GYPSY MUSIC:

Just as important as Steffani's chamber duets are the sixteen operas, which combine the best features of Italian opera--melodic richness, great vocal virtuosity, expressive harmonies--with the main achievements of contemporary French opera (an often large role for the chorus and colourful instrumentation, with prominent parts for wind instruments). During the period of 1678-1679, Steffani resided in Paris, where he immersed himself in the French musical style. By blending Italian and French musical styles, Steffani was a pioneer and a model for Handel, Telemann, and Bach.

After 1709, Steffani composed no new operas. As a bishop, however, he was still interested in composing sacred works and vocal chamber music. In the last years of his life, he wrote some of his very finest works at the instigation of the Academy of Vocal Music, a society of aristocratic music connoisseurs, composers, and singers founded in London in 1726, which elected Steffani as its president on the 1st of June, 1727. In addition to previously composed pieces, Steffani sent the Academy newly composed works, including the magnificent five-voice motet Qui diligit Mariam. But at that moment the best was yet to come. In his letter of the 11th of January, 1728--written a month before his death--Steffani offered to send his Stabat mater to the Academy in London. In the same letter, the composer himself called it his masterpiece and the conclusion of his long compositional career.

Steffani's Stabat mater is indeed a musical miracle: the melodies are authentically Italian and utterly compelling, the harmonies as rich as those of Bach, the choruses brilliantly worked out in six voices. The moving late medieval poem about the Virgin Mary standing at the foot of the cross inspired Steffani to create a highly emotional choral work, in which Baroque sensuality and musical learning are perfectly merged. Consequently, the most alienating experience of my career was a conversation with an internationally respected choral conductor who told me he thought it was just a "weird and mediocre piece." That comment did not stop me from organising a highly successful performance of Steffani's Stabat mater at the Saturday Matinee Series in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw. To my ears, it is the resounding counterpart to Bernini's overwhelming L'Estasi di Santa Teresa d'Avila (The Ecstasy of Saint Theresa of Avila), even though that sculpture was created almost 80 years earlier.

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