Niccolò Paganini
Onstage he was called a devil; offstage he was a father who spoke freely only before his son.
At a glance 🔭💭
Some coordinates adapted from GeoNames (CC BY 4.0) · Pleiades (CC BY 3.0)
Those close to him ⏳🌊
- FamilyAntonio Paganini
He was a father who drove his son's talent hard with strict early training.
- FamilyTeresa Bocciardo
The mother who believed in a revelation that her son would become a great violinist.
- TeacherAlessandro Rolla
In Parma he said there was nothing more to teach a boy who had already surpassed him.
- PatronageElisa Baciocchi
As Princess of Lucca she made him director of court music, and their lives became entangled privately as well.
- InfluenceLudwig van Beethoven
Paganini revered him deeply, but by the time he reached Vienna in 1828, Beethoven had already died.
- FamilyAchille Paganini
The son who became his father's voice in his final years and spent his life striving to secure him a proper burial.
I. The boy from Genoa · 1782–1795 (age 0–13)
He was born in October 1782 in Genoa, Italy. (Poverty) His father, Antonio Paganini, was a small tradesman who hauled goods at the harbor and played the mandolin. He and his wife, Teresa Bocciardo, had several children, but many of them died young; Niccolò was one of those who survived. The household was far from comfortable. (Revelation) Teresa, a devout believer, later said that before her son was born she had dreamed that an angel appeared and foretold he would become the greatest violinist in the world. Paganini himself loved to tell the story, wrapping his own destiny in mystery. (Severity) From about the age of five, Antonio taught his son the mandolin and then the violin. He made him practice all day, and when he was not satisfied, the boy went without meals. Paganini later recalled this time as having 'suffered under my father's hand.' (Talent) By around eight he was already composing short pieces of his own, and he began formal lessons with Giacomo Costa, a renowned Genoese violinist. His teachers struggled to keep pace with how quickly he absorbed everything. (Body) From childhood he was slight and often ill. His joints were unusually flexible, letting him spread his fingers far wider than others could, a trait that later underpinned his unrivaled technique but was also the source of the chronic pain that plagued him all his life.
II. Teachers and independence · 1795–1804 (age 13–22)
(Stage) In 1795 his father arranged a benefit concert for the boy in Genoa to raise money for study in Parma. The boy's playing captivated the audience, and on the strength of this success Paganini was soon sent to Parma's celebrated violinist Alessandro Rolla. (Teacher) The story goes that Rolla, hearing the boy play from his sickbed, waved him off, saying there was nothing left to teach him. Instead he had him study composition with Gasparo Ghiretti and later seek advice from Ferdinando Paer as well. In this period Paganini was already sketching the ideas that would one day become the twenty-four Caprices. (Rebellion) In his late teens he grew increasingly resentful that his father controlled the money he earned from performing. Around sixteen or seventeen he slipped free of his father's control and began touring northern Italy on his own. (Dissipation) Newly free, the young man fell into gambling. At one point he was on the verge of pawning his own violin to cover his debts; the story goes that a merchant, struck by his playing, lent him a fine Guarneri and then gave it to him outright. His love affairs were frequent as well. (Seclusion) For several years from 1801 he stayed on a country estate with a noblewoman whose name has not come down to us, learning the guitar and living quietly. The chamber music for violin and guitar he wrote in this period reveals a private, tranquil Paganini, quite unlike the dazzling performer of later years.
III. The court of Lucca and love · 1805–1810 (age 23–28)
(Court) In 1805, when Napoleon's sister Elisa Baciocchi became Princess of Lucca, she appointed Paganini court violinist and then music director. (Scandal) Rumors of intimacy between him and Elisa circulated in and around the court. Her husband, Felice Baciocchi, was displeased, and the gossip only grew. (Virtuosity) It is said that when Elisa playfully asked whether he could play on just two strings, Paganini replied that one would be enough, and composed and dedicated to her the 'Napoleon Sonata,' played on the G string alone. A private relationship had, in effect, given birth to one of his signature techniques. (Rupture) As the rumors spiraled out of control and Felice's jealousy became open, he left the court of Lucca around 1809. Never again would he bind himself to a single patron or court. (Freedom) The experience left him with a lifelong principle: he chose the path of the independent performer, employed by no one, earning his living by organizing his own concerts.
Written at the court of Lucca in answer to a playful question from Elisa Baciocchi, it turned a private bond directly into virtuosity.
- From beginning to end it is played on a single string, the thick, low G. The very constraint of never touching another string is the piece's reason for being.
- The march-like theme, with its stately rhythm written with Napoleon in mind, reveals its character as a dedication for the court.
- The thick, dark tone peculiar to the G string dominates the whole work; listen for how it conjures a wide range of expressions within a narrow compass.
IV. The bow that became legend · 1810–1828 (age 28–46)
(Momentum) In the 1810s, as he toured throughout Italy, his fame snowballed. His concerts sold out again and again, and audiences were spellbound by sounds that seemed beyond human making. (Devil) His pale, gaunt face, his black clothes, and the strange way he twisted his body as he gripped the bow gave rise to rumors that he had made a pact with the devil. It is also said that in some towns the clergy shunned him. Paganini never bothered to deny the rumors; instead he deepened the mystery onstage. (Technique) One after another he perfected clear tones drawn from harmonics (flageolet), plucking the strings with the left hand without the bow, bouncing the bow on the string to link several notes, and the feat of playing an entire piece on a single string. These achievements reached the world in 1820, gathered as the twenty-four Caprices, Op.1. (Reverence) He revered Beethoven deeply. When he at last reached Vienna in 1828, Beethoven had already died, and Paganini long regretted never having met him in life. He was also close to Gioachino Rossini, and in 1821, at the Teatro Apollo in Rome, he stepped in to conduct the premiere of Rossini's opera 'Matilde di Shabran.' (Wealth) His explosive fame brought enormous income, but he was dogged at once by a reputation for stinginess and by talk of losing fortunes at the gaming table. (Solitude) Behind the dazzling applause he spent much of his time alone. He rarely trusted impresarios or critics, and, fearing that his scores might be published without permission and his techniques stolen, he kept his manuscripts rigorously hidden.
Gathering the techniques he had honed since his Lucca years into twenty-four solo études, it is the written proof of the 'devil's violinist' legend.
- The theme and variations of No. 24 is a melody so beloved that later composers such as Liszt, Brahms, and Rachmaninoff each arranged it in turn.
- No. 9, 'La chasse,' imitates hunting horns and birdsong with leaping bow strokes that bounce on the string to link several notes, and with harmonics (flageolet).
- In No. 13 the trills sound like laughter, earning it the nickname 'Devil's laughter.'
- In No. 5, broken chords (arpeggios), spreading each chord out note by note, surge up and down in a relentless stream, and it is still used today to train violinists' fingers.
A set of variations leaning on a ballet tune by Süssmayr, it feels as though he were savoring, in music, the devilish rumors that surrounded him.
- Taking a ballet melody as its theme, it grows ever more grotesque and faster with each variation.
- The ghostly whistling of harmonics (flageolet), produced by lightly touching the string so it rings clear and thin, brings the title's 'witches' vividly to life.
- The bright yet eerie rhythm of short, detached, bouncing bow strokes (staccato) fits neatly with the rumors that he was entangled with the devil.
A signature work from the years when his fame was racing toward its peak, this concerto sets his dazzling technique squarely against the orchestra.
- Though actually written in E-flat major, it is played with an irregular tuning (scordatura) in which every string of the solo violin is tuned a semitone higher, so the soloist can use the easier fingerings of D major while producing a tone brighter and more brilliant than the orchestra's.
- In the first movement, the solo violin enters after a grand orchestral introduction, creating a dramatic contrast.
- Passages that call for plucking the strings with the fingers of the left hand, without the bow, while bowing at the same time are counted among the most notorious hurdles for violinists.
- The third-movement rondo opens with a light, dancelike rhythm and closes in a blaze of virtuosity.
V. Paris·London, a father's place · 1828–1834 (age 46–52)
(Illness) In 1828, while touring Vienna and Prague, he fell gravely ill. The cause is thought to have been the aftereffects of mercury, used in his long treatment for syphilis, compounded by pulmonary tuberculosis, and from around this time his voice began little by little to fail. (Lover) From around 1824 he lived with the young singer Antonia Bianchi and toured with her. (Son) In July 1825 his son, Achille Ciro Alessandro, was born in Palermo. Paganini was deeply attached to the child, and around 1828, when his relationship with Bianchi ended, he won sole custody, an unusual thing in that era, and cared for his son with his own hands even while on tour. (Paris) From 1831 he swept the stages of Paris and London and sealed his legend. The young Franz Liszt, who heard him play around this time, later recalled that it changed his life, and vowed to become 'the Paganini of the piano.' (Berlioz) Struck with admiration for Hector Berlioz's 'Symphonie fantastique,' he asked him for a viola concerto. But he felt the finished 'Harold in Italy' lacked the brilliance he needed as a performer, and never played it himself. Instead, on hearing the work at a later concert, he knelt before Berlioz in front of the audience and sent him 20,000 francs to ease his poverty. (Shadow) Just as his fame reached its height, his health was quietly crumbling. He needed help even to get from place to place, yet he seldom heeded his doctors' advice to rest.
The final movement of a concerto completed shortly after the birth of his son Achille, it captures the brilliance of his touring life at its very height.
- As its title says, it means 'little bell,' and the orchestra's real triangle and the solo violin's high harmonics (flageolet) blend together as if trading the chimes of a bell.
- The buoyant recurring rondo theme, hard to forget once heard, was so widely loved that Franz Liszt later rearranged it as a work for solo piano.
- The passages that demand pinpoint accuracy in the high register are still regarded as among the hardest challenges a violinist can face.
A miniature from the height of his Paris and London tours that seems to transcribe the relentless, driving rhythm of his performing life.
- As its title says, it means 'perpetual motion,' and the entire piece is filled, without a single rest, with short notes at one unchanging speed.
- A test of endurance for the bowing right arm, it is known among players as a piece so grueling it leaves the arm numb.
- The unbroken stream of notes sounds like the breath of someone running without pause.
VI. Silence and rest · 1834–1840 (age 52–58)
(Business) In 1836 he invested a fortune in opening the 'Casino Paganini' in Paris, a gambling house that doubled as a concert hall. The venture failed, and he was drawn into lawsuits on charges of fraud, suffering heavy losses. (Decline) A disease of the larynx all but took his voice. The boy Achille stayed at his side, speaking for his father and handling his affairs. (Nice) In 1840 he withdrew to Nice in search of a milder climate. Bedridden, he could scarcely compose or play. (Death) He died in Nice on May 27, 1840. He had not received the last rites from a priest; one account holds that he refused them, another that the Bishop of Nice withheld them because of his reputation. The Church would not permit him to be buried in consecrated ground. (Rest) His embalmed body wandered for decades between Genoa and the outskirts of Parma. All that while, Achille petitioned the Church and the authorities tirelessly to give his father a proper burial, and in 1876, thirty-six years after his death, Paganini at last found a consecrated resting place in a Parma cemetery. A son's long devotion had brought his father's story to its close.
A piece written not for transcendent virtuosity but as if to sing quietly through the instrument.
- As its title says, it means 'in a singing manner,' and in place of dazzling technique a slow, lyrical melody unfolds.
- Laid over a simple accompaniment, the melody holds a restrained sorrow that sets it sharply apart from his other transcendentally virtuosic works.
Notes on terms 📚🔎
Caprice (capriccio)
A short solo piece that shows off technique freely, without a fixed form.
Flageolet (harmonics)
A technique of lightly touching the string to produce a clear, slender overtone. It sounds like a bell.
Left-hand pizzicato
A technique of plucking the string with the fingers of the left hand instead of using the bow. Used together with the right hand's bowing, the two sounds are heard overlapping.
Scordatura (irregular tuning)
A technique of tuning the strings higher or lower than standard pitch to change the tone color or the fingering.
Ricochet (bouncing bow)
A bowing technique in which the bow is lightly bounced on the string, as if dropped, to play several notes in rapid succession.
Perpetuum mobile
A piece in which notes at one unchanging speed run unbroken from beginning to end, without a single rest.
Variations
A form in which a single theme is repeated many times while its rhythm or harmony is varied.