The saltarello is a musical dance originally from
Italy. The first mention of it is in
Add MS 29987, a late-fourteenth- or early fifteenth-century manuscript of
Tuscan origin, now in the
British Library.[1] It was usually played in a fast
triple meter and is named for its peculiar leaping step, after the
Italian verb saltare ("to jump"). This characteristic is also the basis of the German name Hoppertanz or Hupfertanz ("hopping dance"); other names include the French pas de Brabant and the Spanish alta or alta danza.[1]
History
The saltarello enjoyed great popularity in the courts of
medievalEurope. [citation needed] During the 14th century, the word saltarello became the name of a particular dance step (a double with a hop on the final or initial upbeat), and the name of a meter of music (a fast triple), both of which appear in many choreographed dances. Entire dances consisting of only the saltarello step and meter are described as being improvised dances in 15th-century
Italian dance manuals. (The first dance treatise that dealt with the saltarello was the 1465 work of
Antonio Cornazzano.) A clearer, detailed description of this step and meter appears in a 16th-century manuscript in Madrid's Academia de la Historia.[3] During this era, the saltarello was danced by bands of
courtesansdressed as men at
masquerades. The saltarello gave birth to the quadernaria in
Germany, which was then fused into the saltarello Tedesco (German saltarello) in Italy. [citation needed] This "German saltarello", in contrast to the Italian variety, was in duple time and began on the downbeat, and was also known by the name quaternary.[4]
In 1540,
Hans Neusidler published an Italian dance under the name Hupff auff (introductory skip), and identified it with a parenthetical subtitle: "saltarella".[5]
The saltarello is still a popular folk dance played in the regions of southern-central Italy, such as
Abruzzo,
Molise (but in these two regions the name is feminine: Saltarella),
Lazio and
Marche. The dance is usually performed on the
zampogna bagpipe or the
organetto, a type of diatonic button accordion, and is accompanied by a tamburello or hand-drum.[citation needed]
Medieval saltarelli
The principal source for the medieval Italian saltarello is the
Tuscan manuscript
Add MS 29987, dating from the late 14th or early 15th century and now in the
British Library. The musical form of these four early saltarelli is similar to that of the
estampie.[7] However, they are in different metres: two are in senaria imperfecta, and two in quaternaria.[8]: 168 No choreographies survive from before the 1430s, and it is not clear that these four dances have any relationship to later saltarelli.[1]
In classical music
Tielman Susato included a saltarello in Het derde musikboexken: Danserye (1551).
A guitar piece entitled "Saltarello" is attributed to
Vincenzo Galilei, written in the 16th century.
Odoardo Barri: Six morceaux de salon, for alto-viola and piano (no. 6 is a saltarello)
Charles-Valentin Alkan wrote a "Saltarelle" Op. 23, and in the final movement of his Sonate de Concert Op. 47 for piano and cello, "Finale alla Saltarella".
Berlioz used a saltarello in the Carnival scene of Benvenuto Cellini which was reprised in the Roman Carnival Overture.
^
abcMeredith Ellis Little ([n.d.]). "
Saltarello", in: Deane Root (ed.), Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press. Accessed December 2017. (subscription required).
^Alfred Blatter (2007). Revisiting Music Theory: A Guide to the Practice. Abingdon; New York: Routledge. p 28.ISBN9780415974394.
^Curt Sachs (1937). World History of the Dance, translated by
Bessie Schönberg. New York: W. W. Norton & Company Inc. p 323.
^Curt Sachs (1937). World History of the Dance, translated by Bessie Schönberg. New York: W. W. Norton & Company Inc. p 294.
^Curt Sachs (1937). World History of the Dance, translated by Bessie Schönberg. New York: W. W. Norton & Company Inc. p 324.
^A Carnevale ogni scherzo vale!: filastrocche della tradizione, AliRibelli
^Lawrence H. Moe (2003), "Saltarello", The Harvard Dictionary of Music, fourth edition, edited by Don Michael Randel (Cambridge: Belknap Press for the Harvard University Press)
ISBN978-0-674-01163-2
^Timothy J. McGee (2014). Medieval Instrumental Dances. Bloomington; Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
ISBN9780253013149.