Giulio Caccini - Amor, io parto - Montserrat Figueras

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Giulio Caccini
(1551--1618)

Amor, io parto
Madrigal for soprano voice, from "Le nuove musiche, 1601" set on an anonymous text


In this recording:

Montserrat Figueras, soprano
Hopkinson Smith, baroque guitar
Harmonia Mundi

The score I used is from a facsimile copy of Caccini's Le Nuove Musiche, 1601. I didn't edit the score at all, except that I cleared the specks around it . Here and there, the text may not be so easy to read on the score. But, as always, I included the text in modern spelling and the translation.

"Caccini's Le Nuove Musiche is a collection of works for solo voice and basso continuo. Caccini uses two distinct compositional styles in the collection: twelve "madrigals" -- through-composed, somewhat rhythmically-free compositions with rhapsodic passages designed to emphasise the important words in the text -- and ten "arias" which are shorter and usually strophic.
...
The type of solo "madrigal" pioneered by Caccini is distinguished from the polyphonic madrigal which was the most popular form of secular composition during the late Renaissance."
Sheila Barnes

"Madrigals are, according to Caccini's definition, through-composed one part pieces which are usually elaborately ornamented on non-strophic texts whose metric structure is irregular.
...
One main theme dominates all of the poems upon which Caccini's Nuove Musiche is based: love. Two literary forms reflect the two aspects of love, the elegiac madrigal, in which the plaint of the hapless lover finds its expression, and the canzonetta, in which the joy of reciprocated love and the rapturous desire of the young lover is celebrated in many stanzas. In setting the madrigals Caccini chose a free recitative form, whereas the canzonette find their musical counterpart in rhythmically striking arie, which bear similarity to dance songs"
Silke Leopold

"Among the notational innovations developed by Caccini was the specification and writing out of ornamentation. Previously, ornamentation had always been left to the discretion of the performers. In order to eliminate "excesses" on the part of singers (which presumably obscured the text), Caccini wrote out the music exactly as he wished it to be performed. He did, however, still allow for improvisation to emphasise significant words and cadences. The use of ornamentation was thus restricted to expressing the text, and was no longer an end in itself, as had been the case in earlier vocal practice. One type of ornamentation specified by Caccini, which may be less familiar to modern ears is the trillo: a kind of "tremolo" in which fluctuations of intensity are sounded like a reiteration of the note. Caccini includes the trillo in "the good manner of singing" as a thing written one way, but sung another way "for more grace" and "refinement" ("squisitezza"), qualities of which Castiglione would have approved."
Sheila Barnes

Original text:

Amor, io parto, e sento nel partire
al penar, al morire,
ch'io parto da colei ch'è la mia vita,
se ben ella gioisce
quand'il mio cor languisce.
O durezza incredibil'e infinita
d'anima che 'l suo core
può restar morto, e non sentir dolore!
Ben mi trafigge amore
l'aspra mia pen', il mio dolor pungente,
ma più mi duol il duol ch'ella non sente.

Translation (by Flavio Ferri Benedetti):

Love, I depart, and I feel while I part,
while I suffer and while I die,
that I part from her who is my life,
although she rejoices
when my heart languishes.
O incredible, endless harshness
of the soul: her heart
can die without feeling pain!
Love pierces well
my bitter pain and my sharp grief,
but even more painful is the grief that she does not feel.