Giulio Castagnoli: Kaddish

The family tree of Giulio Castagnoli's music is extensive. It's roots lie in the ancient music of the Maghreb and Andalusia, and while the strongest branches are formed by the vibrant colours of Monteverdi's madrigals and the complexity of Giacinto Scelsi's orchestral music, the foliage, to stay with this metaphore, is the composer's understanding of the physical realities of life and music. The fact that his mother's family was of Sephardic Jewish origin brought him closer to the sound and spiritual world of the Middle East, but it should not be overlooked that the music of India and the Far East has also influenced his compositions over the decades. Among the string instruments, the cello is undoubtedly Castagnoli's favourite. The depth of it's timbre, the masculine power of it's middle register and the availability of a rich spectrum of harmonics (and thus of scales of natural tone series, which contain fascinating echoes of the harmony revealed centuries ago) make the cello rather more than a docile instrument that embodies abstract musical ideas. By composing for one instrument, for it's body and soul, Castagnoli also honours it's evolution, that is, the numberless experiments which have led it's current ideal form, as well as it's origin from the three kingdoms of nature.