Paganini: secrets and gut – A resource page for The Exale

Posted on September 20th, 2020 by


This is the resource page for the talk I am presenting for ‘The Exhale’ at 630pm on the 22nd September. Details and booking here: LINK

A glimpse of The Secret – sent to Luigi Germi. an engraving published in Paris a year before Paganini’s arrival and his three-octave chromatic scale fingering
Paganini-Il Segreto
In 1831 – you could buy publications such as this in Paris, for 2 Fr – promising you ‘a few words on his secret’

Double Stopped Harmonics

Il Segreto – Reverse Harmonic Fingerings

Imiration of flutes and horns 9th Caprice
Extraordinary indeed – notation of scratch tones
Caprice 1 – 10th, then 14th.
The mad stretch!
Paganini’s scale for the young Clara Schumann
Franz von Lenbach’s picture of Clara Schumann (1878)
The scale – Breslau August 1829
Manuscript of the 5th Caprice
Standard 19th Century Chromatic fingering (and for most of the 20th) from Hans Wessley’s Scale guide) It’s what I was taught
Look familiar? The opening of the E Major Capriccio from Locatelli;s l’Arte del Violino 1733
Locatelli
From my working copy of the 17th Caprice
Indication of D/G String writing (24th Caprice)
Bariolage & open strings – 24th Caprice
‘Up the octave’
Open string to descend
Register
Unison E (open and 4th -notated)
Paganini and Ketch Secor at the Hollywood Bowl
Filming at the Library of Congress, in my version of Paganini’s posture…! 20th June 2012 Photo; Richard Bram
Typical cheap engraving of Paganini, produced during his time in the UK (1831-1834)
Rehearsing on Paganini’s del Gesu ‘the Cannon’. Genoa 2007. Photo Richard Bram
Balance point on Bull’s huge bow, Bergen (Shak Bull’s Apartent) 2 6 16
The end of the 6th Caprice
Paganini’s Bridge from ‘il Cannone’ (note multiple notches)