Preghiere di Luigi Dallapiccola

Qualche nota su testo e contesto

Abstract

This essay first seeks to place Preghiere in the more general context of Luigi Dallapiccola’s textual choices based on spirituality and, more specifically, on the concept of “prayer”. It then reconstructs the genesis of the work, starting from Dallapiccola’s first encounter (in 1959) with the texts of Murilo Mendes, the Brazilian poet, writer, and literary historian, with whom a lasting relationship based on mutual esteem and spiritual affinity was established. Based on the correspondence between the two artists and the books in Dallapiccola’s personal library, the sources of the three selected texts will be examined, as well as the (minimal) variations made to Ruggero Jacobbi’s Italian translations and the reasons for choosing the overall title Preghiere. In fact, the composition took place between the height of the summer and October 1962, i.e., in the months immediately before and after Dallapiccola’s transfer to Berkeley (California), where he had been invited to hold the chair of Italian culture at that university, and where the first performance of the work took place (10 November 1962).
Finally, some significant variations in the first version performed in Berkeley before sending Preghiere to the publisher (1963) are examined.