Pini di Roma

Program notes

About the Work

Eight years after Fountains of Rome, Respighi returned to the city for a second tone poem, Pini di Roma (Pines of Rome), first performed at the Augusteo in Rome on 14 December 1924 under Bernardino Molinari. This time his subject was the umbrella pines that are among the most characteristic features of the Roman landscape, and once more he took four locations, each chosen, as he put it, as “witnesses of the principal events of Roman life”. Where Fountains moves through the times of a single day, Pines moves through time itself, from children playing in a modern park to the soldiers of ancient Rome marching into the city.

Pines of Rome is louder, bolder and more theatrical than Fountains, and it became one of the most popular orchestral works of the twentieth century, a showpiece for any orchestra with a strong brass section. It is also famous for a technical innovation: in the third section Respighi asks for a gramophone recording of a nightingale’s song to be played with the orchestra, one of the first times recorded sound was specified in a concert score. And the final march calls for extra brass instruments, the buccine (Roman trumpets, today usually played by flugelhorns or extra trumpets and trombones), which are sometimes placed around the hall to surround the audience with sound.

After the Italian operatic scenes of the evening, Respighi’s two Roman portraits frame the programme as an orchestral celebration of the city and its landscape, and give the Berliner Philharmoniker a chance to show off its full power in a grand finale.

What to Listen For

The Pines of the Villa Borghese. Bright, noisy, joyful music: children playing and singing nursery rhymes in the gardens of the Villa Borghese, marching like soldiers and dancing in circles. Listen for the dazzling, chattering orchestration, trumpets and all, which stops dead at the end.

Pines near a Catacomb. A complete change. Muted, low strings create a gloomy atmosphere, and a trumpet offstage sings a slow chant. Respighi imagined the pines standing over an early Christian catacomb, from which the sound of a mournful hymn rises. Listen for the chant growing into a huge, solemn climax before sinking back into darkness.

The Pines of the Janiculum. A night scene: a piano arpeggio, a warm clarinet solo, soft strings, the full moon over the pines on the Janiculum hill. At the end, listen for the recorded song of the nightingale that Respighi wrote into the score: a real bird singing over the orchestra’s hushed chords.

The Pines of the Appian Way. Dawn on the ancient Appian Way. Out of nothing comes a soft, heavy tread in the low strings, piano and timpani: the sound of a Roman army approaching. The march grows louder and louder as the extra brass (the buccine) enter in fanfares, until the whole orchestra, with organ, reaches a colossal climax as the legions march triumphantly up to the Capitol.