Sérénade Mélancholique

The Sérénade Mélancholique was stimulated by hearing a vocal and piano performance of the Ave Maria of Vladimir Vavilov at an Armenian Funeral the composer attended in San Luis Obispo. Vavilov attributed the piece to the Renaissance composer Giulio Caccini. Vladimir Vavilov was a lutenist who lived from 1925 to 1973 and the piece was “introduced/discovered” in 1971 by Mr. Vavilov. While the body of work of Caccini on IMSLP is relatively scant there is no mention of an Ave Maria or melody that would match that of Mr. Vavilov. I suspect that the Ave Maria was actually written by Mr. Vavilov who perhaps chose to mimic Fritz Kreisler who was constantly “discovering” pieces of other composers that turned out to be his original compositions since he felt that the piece would receive better notice if people thought a famous composer wrote it.

The Ave Maria has a 4/4 time signature with a “strumming” chordal bass as one would experience with a lute or guitar accompanying the melody.

In the present composition I have envisioned a serenade with a melancholy tone such as might be presented by a troubadour strumming a guitar or lute in accompanying the melody. The bass accompaniment makes extensive use of seventh chords and progressions. The main melody is punctuated by a repetitious four quarter note motif around the scale tones of “3-2-4-3” (or B¨-A-C-B¨). The main melody transitions to a somewhat “brighter toned” middle trio section in the key of G Major before returning to the primary key of G minor. The piece ends with in a coda.

The piece was written from 07 April 2020 to 12 October 2020.