wet ink.
Carnevale has burst upon the city as violently as usual, but Antonio
notices nothing of it. All his concentration is upon the composition
of his concerti. For he has decided they will all be concerti. Four sets
of three, a structure with which Antonio is exploring the farthest
frontiers of traditional composition. Estienne has made plain that
concerti modelled on the Roman, the sort composed by Corelli, will
sell well. But, as he readily admitted, a whiff of fresh air through
them could never go amiss. But how much is a whiff? What in the
morning feels like a wondrous flash of inspiration is the same
afternoon waved aside by a grimacing Giambattista. It begins to
get on Antonio’s nerves the way his father constantly rejects his
work like this, without ever offering a sound alternative. What does
his father know of the creative process? Giambattista certainly has
no new musical ideas of his own. But despite everything the new
work takes shape, Antonio refusing to accept some of the criticism
aimed at him. The act of composing comes more and more easily
to him and fewer and farther between are those moments in which
the pen hangs motionless above the paper whilst the ink slowly
clots.
Nowadays, whenever the priest feels himself falling into a
vacuum he thinks back on the inspiring conversations with Andrea
Farsetti. It had been a great sorrow to him that day when, with his
returned letters, had come a brief note telling him that his friend
was gone. The priest had prayed for his soul; it was all that he could
do for Andrea now.
After Christmas the manuscript is ready to send off. Antonio
intends at first to dedicate the work to Andrea, but his father will
hear nothing of it. ‘There’s no money to be made from corpses,’ is
his definitive observation. Eventually father and son agree that the
dedication must be to Grand Prince Ferdinando of Tuscany. ‘After
all, you never know,’ Giambattista chuckles. ‘Perhaps you’ll be
welcomed back to his court when he recovers, and that might be
worth a lot more than the last fifteen ducats.’ Picturing the sick
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