The Commedia dell'Arte tradition ends up finding its way into a lot of Stravinsky's work, even the Soldier's Tale early on during the First World War. I've done another video about the Soldier's Tale that also comes in great part from this Commedia dell'Arte inspired tradition.

I highly recommend that you do a little digging on your own. There are some other Polichinelle piano pieces by various composers, mostly from the 19th century. Do a little researching and look into 19th century French piano music and see what you find in terms of the Polichinelle. I’d love to hear your feedback in the comment section of my YouTube videos!

The following video features my performance of Polichinelle Opus Three, Number Two by Rachmaninoff, and O Polichinelo by Heitor Villa-Lobos. Enjoy!

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