Tomaso Albinoni liked to refer to himself as a “musico di violino dilettonte Veneto” which is, being translated, an “amateur Venetian fiddle-player." Of course he did not mean to be self-deprecating as the phrase sounds today. Properly an amateur is one who does something because he loves to do it (and a dilettante one who does something because he delights in it). English borrows useful foreign words like that and then subjects them to pejoration. Thus amateur and dilettante are most often sneer-words; but the loss of the original meaning leaves a gap which we have to fill with terms like buff and fan that really don't connote the same thing. We would probably apply some such horror to Albinoni as talented amateur. Anyhow, all that he was trying to say was that he would like to be regarded as just one of the boys in the band. In point of fact, he was a pro for a time, serving the Duke of Mantua "chamber player," and no doubt getting to know Gilda and Rigoletto and all those other fine people. In actuality, however, Albinoni came of a wealthy Venetian family and stood to inherit a lot of money. That is, the family made its paper fortune in producing paper, which in Venice was probably a good business to be in, what with the Aldine Press and all.
Manfred Bukofzer published his long authoritative Music in the Baroque Era thirty years ago. In it he mentions Albinoni only as an influence on Bach and an also-ran. One wonders whether, if Bukofzer could return and rewrite his book now, he might have second thoughts. For Albinoni is almost entirely a re-creation of the LP record, He is not mentioned in the initial volume of the World's Encyclopedia of Recorded
Music. He turns up first in the first supplement (1950-51), where he is represented by one-and-a-third of the
Op. 7 oboe concerti (played by Leon Goossens), and (already!) the infamous Adagio. (Today the Adagio is to Albinoni's popularity what the Canon is to Pachelbel's. But it is really a modern confection based on some sketchy fragments of an Albinoni trio sonata, whipped up by Reno Giazotto. Yet we should be tolerant here, for in 1945 Signor Giazotto published what seems still to be the only full-scale study of the composer). Now Albinoni is a familiar name, and many of his most important instrumental works have been recorded.
The Solisti Veneti have preceded this recording of Op.7 with traversals of Opp. 5 and 9. Presumably they are engaged, as in the case of Vivaldi, in bringing out the whole canon of Albinoni concerti. This is as it should be, for we now recognize that Albinoni represents (with Vivaldi and Benedetto Marcello) part of the holy trinity of Venetian concerto composers and, therefore, an important force in the development of both the concerto and the symphony. How important is presently a much-argued point. Though he was almost a generation older than Marcello, he was born only four years before Vivaldi. But, apparently through the sheer impact of his genius, he attracted publishers long before Vivaldi did. There is some reason to believe that Albinoni may have pioneered the oboe concerto (and perhaps the wind-instrument concerto) but the problem is that we do not know dates of composition in most instances.
The Op. 7 concerti pursue a pattern that was to be followed again in Op. 9: twelve 5-part works in four cycles of three, calling respectively for strings only, one oboe, and two oboes. It is more than reassuring to note that the premier oboist here is the indefatigable Pierre Pierlot.
