Vivaldi Unmasked
BBC
ONE has commissioned a major new music film about the mysterious
and passionate Antonio Vivaldi.
A helter-skelter
mix of documentary and music video, the film contextualises Vivaldi's
life through The Four Seasons, the most recorded and popular classical
music ever written. Yet until 50 years ago it was forgotten, and
remarkably little is known about the man who wrote it.
Presented
by the dynamic young conductor Charles Hazlewood, the story of how
Antonio Vivaldi's extraordinary life and work were rediscovered
is one of the most intriguing musical detective investigations of
our time.
Charles
Hazlewood travels to Venice in search of Vivaldi and his Four Seasons.
The composer's own life falls into Four Seasons.
Vivaldi's
Spring sees him in Venice and a violin child prodigy, at 15 ordained
as a priest, and at 25 he was teaching at an all-girls' orphanage.
Summer
finds Vivaldi a star composer at the height of his creativity, but
dangerously entering into a scandalous relationship with Anna Giro,
a singer young enough to be his daughter.
In
Autumn he branches out into the role of opera impresario, extravagantly
spending way beyond his means, and threatened with excommunication
for his disreputable relationship with Anna Giro.
By
Winter he is penniless, far from home, and buried in an unmarked
pauper's grave.
As
well as the documentary footage, each season is rehearsed and performed
by Charles with violin soloist Clio Gould (the virtuoso leader of
the contemporary music group the London Sinfonietta) and The Red
Megaphones - Charles' hand-picked band of musicians.
Through
the rehearsal process they show how Vivaldi creates a whole series
of stories in the music of The Four Seasons, and why they are the
world's only "programme" concertos - concertos that tell
a story.
He
puts them in a contemporary context, demonstrating how much they
have in common with Pink Floyd and Wyclef Jean.
Charles
Hazlewood is one of this country's most exciting and charismatic
conductors and musical communicators.
His
recent sell-out West End hit The Mysteries is a typical example
of his innovative and challenging approach to music drama.
As
a television presenter this summer Charles Hazlewood hosts a fortnight
of Proms on BBC FOUR.
The
violinist Clio Gould has performed as a soloist all over the world.
Apart from her busy career as soloist and orchestral leader, she
has recently presented a television documentary on the Royalist
composer William Lawes for BBC FOUR.
A woman
of the 21st century, Clio has a lively and engaging television presence,
for Vivaldi Unmasked she is playing a Stradivarius violin made 14
years after Vivaldi's birth.
Notes
to Editors
The
programme is scheduled for
broadcast on Sunday July 14.
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