La scuola di guida by Nino Rota has been unjustly left to languish in obscurity. Written for the 1959 Spoleto Festival, this breezy 15-minute “idillio musicale” for soprano and tenor, about a blooming romance between a driving instructor and his pupil, receives its world premiere recording in this second volume (2013) of Decca’s ongoing Rota cycle with the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi.
Conductor Giuseppe Grazioli has opted for Bruno Moretti’s sparky orchestration over the original piano accompaniment, which he rolls out in fluid tempos and with a sound that hops between ambrosial lushness and requisite urgency when at the work’s denouement, for example, the car in which the dialogue unravels is sent hurtling into a tree. Soprano Valentina Corradetti and tenor Paolo Cauteruccio give an incisive delivery of the innuendo-filled text.
This is just one of a number of previously unrecorded works that make it into this chocolate-box selection of delectable surprises. La Fiera di Bari, a toe-tapping vignette whose unconventional scoring calls for five trombones and five saxophones, makes for joyous listening–and it’s a wonder that Rota’s music for the classic Fellini film Le notti di Cabiria has never before made it onto disc in the Suite version we get here. La Verdi brings these soundscapes to vivid life, making the little details sparkle, though rarely at the expense of clarity of the overall structure. And, just as crucially, the orchestra brings bags of personality to the table, plastering a grin on the face when it kicks back for the swaggering outer movements of the Suite from Fellini’s Amarcord.
In the context of such fine playing only the trumpet concerto comes across a bit sloppily, though even this Mozart pastiche has something to offer by shedding light on Rota’s pilfering yet individual compositional approach. The other two concertos–for restless bassoon and acrobatic trombone respectively–come across better. But the disc’s most striking inclusion, both for the quality of the recording and that of the score, is the four-minute-long Guardando il Fujikyama, written for an orchestra tour Rota led to Japan in 1976. Here, impressionistic, swirling violins ultimately give way to an enigmatically arpeggiating electric guitar. Unfairly neglected indeed.
