Alessandro Rolla (1757 – 1841): Divertimento for Viola and String Orchestra
Alessandro Rollo is best known today for having supposedly taught famous violin virtuoso, Niccolò Paganini, even if some doubt remains over whether he actually did so.
The story goes that Paganini’s father took his 13-year-old son to see Rolla, with the young prodigy recalling: “Coming to Rolla we found him laid-up. He appeared little inclined to see us, but his wife showed us into a room adjoining his bedroom, until she had spoken to him. Finding on the table a violin and the music of Rolla’s latest concerto, I took up the instrument and played the piece at sight. Astonished at what he heard, the composer asked for the name of the player: and when told that it was but a young boy, would not believe it until he had seen for himself.”
Rolla declared there was nothing further he could teach Paganini junior. He reportedly then passed him onto one of his colleagues, Ferdinando Paer, who had much the same overwhelmed reaction. Paer suggested that Paganini should study with his own teacher, Gasparo Ghiretti. Whatever the case, Paganini did eventually get his violin lessons from some suitably qualified individual in northern Italy. Several good sources declare that he later had tuition with Rolla himself, but for some reason Paganini was always cagey about this afterwards, as if not wanting to give the older man too much credit.
What he could not deny was Rolla’s underlying importance in shaping his own work. The two men would become lifelong friends, often working and performing together and Paganini learned much from his colleague. He noted the way that Rolla had pushed back the boundaries on what was technically possible for the viola and violin, preparing the ground for his own innovations. He also grew to like Rolla’s music and was inspired by it – a common reaction to hearing music by Rolla nowadays is to say that it sounds like Paganini whereas it would be fairer to say that Paganini often sounds uncannily like Rolla.
So who was Alessandro Rolla? Born in Pavia in northern Italy, he had moved to Milan in his teens to complete his studies under Giovanni Andrea Fioroni, who was maestro di cappella at the city cathedral. As a young man, he set out to captivate audiences as a viola virtuoso. Such was his dazzling prowess, that one contemporary historian suggested, apparently not in jest, that Rolla was for a time banned from performing in front of women because they would either swoon or be overcome with nervous attacks. Rolla was also a pioneer for the instrument – he claimed at one point to have composed “the world’s first” viola concerto in 1772 (not quite true: the French Baroque composer, George Philippe Telemann had written one a few years earlier). Later he became a pioneer of other peoples’ music in his own country.
Although Rolla continued to perform all throughout his long life, it was as an orchestral director and player that he eventually built a lasting career. After several years as both principal violinist, violist and conductor of the Ducale Orchestra in nearby Parma, he eventually moved back to Milan in 1803 to take up the post as lead violinist and director of the famous La Scala Orchestra, a position he held until he was in his mid-seventies. It was here that Rolla directed the first Milanese performances of several Mozart operas, as well as much more contemporary operas by a new generation of Italian composers including Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti. He also regularly performed Beethoven’s symphonies and is now regarded as an important early champion of Beethoven’s music in Italy, at a time when opera otherwise dominated.
Despite his busy work schedule, Rolla’s creativity hardly suffered, and he continued to turn out his own music in large quantities. Although most could now be classified as either didactic works or showy concert numbers, he showed himself receptive to all the latest European trends: many of his compositions still sound distinctly fresh and modern for their time.
It is certainly true of this Divertimento, an attractive and charming concertino-style work, written at the height of his career. One could almost approach it as a three-movement concerto, minus the first movement. It starts with a slowish andante sostenuto, and from the lush, chromatic harmonies heard in the string orchestra at the outset, to the expansive, operatic melody which follows on the viola, it is music which sounds oddly ahead of its time – it could just as easily belong to the middle of the nineteenth century as to the start. The second movement, a classic Polonaise, is strident and energetic, and there are several opportunities for the soloist to show off – and not least in the fast arpeggio passages spread across all four strings of the instrument in the middle of the movement.
Rolla’s output was diverse, and aside from his works for viola or violin and orchestra, he wrote many other concertos, as well as symphonies, quartets and sonatas. It is notable that his compositions were published widely in his lifetime, from as far afield as Paris, London and Vienna, a sign of his high regard outside of Italy.
He remained in Milan for the rest of his days. In later life he became professor of violin and viola at the city’s newly opened Conservatoire. Up until his very last years, he regularly performed with chamber music ensembles, playing string quartets by Mozart, Haydn or Beethoven.
Suggestions for further listening
Aside from the viola, Rolla wrote many works, including Concertos for the violin. Sometimes he even pitched the violin and viola together into the same piece, such as with this rather pretty Duo Concertant for the two solo instruments.