Scarlatti distinguished himself in a variety of compositional vehicles including opera, oratorio, and sacred, having held several notable positions in Spain and Portugal. But what Scarlatti is most prominently remembered for are 555 short sonatas for keyboard written originally as Essercizi ("Exercises"). When he died in Madrid July 23, 1757, Scarlatti left a treasury of his harpsichord sonatas manuscripts, which were largely unplayed beyond Spain and Portugal until pianist Carl Czerny published a selection of the sonatas in 1839. Publication of an ostensibly complete set of sonatas was made by Alessandro Longo (designated with “L” numbers), who provided the first systematic numbering of the sonatas in 1906. Ralph Kirkpatrick added to and reorganized the sonatas (designated with “K” numbers) in a 1953 critical edition considered de rigueur for Scarlatti performance. In 1967, Giorgio Pestelli published the most recent accepted edition of the sonatas using the “P” numbering system.
The majority of Scarlatti’s 555 sonatas were envisioned in pairs with one sonata in minor key and its partner in the corresponding major key, but both of the pair always sharing the tonic. Beyond this tonal relationship, these sonata pairs existed dynamically in contrast or complement. Sonata pairs with a complementary association may share stylistic agreement or harmonic palette. Those pairs that contrast one another may do so in tempi or compositional complexity. The result is an almost inexhaustible collection of keyboard pieces, all of high artistic quality and accessibility.
This almost inexhaustible assembly of music becomes infinitely inexhaustible when considering recorded performances. Scarlatti has received much attention since the 1940s when master harpsichordist Wanda Landowska recorded her landmark collections. Landowska, who was uncompromising with her Bach (Landowska to Pablo Casals: “You play Bach your way, and I'll play Bach his way”) certainly took her liberties with Scarlatti. Nevertheless, her Angel recording is uniformly fine displaying not only Landowska’s iconoclastic streak, but also mid-Twentieth Century Scarlatti thinking.
Article comments
1 - VICTOR STEVENS
THERE ARE TWO OTHER PIANISTS OF THE HOROWITZ GENERATION WHO WERE NOTABLE SCARLATTI INTERPRETERS AND WHO OFTEN INCLUDED A SELECTION OF THE SONATAS IN THEIR PROGRAMMES : MICHELANGELI AND EMIL GILELS. DINU LIPATTI, TOO, WAS A FINE SCARLATTI INTERPRETER. ALSO TO BE MENTIONED, AMONG CONTEMPORARY PIANISTS, IS MURRAY PERAHIA.
2 - C. Michael Bailey
Victor: You are so very correct. Michelangeli's Scarlatti is very well respected are Gilels and Lipatti's. As for Murray Perahia, I very well froth over his "Handel/Scarlatti: 3 Suites/Chaconne/7 Sonatas" (Sony, 1997); it is one of my five favorite piano recordings.
I suspect that I erred in including only those pianists in my collection who devoted entire discs to Scarlatti.
3 - Mark Berry
Volume 7 of the Naxos series was very well reviewed; I think most would regard it as the best of the set yet. There's a good review on ClassicsToday.com of it.