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Thread: Leopoldo Francia (c. 1900): "Adagio" - Mandolin Duet (with score)

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    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Leopoldo Francia (c. 1900): "Adagio" - Mandolin Duet (with score)

    Leopoldo Francia (1875-1918): "Adagio" - Mandolin Duet

    This is a short piece for two mandolins, written by Leopoldo Francia, the foremost mandolin soloist of the 1890s. At the age of 17, Francia won a gold medal at the Genoa Concourse of 1892, the start of the mandolin viruoso era in Italy, and soon became a touring concert mandolinist before settling in London in 1894, where he rapidly became Britain's most prominent mandolinist. He wrote over 500 pieces for mandolin, as well as two method books, but I have come across only a small handful of his compositions, including this simple duet from an early edition of the BMG Magazine found in a box of old mandolin music. I attach a scan. The tempo printed on the score is 84bpm. I tried that, but while it is playable at that speed it didn't sound particularly adagio, so I played it a bit slower.

    Leopoldo Francia played and endorsed mandolins made by Umberto Ceccherini, and so it is only fitting that I play both parts of this tune double-tracked on my own 1890s Ceccherini mandolin, maybe coming close to the tone colour (if not the virtuosity) that Francia would have brought to his own performances.

    1890s Umberto Ceccherini mandolin (x2)



    Martin
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    Last edited by Martin Jonas; Jun-19-2016 at 4:54pm.

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    Registered User Rob MacKillop's Avatar
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    Default Re: Leopoldo Francia (c. 1900): "Adagio" - Mandolin Duet (with sc

    Funnily enough, I have just been listening to that on youtube. It seems a nice student-teacher piece. Good to hear it on the appropriate instrument.

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    Registered User Martin Jonas's Avatar
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    Default Re: Leopoldo Francia (c. 1900): "Adagio" - Mandolin Duet (with sc

    I spent today rehearsing and then recording Francia's lovely Adagio mandolin duet, having completely forgotten that I had already recorded it back in 2016.

    As I've enjoyed rediscovering the piece, and as I think the new recording came out better than my old one, I have now replaced the 2016 version with the new one from today. This time, I've used my Vinaccia for both parts, not the Ceccherini. I'm also closer to the notated tempo, and (unlike in 2016) I've used Francia's fingering to play most of the piece in higher positions whereas my old version used first position where possible. Having done this, I can see why Francia wants us to play up the neck even where a phrase is perfectly straightforward in first position -- the tone colour is better for it.

    1898 Giuseppe Vinaccia (x2)



    Martin

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