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• Minuetto From Falstaff
• Ants Revisited

Minuetto from Falstaff

Here is a minuetto taken from Giuseppe Verdi's opera, Falstaff, arranged for solo guitar by Amelie Luigi. Falstaff was Verdi's last opera, written when he was pushing 80. It was only his second comic opera, out of a total of 26 operas. Falstaff is universally considered a masterpiece - one of the three or four greatest comic operas. I hope you'll check it out some time. You'll hear that it's not one of the old-fashioned "number" operas - those with distinct arias like La Traviata or Rigoletto. The music of Falstaff romps along brightly, changing character continuously to reflect whatever is happening. This minuetto, as nice as it is, cannot be considered characteristic; do not expect two and a half hours of Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach!

The premiere of Falstaff was in Milan on Feb 9 1893. It's interesting to note that the copyright date of the guitar arrangement is the same year as the first North American performance of the opera, in New York in 1895. I wonder if Ms. Luigi saw it in either city. I can't tell you anything about her except that four other pieces by her in my collection are original compositions, and that her name appears as "Amelie" on pieces published in 1895, and as "Amelia" in 1897.

The minuetto comes from the very last scene. Falstaff the opera is based on Shakespeare's Merry Wives Of Windsor. Sir John Falstaff was the rascally, vain, old "Fat Knight", and in the last scene he receives a well-deserved humiliation. He is told that he can meet Ford's wife Alice secretly at the haunted Herne's Oak, but of course it's all a set-up. The other characters show up dressed as elves, fairies and imps, and they scare Falstaff half to death. He finally figures out what's going on, but not until after he's learned his lesson. Then, on the spot, there is a quick wedding ceremony for two couples, everyone still wearing his or her disguise. This minuetto provides the background music, and when it is finished, blustery, old Dr. Caius lifts the veil of his new wife, assuming her to be the pretty young Anne Ford. You can imagine his shock and disgust when "she" turns out to be one of Falstaff's smelly, red-nosed, drinking buddies! The merry wives had fixed it up so that the second couple was Anne and the young gentleman Fenton, foiling Mr. Ford's plans to match his daughter with old Caius.

It may interest guitarists that Verdi wrote some lute music for the opera. In Act II, scene 2, Alice Ford takes up a lute and plays it as Falstaff shows up at her house for their first secret meeting. That one was a set-up, too, and poor Falstaff ends up getting dumped out of a laundry basket, through the window and into the sewer.

In the opera, none of the sections of the minuetto are repeated. I think the second G in staff 4, measure 1, should be natural. I thank the Library of Congress again for making its music collection so accessible.

-Donald Sauter

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Ants Revisited

At the February meeting, our guitar orchestra played and recorded "The Floating Ancillary Ants" by Rex Willis. You're not supposed to speak for everybody in news articles, but I'll stick my neck out: we all had a great time. This was due in large measure to Kevin Vigil's expert guidance. In fact, I know everyone enjoyed themselves because everyone took parts for our next guitar orchestra session, on April 19 (see article.) There was even some talk of taking our show on the road heard at the end of the evening. (Now, I don't know about
that!)

Here are the guitarists who joined in: Conductor - Kevin Vigil. Guitar 1 - Bob Wysong, Bill Dykes, Kevin Hassett, John Rodgers. Guitar 2 - Donald Sauter, Mark Kowaleski, Andrew Burt, John Politte, Mark Carson, Leila Carson, Val Klavans, Charlotte Asmuth. Guitar 3 - Bev Ross, Eric Howard, Kathy Weiland, Debby Maatta. Special thanks to Bev Ross for bringing her recording equipment.

We've never had so many people turn out for a WGS ensemble session - and this in spite of the previous newsletter not giving the time or the place! The guitar society has been going for about 10 years now, and I'd like to think something is finally starting to ignite, participation-wise. Let's get members' recitals numbers up, too! Folks, you'd have a hard time naming anything that offers anything near the recreational bang-for-the-buck the WGS does.

As good as the February meeting was, could it be any better? Well, we could all try to show up promptly, ready to play, at 7:30. This is especially important since we have to vacate the community center at such an early hour, about 9:45. I felt like we were just beginning to pull the piece together - just reaching the starting point- when we had to break up.

So, come prepared. Let's hit the ground running. Have your part worked up like you would a solo. Remember to bring your guitar. Remember to bring your music stand. Remember to bring your foot stool. Remember to bring your personal page turner if you need one. Remember that the WGS is just a volunteer operation. The $12 million Ford Foundation grant was lost in the mail; our president pulls down a zero-figure income; and the WGS International Headquarters look suspiciously like our homes.

In the "Ants" piece, probably half of us were playing a part we had never played before. For instance, even though I had sent out five Guitar 1 parts, three of the four Guitar 1 players at the session were seeing it for the first time. Don't sweat choosing a part. I can assure everyone it is not worth the trouble trying out several parts to find your "perfect fit". Take one and go with it. Sometimes you'll be Guitar 1, sometimes Guitar 9 - all parts are important!

Getting back to the time problem, both of our locations, the Levine School of Music and the Chevy Chase Community Center, kick us out fairly early. If anyone knows of other locations for WGS meetings without such time constraints, pipe up. It would be nice to find a place convenient to our Virginia members to alternate with our D.C. location(s).

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