Esordio e "drammaturgia" del primo movimento nelle sinfonie di Boccherini

In his symphonies no less than in his chamber music, Boccherini’s instrumental style appears to be fundamentally different from that of the masters of the ‘classical style’. This, however, as has already been amply demonstrated, does not mean that his symphonies, as well as his chamber compositions, lack internal cohesion concerning both musical form and expressive content, nor that they are weak from the point of view of ‘rhetorical’ efficacy or lacking in the dramatization of musical ideas and episodes and more generally of expressive materials, compared to coeval ‘classical’ works. Some peculiarities of Boccherini’s instrumental style, such as a tendency towards modular construction, the significant role given to texture, a dialogue with frequent intersections between chamber and symphonic style, bring these aspects – structural cohesion, ‘rhetorical efficacy’ and instrumental ‘dramaturgy’ – to be configured in the symphonies as well in an often original way. This contribution is focused on the latter point. The exordium types in the initial movements of Boccherini’s symphonies are examined, considering their impact on the ‘rhetorical’ and ‘dramaturgical’ profiles of the compositions they open. The exordium is a decisive moment for a symphony, the instrumental genre mainly connected to the idea of ‘greatness’ and essentially designed to satisfy and excite its audience with the strength and variety of an impressive musical construction. One important aspect of Boccherini’s symphonies, in this sense, immediately appears to be the non-prevalence of forceful openings. Starting from this signal and analyzing three initial movements (from the symphonies op. B 21, No. 4 G 496; op. B 35, No. 1 G 509; op. B 42 G 520), but with references ranging throughout the entire corpus of Boccherini symphonies, the particular way in which the energy is dosed within the first movement of a Boccherini symphony will be observed, trying to understand what this implies as regards all the structural parameters of the composition and its topical plot, in terms of its ‘dramaturgy’.