The Spanish-born, Syrian-Palestinian gambist Fahmi Alqhai has studied early texts from the Renaissance and Baroque periods thoroughly and takes their instructions on improvisation very seriously. He incorporates them into an individual and historically informed ornamentation practice; many nuances of intonation recall his connection to a culture that uses intervals smaller than semitones.
The fact that dances such as La Spagna by Heinrich Isaac or Santiago de Murcia’s Fandango are open to improvisation is not surprising – their simple harmonic structures were intended as the starting point for interpretations. In his programme, Alqhai also continues the tradition of the glosas, which were common in Spanish instrumental music of the 16th and 17th centuries. As in these musical “glosses”, he presents his own interpretations of existing works – either with embellishment and ornamentation or using the techniques of variation. In this way, for example, he adapts Josquin des Préz’s chanson Mille regretz, which was a “hit” during the 16th century. This practice is well documented in various treatises of that time, such as the Trattado de glosas by the Spanish composer and music theorist Diego Ortiz, in which he demonstrates how he glossed Jacob Arcadelt’s madrigal O felici occhi miei. Fahmi Alqhai will present his glosa of Diego Ortiz’s glosa of Jacob Arcadelt’s madrigal at today’s concert.
With a varied selection of dances and other arrangements of vocal works, Fahmi Alqhai and his Accademia del Piacere create a performance situation similar to that of the 16th and 17th centuries. They use the notated music as the basis for their arrangements and alternating ensembles and develop unique, spontaneous, improvised versions of the musical scores.