Federico Maria Sardelli

File:Federico Maria Sardelli.jpg

Federico Maria Sardelli

Federico Maria Sardelli is an Italian conductor, composer, musicologist and flautist. He is the founder of the baroque orchestra Modo Antiquo and has made more than forty recordings as soloist and conductor, some of them in co-production with the German broadcast company Westdeutscher Rundfunk. He has twice been nominated for the Grammy Awards. A notable protagonist in the Vivaldi renaissance, he has conducted the world premiere recordings and first modern performances of Arsilda, regina di Ponto, Orlando Furioso, Tito Manlio, Motezuma, and L'Atenaide. For his artistic merits, on 28th november 2009 the Government of Tuscany decorated Federico Maria Sardelli with the Gonfalone d'Argento, the highest medal of honour of the Regione Toscana. In addition to his musical activities, Sardelli is also a painter, engraver and satirical writer.

Essays

• Catalogo delle concordanze musicali vivaldiane, Fondazione G. Cini, Istituto Italiano Antonio Vivaldi, «Quaderni vivaldiani», XVI, Firenze, Olschki, 2009, forthcoming.
• Vivaldi’s Music for Flute and Recorder, Aldershot, Ashgate, 2007, 316 pp., translated by Michael Talbot.
• Dall'esterno all'interno: criteri di autenticità e catalogazione, «Studi vivaldiani», 7, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2007.
• Una nuova sonata per flauto dritto di Vivaldi, «Studi vivaldiani», 6, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2006, pp. 41–51.
• Le opere giovanili di Antonio Vivaldi, «Studi vivaldiani», 5, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2005, pp. 45–78.
• Il flauto nell'Italia del primo Settecento, «Ad Parnassum», vol. 2, Issue 3, April 2004, pp. 104–152.
• Un nuovo ritratto di Antonio Vivaldi, «Studi vivaldiani», 2, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2002, pp. 107–114.
• Vivaldi a Ulm negli acquisti di Johann Kleinknecht, «Studi vivaldiani», 2, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2002, pp. 99–106.
• La musica per flauto di Antonio Vivaldi, Fondazione G. Cini, Istituto Italiano Antonio Vivaldi, «Quaderni vivaldiani», XI, Firenze, Olschki, 2001, 250 pp.
• Ciuffi rossi ed altri dettagli. Per una riconsiderazione dell’iconografia vivaldiana, «Informazioni e studi vivaldiani», 15, Milano, Ricordi, 1994, pp. 103–113.

Critical editions

• Antonio Vivaldi, Arie d'opera per Baritono e Basso, Milano, Ricordi, 2008
• Antonio Vivaldi, Arie d'opera per Tenore, Milano, Ricordi, 2008
• Antonio Vivaldi, Concerto per 2 violini e 2 violoncelli RV 575, critical edition, «Antonio Vivaldi. Opere incomplete», 6, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2006.
• Antonio Vivaldi, Arie d'opera per Mezzosoprano e Contralto, Milano, Ricordi, 2005
• Antonio Vivaldi, Arie d'opera per Soprano, Milano, Ricordi, 2005
• Nicholas Chédeville, Il Pastor Fido (attribuited to Vivaldi), critical edition, Bärenreiter, Kassel, 2005
• Antonio Vivaldi, Concerto in due cori per 2 violini principali e 2 organi RV 584, critical edition, «Antonio Vivaldi. Opere incomplete», 3, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2003.
• Antonio Vivaldi, Concerto in due cori per 2 violini principali e 2 organi RV 584, critical edition, «Antonio Vivaldi. Opere incomplete», 3, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2003.
• Antonio Vivaldi, Concerti per fagotto RV 468 e RV 482, critical edition, «Antonio Vivaldi. Opere incomplete», 2, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2002.
• Antonio Vivaldi, Orlando Furioso, RV 728, Fondazione G. Cini, Istituto Italiano Antonio Vivaldi, 2002.
• Antonio Vivaldi, VI Concerti Opera Decima, facsimile edition, «Vivaldiana», 1, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2001.
• Antonio Vivaldi, Concerti per traversiere RV 431 e RV 432, critical edition, «Antonio Vivaldi. Opere incomplete», Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2001.
• Antonio Vivaldi, Arsilda Regina di Ponto, RV 700, Fondazione G. Cini, Istituto Italiano Antonio Vivaldi, 2001.
• Antonio Vivaldi, Opera Seconda, facsimile edition, «Strumentalismo italiano», 86, Firenze, S.P.E.S., 2001.

Selected discography

• Georg Friedrich Händel, Arie italiane per basso, Ildebrando D'Arcangelo, bass, Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, Deutsche Grammophon, September 2007
• Antonio Vivaldi, L'Atenaide (3 CD), Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, World Première & Complete Recording, Naïve, September 2007
• Antonio Vivaldi, I Concerti di Sfida, Anton Steck, violino, Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, World Première Recording, Naïve, April 2007
• Claudio Monteverdi, Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda, Lamento d’Arianna, Anna Caterina Antonacci, mezzosoprano, Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, Naïve, February 2006
• Antonio Vivaldi, Opera Aria, Sandrine Piau, soprano, Ann Hallenberg, alto, Paul Agnew, tenor, Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, World Première & Complete Recording, Naïve, September 2005
• Alessandro Scarlatti, Inferno, Cantate drammatiche, Elisabeth Scholl, soprano, Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, CPO, 2006
• Antonio Vivaldi, Tito Manlio (3 CD), Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, Amadeus Speciale, April 2004/CPO, 2005
• Antonio Vivaldi, Orlando furioso (3 CD), Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, Amadeus Speciale, February 2003/CPO, 2007
• Antonio Vivaldi, Arsilda, regina di Ponto (3 CD), Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, WDR, August 2001/CPO, October 2004
• Arcangelo Corelli, Concerti Grossi op. VI (2 CD), Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, World Première Recording with wind instruments, Grammy Awards Nominée 2000, Amadeus speciale March 1998/Tactus, 1999
• Antonio Vivaldi, Juditha Triumphans (2 CD), Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, Amadeus/WDR, December 2000, Tactus, 2002
• Antonio Vivaldi, Concerti per molti Istromenti, Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, Grammy Awards Nominée 1997, Tactus, 1996
• Antonio Vivaldi, Le Sinfonie dai Drammi per Musica, Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, World Première & Complete Recording, Frame, 2002
• Antonio Vivaldi, I 12 Concerti di Parigi, Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, World Première Recording, Amadeus, 1999/Tactus, 1999
• Antonio Vivaldi, Le Cantate (4 CD), Federico Maria Sardelli, conductor, World Prémiere Recording, Tactus 1998/99, 4 vols. cantatas for soprano and b.c.
• Antonio Vivaldi, I Concerti per flauto traversiere vol. I, Federico Maria Sardelli, flute and conductor, Tactus, 1994
• Antonio Vivaldi, I Concerti per flauto traversiere vol. II, Federico Maria Sardelli, flute and conductor, Tactus, 1995
• Pietro Antonio Locatelli, Sonate à tre op. V, Federico Maria Sardelli, flute and conductor, Tactus, 1996
• Alessandro Scarlatti, I Concerti per flauto, Federico Maria Sardelli, flute and conductor, World Première Recording , Tactus, 1993

Comic works

Federico Maria Sardelli is a longtime collaborator of the satirical magazine Il Vernacoliere and is valued because of his satire of Italian mainstream culture, religion and religious kitsch. His nonsensical style resembles that of Monty Python and Daniele Luttazzi, but he has a recognizable style of his own rooted in Tuscan popular humor.

Notable characters and strips by Sardelli include:

'Clem Momigliano', an improbable detective who uses a 9V-battery-fueled rocket (!) and cynically exploits his servant Negro Balongo. However, Balongo is not really a slave: he agrees to be the servant (for free) of Clem since he admires Clem, which is a hero.

'Il Bibliotecario' ("The Librarian") : a peculiar comic strip made always of only two frames that are variations on a common theme : in the first the librarian greets an unnamed elderly woman with an (always slightly different) improbable and archaic sentence (e.g. something like "May I help thee, my Peripatetic Friend : if I can be a Spring of Fulfillment for you, please consider me at Yor Disposal"). The woman will always ask for an (always different, and always real) improbable ancient book (e.g. the "Gabinetto Armonico" of Filippo Bonanni). In the second frame the librarian will answer the elder woman with a totally unpredictable, often nonsensical and more often heavily offensive behaviour (for example by showing her his buttocks and asking her for advice on his new tattoo, or telling her he's the "King of Fried Food" and insulting her).

'Merda' ("Shit") : a mute strip where various characters are obsessed by their relationship with excrement of which they can never liberate themselves.

'Circo' ("Circus"): about the adventures of a circus whose animals indulge in embarrassing activities like homosexual copulation just when the show is going on

But the talent of Federico Maria Sardelli as a comic author shows in more elaborate and unique gags like elaborate parodies of Padre Pio agiography or of Italian sagra (sort of popular festivals that Italian contadine communities once often organized ); the so-called Proesie ("Proetries") that are ineffable nonsense works sounding like:

Take care when
you move it from the sofa:
it's the very fragile
corpse of a dingo.

His Più Belle Cartoline Del Mondo ("Most Beautiful Postcards Of The World") are elaborate stories built around kitsch 60's and 70's postcards (often representing children or couples), written in an absurdly baroque and archaic style and lexicon, full of wonderful linguistic inventions (like the fake Zodiacal signs : e.g. Cancellini Marika, born under the sign of the lifting...), and with exhilarating plots rich in politically uncorrectness and cynical unhappy ends ; a recurring character in these stories is that of the terrible dwarf Gargilli Gargiulo.

Comic bibliography

• Il Libro Cuore (forse), Livorno, Mario Cardinali Editore, 1998 (a parody of the famous Edmondo De Amicis's Cuore)
• Trippa, I più grandi eroi dei fumetti (forse), Livorno, Mario Cardinali Editore, 1999 (comic strips)
• I Miracoli di Padrepio, Livorno, Mario Cardinali Editore, 2002 (comic miracles of S. Pio)
• Le più belle cartolyne del mondo, Livorno, Mario Cardinali Editore, 2005 (a gallery of the most terrifying postcards, with comments)
• Proesie, Livorno, Mario Cardinali Editore, 2004 (first book of poetry)
• Proesie II, Livorno, Mario Cardinali Editore, 2008 (second book of poetry)
• Paperi in Fiamme, Livorno, Mario Cardinali Editore, 2008 (comic strips)
• Saggi di Filosofia Neorazionalista, con un metodo sicuro per indovinare i gratta e vinci giusti e levare il malocchio, Livorno, Mario Cardinali Editore, 2009 (comic writings)

External links

• Federico Sardelli biography on the Modo Antiquo website
• Free scores by Federico Maria Sardelli at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)