Desperate Measures: The Life and Music of Antonia Padoani Bembo by Claire Anne FontijnReview by: Catherine Gordon-SiefertNotes, Second Series, Vol. 64, No. 2 (Dec., 2007), pp. 309-311Published by: Music Library AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30163105 .

Accessed: 16/06/2014 04:43

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

.

Music Library Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Notes.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 185.44.77.82 on Mon, 16 Jun 2014 04:43:15 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Book Reviews 309

WOMEN COMPOSERS

Desperate Measures: The Life and Music of Antonia Padoani Bembo. By Claire Anne Fontijn. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. [xx, 372 p. ISBN-10: 0195135385; ISBN-13: 9780195135381. $45.] Illustrations, maps, music examples, bibliographical references, index, compact disc.

Comprehensive, erudite, detailed, fasci-

nating, and, yes, screenplay. These are the words that come to mind as one reads Claire Fontijn's account of Antonia Bembo's life and works (ca. 1640--ca. 1720) in Desperate Measures: The Life and Music of Antonia Padoani Bembo. Few could argue that Bembo was one of the most gifted and determined of all Western European fe- male composers. Hers was a life of extraor-

dinary adversity which she overcame with stunning success, demonstrated not only by her strength of character but also by the

power and beauty of her music. Forced to undertake a daring escape from her native Venice, leaving behind her abusive hus- band and three children, she was able to es- tablish herself as a composer (and perhaps performer) in Paris under the protection of King Louis XIV. But hers was also a life of secrecy and silence, which made Fontijn's task as researcher extremely exigent, a chal- lenge she met with great perseverance and yet joy at the prospect of introducing to the world this phenomenal composer. Indeed, Fontijn's ability to traverse a wide variety of documentation in the archives of three countries--Italy, France, and Croatia--is impressive. Also notable is her ability to bring together a wealth of knowledge, not only from archives, but also from historical, social, cultural, and musical sources, that results in a remarkable narrative about a composer whose story needs to be told and music heard and understood. Desperate Mea- sures reveals just as much about the events, personalities, and music of the times as it does about Bembo's life and music.

The book begins with Bembo's dedica- tory letter to Louis XIV, which introduces her first manuscript collection of music, Produzioni armoniche. From this we learn that she left her family in Italy and made her way to the French royal court, that she was abandoned by the person who took her away from Venice (Fontijn speculates later in the book that abandonment most likely referred to the death of Francesco Corbetta

in 1681), that the King recognized her tal- ent, awarded her a pension, and allowed her to stay in the community of Notre Dame de Bonne Nouvelle, and then moved her to a "holy refuge" (Petite Union Chretienne). The

questions raised by this letter, as well as shorter studies on Bembo by Yvonne Rokseth ("Antonia Bembo, Composer to Louis XIV," Musical Quarterly 23, no. 2 [April 1937]: 147-69) and Marinella Laini ("Antonia e le altre: percorsi musicali fem- minili nella Venezia del Sei-Settecento," in Ecco mormorar l'onde: la musica nel Barocco, ed. Carlo de Incontrera and Alba Zanini [Trieste: Stella Arti Grafiche, 1995], 138- 69), inspired Fontijn to undertake her own, more comprehensive examination of Antonia Bembo. Fontijn asks: "Why would she [Bembo] leave Venice? How had she gained admiration for the king so early in life, and under which circumstances did he deem her a singer worthy of a pension? How was she abandoned and what was 'the community of Notre Dame de Bonne Nouvelle'? When did she move to the 'holy refuge' and where was it? How did she learn to compose all of this music?" (pp. 3-4) Many details of her life will presumably never be recovered. Given that Bembo was not a member of a prestigious musical family, as were well- known women composers/performers Francesca Caccini (1587--ca. 1640) and Elizabeth-Claude Jacquet de La Guerre (1665-1729), nor able to practice her musi- cal skills in a Venetian academy, as did Barbara Strozzi (1619-1677) under the care of her father, and given that she had to es- cape an abusive husband who had every right to hunt her down and punish her, she had no choice but to remain hidden, draw- ing as little attention to herself as possible. Because she had to live much of her life in secrecy, Fontijn was forced to speculate on many aspects of Bembo's existence, but every supposition made is supported by related facts and intelligently reasoned.

Part 1 of Desperate Measures deals with Bembo's life, and here, Fontijn relies on

This content downloaded from 185.44.77.82 on Mon, 16 Jun 2014 04:43:15 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

310 NOTES, December 2007

documents relating to the Padoani and Bembo families: her father's will, his correspondence, legal papers (the wedding contract and documents pertaining to Antonia's request for a divorce), the Bembo family papers, and a few letters writ- ten by Bembo from Paris. Fontijn reveals that Antonia was the daughter of a success- ful Venetian doctor who provided her with a sound education, including the study of Latin, and nurtured her talent. This we learn from letters concerning the possibil- ity of the doctor's employment under the Duke of Mantua. We learn as well from these letters that at a young age, she stud- ied with Francesco Cavalli, who was maestro di cappella at St. Mark's, and excelled as a virtuoso singer (referred to as "the girl who sings"). Thus Antonia's gift became part of the "employment package" presented to the Duke by her father, who, for reasons not clear, never took the job. We also learn about the connection between the Padoani family and Francesco Corbetta (ca. 1615-- 1681), one of the most famous guitarists of the seventeenth century, who most likely played a part in Antonia's eventual flight from Venice.

Antonia married nobleman Lorenzo Bembo in 1659. Legal documents reveal that financial difficulties, hardships en- dured as a result of her husband's ex- tended absence as an officer in the armed forces, and Lorenzo's philandering forced Antonia to file for divorce in 1672. But he renounced all accusations, and the divorce was denied. A little over four years later in 1677, Antonia fled to Paris, presumably ac- companied by Francesco Corbetta, who was familiar with Paris and members of the royal family and most likely facilitated her subsequent pension and patronage under Louis XIV and the highest members of the royal family.

In part 2 of the book, Fontijn devotes a chapter to each of Bembo's collected works. While in Paris, Bembo prepared a total of six manuscripts of music now lo- cated at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris: Produzioni armoniche (her first collec- tion which consists of pieces written earlier while in Italy and later in Paris, including three pieces composed to celebrate the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Burgundy), Te Deum and Divertimento (both to celebrate the birth of the royal son), Te Deum and Exaudiat te, Dominus (offered to

the entire royal family), Les sept pseaumes de David (set to Psalm settings written by Elisabeth-Sophie Cheron), and her only opera LErcole amante. Fontijn uses the dedi- cations in each manuscript, most of which were written to celebrate specific occasions in the lives of the royal family, to date the works (with the exception of L 'Erco le amante, which is dated 1707). Her meticu- lous analysis of Bembo's music, while de- scriptive, is impressive and demonstrates Bembo's ability to compose for large and small ensembles, for voices and instruments, and in various genres--sacred motets, can- tatas, airs, arias, and an opera.

Fontijn maintains that Bembo's choice of texts serve as a metaphor for self expres- sion and life events, namely abandonment, metamorphosis, and rebirth under the protection of Louis XIV. Fontijn contends as well that Bembo conveys through music and text a "preoccupation with female agency," conveying a particular feminine perspective, her own as well as that of other women through characterizations of the Virgin Mary or the Duchess of Burgundy. Indeed, Bembo forged a special relation- ship with the Duchess of Burgundy (Marie- Adelaide of Savoy) with whom she shared a common language and experience as an Italian living in France. In addition, the only two poets identified as authors of texts used by Bembo were also women: Aurelia (Brigida) Fedeli (ca. 1613-1704), Italian actress and poet, and Elisabeth-Sophie Cheron (1648-1711), French painter, musi- cian, and writer.

Bembo was in a unique position to com- pose works that incorporated both Italian and French musical styles, later referred to as les gads reunis (united tastes) by Francois Couperin in Les goitts-reunis, ou nouveaux concerts a l'usage de toutes les sortes d'instumens de musique (1724). Fontijn does an excep- tional job explaining and demonstrating the meaning of the "united tastes" by com- paring Bembo's music to works by Jean- Baptiste Lully (1632-1687) and Francois Couperin (1668-1733). One of the most impressive aspects of Fontijn's analysis is her ability to relate Bembo's works to a number of important composers, including female composers Barbara Strozzi and Elizabeth-Claude Jacquet de La Guerre.

My only criticism of the book is directed to the publishers and not the author. The book needs more music examples, particu-

This content downloaded from 185.44.77.82 on Mon, 16 Jun 2014 04:43:15 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Book Reviews 311

larly those works, described in detail, that refer the reader to published modern edi- tions. The decision to include a few scores in an appendix rather than in the text make reading the analysis a more difficult task than need be (only short examples are included in the text). Despite this, the reader comes away with the knowledge that Bembo was a master composer. The inclu- sion of the compact disc is especially help- ful, and I would even say an integral part of the book's success.

Fontijn's book convincingly demon- strates that Bembo "made the most of her unusual circumstances by cultivating enco- miastic song in praise of the French king- dom, by bringing into vital confrontation the Italian and French musical cultures with which she was intimately familiar, and by finding a suitable context in which to convey a particularly feminine perspective and powerful emotion" (p. 273). Thanks to Fontijn's erudite, comprehensive, and fasci- nating book, it is no longer possible to ig- nore this remarkable composer.

CATHERINE GORDON-SIEFERT Providence College

Nadia and Lill Boulanger. By Caroline Potter. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2006. [xiii, 191 p. ISBN-10: 0-7546-0472-1; ISBN-13: 978-0-7546-0472-1. $99.95.] Music examples, indexes, bibliographi- cal references, list of works.

In 2009, the Bibliotheque nationale de France will unseal containers of documents belonging and related to Nadia and Lili Boulanger that have been kept under wraps since the death of the former in 1979. Scholars of the two sisters' lives and works are more than eager to discover the contents of those boxes, and it is perhaps with this interest in mind that Caroline Potter and Ashgate decided to publish Potter's new book, Nadia and Lili Boulanger, late last year. Unfortunately for readers and scholars looking for new material or in- sights to tide them over until that momen- tous day in 2009, they will find little origi- nal work in this slight book save for some brief analyses of the sisters' compositions.

Organized into six chapters, Potter's book attempts to cover the lives of Nadia and Lili Boulanger, albeit briefly; the music

both composed as part of their prepara- tions for taking part in the Prix de Rome; Nadia Boulanger's compositions; Lili

Boulanger's work after 1913, the year in which she won the Prix de Rome; Nadia Boulanger's teaching methods; and the lasting reputations of each woman. There are also two appendices, providing catalogs of each composer's works.

The downfalls of Potter's book are its heavy reliance on previous biographies and books about the sisters, some of them of questionable repute; its lack of primary sources; and the level of analysis provided in the discussions of individual works. It also neglects a considerable amount of recent research on the Boulangers, includ- ing materials from the American Music Research Center/University of Colorado's symposium on "Nadia Boulanger in America" (held in 2004), leading to a datedness in its approach.

In her chapter on Nadia and Lili's lives, Potter draws primarily from Leonie Rosen- stiel's two books on the sisters (The Life and Works of Lili Boulanger [Rutherford, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1978] and Nadia Boulanger: a Life in Music [New York: W. W. Norton, 1982] ) and Jerome Spycket's paean to Nadia Boulanger (Nadia Boulanger [Lattes: Payot Lausanne, 1987]) and more recent book on Lili Boulanger (A la recherche de Lili Boulanger: essai bi- ographique [Paris: Fayard, 2004]). While Potter does include some newly-translated quotations from Lili's diaries, the result is a traditional account of Nadia's and Lili's up- bringing and early music training, includ- ing time-honored anecdotes about the young Nadia's initial dislike of music and Lili's prodigal abilities. Although Potter makes a note of stating that her intention in this book is to focus on the musical con- nections between the two Boulanger com- posers rather than their lives, she omits a significant amount of biographical and contextual material that illuminates both Nadia's and Lili's musical works and profes- sional spaces. She writes that the "gender issue cannot be avoided in any discussion of the sisters' musical activities" (p. xi), but rarely discusses the atmosphere of the com- positional or musical world they inhabited, offering only a few comments on the topic. It is a crucial omission, as the musical pro- fession at the time of both Boulangers' composition careers was one saturated with

This content downloaded from 185.44.77.82 on Mon, 16 Jun 2014 04:43:15 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions