The highSCORE Festival: The latest chapter in the history of music in the City of Pavia

The festival takes place in one of Europe’s most ancient seats of learning, the city once known to the ancient Romans as ‘Ticinum’, after the river Ticino on whose banks it was built. Pavia first came to prominence as a centre of culture when the great Ostrogoth King, Theodoric, chose to construct a mighty royal palace here after taking control of the Italian peninsula in AD 493. (1) We can only guess at what the music played and sung in that palace might have sounded like, probably a fascinating mixture of ancient Roman music and the music of the Germanic ‘barbarian’ tribes that Theodoric ruled. What we do know, however, is that one of the great philosophers of the age was brought to Pavia to be imprisoned in one of the city’s many, famous towers. He was then cruelly put to death at the hands of the Ostrogoths in one of the central squares of Pavia. His name was Severinus Boethius.

Like all philosophers of his time, Boethius, a Roman, had received a very complete education, ranging from mathematics to astronomy, languages and, of course, music. In fact, throughout the Dark Ages and the Middle Ages, music in western Europe was considered to be one of the most important fields of knowledge, and any person of culture was obliged study it. Thus we find that Boethius, the philosopher, wrote one of the most important textbooks on music, De Institutione Musica, which became mandatory reading for every scholar in Western Europe from the time of Boethius’ death in 525 onwards, for approximately one thousand years. (2)

Scholars like Colombanus, the Irish monk who was summoned to Italy in 612 by Theodolinda, the legendary queen of the Lombards, whose capital city was Pavia. (3) Or like Dungal, another Irish monk who was appointed the master of the new Studium of Pavia, created by Lothair, Holy Roman Emperor in 825. (4) Lothair’s Studium, which later became the famous University of Pavia, was founded as a school of theology and law in the city where his grandfather Charlemagne had been crowned King of the Italic Kingdom. The Studium collected precious manuscripts throughout the Middle Ages, like St Thomas of Aquinas’ own treatise on music De Arte Musica, 1245 circa. One of only two surviving manuscripts of this precious insight into the philosopher’s education and thinking is preserved in a lamb-skin codex in the library of the University to this day. (5)

Since, in medieval times, music was considered to be an essential branch of science, that all people of learning should master, it was especially studied by monasteries, by both priests and nuns. As a consequence, nuns of particular skill in this field earned renown as composers. One such woman was Pavia’s own Sister Caterina Assandra, who in the late 1500s established her reputation as a much sought after composer of both religious and lay music, from two and three part motets to ricercari and songs. (6)

In more recent times, the city also gave birth to one of history’s most renowned viola players and composers for this instrument, Alessandro Rolla, who lived from 1757 to 1841. (7) In his time musical knowledge was no longer the reserve of scholars, tucked away in monasteries or in universities, but had become the singular possession of the people through the highly popular art form of the Italian Opera. Pavia took part in the opera craze, building its own theatre, and hosting productions of all the sensations of the minute throughout the history of bel canto.

However, it was the city’s university which, once again, played a decisive role in its influence on music in those years. Two young writers, a century apart, were attracted here as students, who then went on to profoundly influence the world of opera as librettists. The first, Carlo Goldoni, studied here from 1723 to 1725. His real-life escape from the city as a stow-away on a river boat, fleeing from the young ladies that the young Latin lover had deflowered and insulted, is reminiscent of some of his own comic opera lyrics. (8) The second was Arrigo Boito, the librettist who worked together with the aging Verdi on such masterpieces as Othello, Simone Boccanegraand Falstaff. As student at the Conservatory of Milan he frequented the young literary hotheads at the University of Pavia, who inspired him with their notions of the revival of realism in art. (9) They met and discussed in the very same period cafés of Pavia where the participants in this year’s highSCORE Festival will probably meet for a break and a chat about their work.

Today, Pavia’s ancient and scholarly atmosphere has given birth to a new generation of young men and women who are determined to leave their mark. In the best tradition of the city, which has seen academics (like Colombanus and Dungal) come from afar since the Dark Ages to share their knowledge here, the teachers at the festival come not only from Italy but also from abroad. Composers Christopher Theofanidis and Paul Glass from America, and Giya Kancheli from Georgia will work with young musicians from varying nationalities in a series of lectures, workshops and public rehearsals of new compositions. The Italian tradition is represented by composers Mario Garuti, Ugo Nastrucci and Pavia’s own Giovanni Albini, who is also the Festival Artistic Director. The musical activity will culminate in a series of free concerts, to share the energy and enthusiasm with the whole city. The concert titles (Nights, Fires and Dances; Elegies, Memories, Fantasies; We Must be Bold; and Distant Worlds) reveal the depth of inspiration behind the event.

Pavia now breathlessly awaits the opening of the Festival, to discover this new chapter in the history of the city and music.