First written instances of pizz, col legno, con sordino, sul ponticello etc.?

[Guido]

All these string techniques and 'special effects' appeared more and more in the romantic literature, and of course especially in the 20th century, but does anyone know when they were first notated? I've heard con legno being played in some classical piece, ad certainly have heard pizz in some baroque recordings that I have, but wondered whether these were actually in the score or not.

[M forever]

pizz: 1643
col legno: 1704
con sordino: 1687
sul ponticello: 1744, possibly as early as 1712 though

[(poco) Sforzando]

pizz: 1643
col legno: 1704
con sordino: 1687
sul ponticello: 1744, possibly as early as 1712 though

Uh - could you supply works and composers?

[M forever]

pizz: 1643 - Johann Friedrich von der Nasenlänge: "Musicalische Delectirungen für welche Instrumente gestrichener sowie gezupfter Art" (instrumental music for strings)
col legno: 1704 - Giovanni Testosterone: "La incapibilità del mundo" (opera)
con sordino: 1687 - Charles de Grandpieds: "La comédie humaine" (opera)
sul ponticello: 1744 - Adriano Celentano "Mani de velluto" (ballet music), possibly as early as 1712 though - Willibald Stinkefuss: "Exercicien dafür verfasst von der Gamba vortrefflichen Gebrauche zu machen" (musical study pieces for gamba players, it is controversial however if the instructions for the sul ponticello technique weren't added during a later reprinting).

[(poco) Sforzando]

pizz: 1643 - Johann Friedrich von der Nasenlänge: "Musicalische Delectirungen für welche Instrumente gestrichener sowie gezupfter Art" (instrumental music for strings)
col legno: 1704 - Giovanni Testosterone: "La incapibilità del mundo" (opera)
con sordino: 1687 - Charles de Grandpieds: "La comédie humaine" (opera)
sul ponticello: 1744 - Adriano Celentano "Mani de velluto" (ballet music), possibly as early as 1712 though - Willibald Stinkefuss: "Exercicien dafür verfasst von der Gamba vortrefflichen Gebrauche zu machen" (musical study pieces for gamba players, it is controversial however if the instructions for the sul ponticello technique weren't added during a later reprinting).

Any recommended recordings?

[Drasko]

Any recommended recordings?

Mani di Velluto was staged some time ago by Studio Coreografico de Apulia. Choreography was done by Eleonora Giorgi and it's quite fine, unfortunately direction really isn't. Franco Castellano and Giuseppe Pipolo opted for classic eurotrash run of the mill updating to 20th century, where comedia dell'arte would have been far better option imo, though story can work since it's pure cliche - rich guy falls for poor girl (she is a thief who tried to rob him) and then changes identity to see if she would love him if he was poor .......classic baroque, tons of twists and turns, assumed identities and happily everafter.

It was released on DVD in Italy. Don't know about availability of that but seriously doubt about any new stagings or recordings in foreseeable future.

[Anne]

I know this would not be the first time it was used, but wasn't col legno used in Symphonie Fantastique?

[(poco) Sforzando]

I know this would not be the first time it was used, but wasn't col legno used in Symphonie Fantastique?

It certainly was, and it is one of the first usages known to me if not the first. (I am not up on the music of Giovanni Testosterone, which I have heard is quite hyper-aggressive for the Baroque.)

The first instances of sul ponticello I know is found in Beethoven's C# minor quartet, op. 131 (towards the end of scherzo 2). Not familiar with Celentano's Velvet Hands, or Stinkefuss's Smelly Feet.

[jochanaan]

pizz: 1643 - Johann Friedrich von der Nasenlänge: "Musicalische Delectirungen für welche Instrumente gestrichener sowie gezupfter Art" (instrumental music for strings)
col legno: 1704 - Giovanni Testosterone: "La incapibilità del mundo" (opera)
con sordino: 1687 - Charles de Grandpieds: "La comédie humaine" (opera)
sul ponticello: 1744 - Adriano Celentano "Mani de velluto" (ballet music), possibly as early as 1712 though - Willibald Stinkefuss: "Exercicien dafür verfasst von der Gamba vortrefflichen Gebrauche zu machen" (musical study pieces for gamba players, it is controversial however if the instructions for the sul ponticello technique weren't added during a later reprinting).

Are you pulling our legs?  Really!  "John Frederick of the Longnose"--"Charles Bigfoot"--and the other Italian John!  (Perhaps if you showed us some sources... )

[Sergeant Rock]

Are you pulling our legs?

Ya think? 


Sarge

[jochanaan]

Ya think? 


Sarge

Sir, as little as possible, Sir!

[MahlerSnob]

I'm consulting Grove for this, and here is what it has to say:

Pizz: The first known indication is in Tobias Hume's "The First Part of Ayres" from 1605. It also turns up, not surprisingly, in Monteverdi's "Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda" from 1624.

col legno: Again Hume's 1605 work is cited as the first known use, but it wasn't popularized until Berlioz.

con sordino: Violin mutes were described in a 1637 treatise on string technique by Mersenne, but the first work listed is Lully's opera "Armide" from 1687.

sul ponticello: The earliest example of sul pont Grove mentions is Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique (1830). However, I suspect there are earlier operatic examples. I don't have a score for l'Orfeo handy, but I wouldn't be surprised if Monteverdi used it.

[(poco) Sforzando]

sul ponticello: The earliest example of sul pont Grove mentions is Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique (1830). However, I suspect there are earlier operatic examples. I don't have a score for l'Orfeo handy, but I wouldn't be surprised if Monteverdi used it.

I do, and he makes no such indication. I can't speak to earlier operatic examples, but there's no doubt Beethoven used sul pont. in the C# minor quartet of 1826.

Monteverdi also made considerable use in the Combattimento of the tremolo, and of the string "effects" that have been described here, tremolo along with pizzicato are two of the ones that most took hold. Pizzicato is used occasionally by JS Bach, for example, as in the Esurientes section from the Magnificat and in some of the cantatas. In one of them (I think 198), he uses pizzicati to simulate bell sounds.

[M forever]

rich guy falls for poor girl (she is a thief who tried to rob him) and then changes identity to see if she would love him if he was poor

That's not quite correct, at first he has an accident and loses his memory, so they keep him in the girl's house and they fall in love, and he learns that she, who is from a family of professional thieves, hates him (who he doesn't yet know he actually is) because he got rich by inventing unbreakable glass and that led to her grandfather, a professional burglar, getting arrested when he desperately tried to break into a store equipped with the unbreakable glass. Then when he (Celentano) regains his memory, he realizes he can't just tell the girl who he is, so he starts posing as a master thief and sets up masterful "coups" to impress her, the highlight is of course when he breaks into his own house.

[(poco) Sforzando]

In a familiar example dating from 1813, Rossini uses an effect similar to col legno where he directs the violins to tap their bows against the metal shades of their candle-holders. Today they tap their music stands.

[jochanaan]

That's not quite correct, at first he has an accident and loses his memory, so they keep him in the girl's house and they fall in love, and he learns that she, who is from a family of professional thieves, hates him (who he doesn't yet know he actually is) because he got rich by inventing unbreakable glass and that led to her grandfather, a professional burglar, getting arrested when he desperately tried to break into a store equipped with the unbreakable glass. Then when he (Celentano) regains his memory, he realizes he can't just tell the girl who he is, so he starts posing as a master thief and sets up masterful "coups" to impress her, the highlight is of course when he breaks into his own house.

And at the end, it's revealed that the guy is actually a Thieving Magpie.

[Guido]

Cheers Mahler snob and Sforzando for these insights. I was wondering whether in fact any of these appeared in any pf Paganini's music first as he uses alot of these sorts of things (left hand pizz for instance).

[M forever]

None of the above is anything that we know when it was first done. Even though musicologists may have found the earliest explicit mentionings of these techniques in some cases, we can assume that very basic and obvious techniques like pizz have been done for many centuries or even millenia. It would be very interesting though to find out more about when color effects like sul ponticello and col legno are documented as having been regularly used. They can be heard in period performances fairly often, and I remember reading a few articles about the subject but while I remember reading those articles, I don't remember any of the details in them. So if you read this far, I have once again wasted your time.

[jochanaan]

None of the above is anything that we know when it was first done. Even though musicologists may have found the earliest explicit mentionings of these techniques in some cases, we can assume that very basic and obvious techniques like pizz have been done for many centuries or even millenia. It would be very interesting though to find out more about when color effects like sul ponticello and col legno are documented as having been regularly used. They can be heard in period performances fairly often, and I remember reading a few articles about the subject but while I remember reading those articles, I don't remember any of the details in them. So if you read this far, I have once again wasted your time.

Not a waste of time at all.  Even negative knowledge is knowledge.  However, I remember my college music history professor telling us that in Monteverdi's time, string players were horrified when Signor Monteverdi asked them to do such violently unmusical effects as tremolo--and refused!

[M forever]

I think he made that up. Tremolo was not at all unknown in Monteverdi's time, it had been used before and there were even a variety of different tremolo techniques which were described by some contemporary authors in detail. So, yes, I am pretty sure your professor made that up or read it somewhere and never bothered to doublecheck the information. IIRC, the term "tremolo" was more used to denote a kind of vibrato produced by the bow, not the fast repetition of notes that we call tremolo today. I would have to look that up myself - but I am too lazy now and I don't have to teach a class tomorrow anyway...