Review

Giuseppi Verdi
Ave Maria Scala Enigmatica Armonizzata:

Arranged by Denis Jiron

B-flat cornet, 3 B-flat flugelhorns (sub 2 horns in F), 3 trombones, bass trombone (sub tuba)

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Publisher: Cherry Classics Music
Date of Publication: 2020
URL: http://www.cherryclassics.com

Score and parts.

Primary Genre: Brass Ensemble - 6+ brass (choir)

The ‘enigmatic scale’ was devised by Adolfo Crescentini, Professor of Music at the Bologna Conservatory. He published it in 1888 and challenged his fellow composers to harmonise it. Ascending, it uses flat 2 and sharp 4, 5 and 6; descending, 4 is natural. Most significantly, the scale lacks a perfect fifth.

Verdi rose to the challenge and wrote this piece in 1889, revising it in 1898. The scala is introduced as a cantus firmus in the bass, ascending and descending. It is then repeated three times, moving up through the middle parts into the treble. Even 30 years later, it was sounding strange - “The queer counterpoint which Verdi applies to it is far-fetched and difficult of intonation; the total effect is almost, if not quite, as musical as it is curious.” (Edward Dannreuther: The Oxford History of Music, 1931). The last six measures have a ‘normal’ tonality and the piece ends on a chord of C major marked pp.

Stylistically this piece is remarkably similar to Arnold Schoenberg’s ‘Friede auf Erden,’ composed in 1907. In both we can see a spanner thrown into the works of tonality, which Schoenberg would abandon completely just three years later in his String Quartet No.2 (1910). The Scala Enigmata, being restrictive rather than progressive, did not lend itself to further development.

In this transcription, the piece has been transposed down a major third, closing on a chord of A-flat. The scala is introduced in whole notes by the bass trombone in the first 16 measures. It then moves up through the ensemble with three further iterations by Trombone 1 and Flugel 3, Trombones 2 and 3, and Flugel 2 and Cornet. The tutti ensemble plays in only 15 measures; available combinations are used imaginatively to give a wide range of tonal colours. The predominant dynamic is mezzo piano; the loudest is mezzo forte. The mellow tones of flugelhorns and cornet are especially appropriate to this piece, and I think it will sound quite beautiful.

Trombone parts are given in bass clef. Range for first is A-f¹, and for second and third, c-sharp-d¹ and D-e-flat¹ respectively. Cornet and first Flugel top out at d² (concert). Denis Jiron is a native of Los Angeles and is currently on faculty at California State University, and acting second trombone in the LA Philharmonic.