Mandolin Moments

By Reidar Falch

Raffaele Calace (1863-1934)

Raffaele Calace (1863-1934) was the great Italian master of the mandolin in his time. Living in Napoli, Italy, he performed, composed and built instruments.

Two masters of the mandolin today, Mike Marshall and Caterina Lichtenberg have reissued his mandolin method.

Caterina admires Calace, "Calace is for me the most important composer and teacher of the Romantic period. His compositions are musically very interesting and they include all kind of specific techniques for the mandolin, especially his Solo Preludes for Mandolin. As well he made wonderful instruments and this all together makes him a shining light for mandolin."

Mike has some nice words too, "Calace elevated the art of mandolin playing way beyond anyone who was playing at his time. His use of extended techniques such as duo style and multiple voice tremolo, harmonics, 10ths and 12ths. All of these techniques he really mastered and explained in detail in his method books."

Caterina Lichtenberg and Mike Marshall

"But more importantly than all of that were his compositions themselves. He had a very modern approach to harmony and form that transcended the typical mandolin playing of his time, especially in his solo prelude compositions," Mike continues.

Calace's method was published in 1910 with both Italian and French side by side on each page. "The Japanese company "Suiseisha" released this version with some Japanese added here and there," Mike says. Caterina adds, "Calace's Method was also published in German language by Marga Wilden-Hüsgen. But it is not a word for word translation, because she wanted to capture the essence and include her own pedagogical ideas."

Caterina and Mike can agree to that Calace's method seems more modern in pedagogic approach than many methods published later. "Yes, his method seems to me more modern and he has a system and methodology which takes you step by step from the most basics to the most advance. This makes his method more complete. As a composer he has a unique voice and you can tell that he really studied composition. Even in his simplest pieces you can hear this background, and that’s why his little exercises and pieces in the method are very satisfying musically," Caterina says.

"Yes, he was pushing into some very advanced technical questions and he developed a method which walks you through learning these techniques in a very systematic way. My guess is that not too many players of the time were able to master much of what is in especially the later parts of these books. He was without a doubt very far ahead of his time," Mike says.

Mike sees this in another perspective, "The mandolin in America became a folk instrument shortly after Calace's time after the fall of the Golden Era of mandolin orchestras. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, because so much of the music we all love developed because of this trend towards rural folks playing the instruments and simply playing what they could by ear. But it has taken us these 100 years to finally get to the point where we are ready to begin to incorporate some of these techniques back into the mandolin from our new perspective."

Caterina Lichtenberg and Mike Marshall

Caterina would suggest that you have to have this method in your library, "Before you for example start working on Calace's advanced preludes it makes sense to have studied and worked your way through his method. But also for the other compositions of the Romantic Period it is very helpful to have studied the specific techniques of that time."

"To play any of Calace's solo pieces you must first understand what his intent is in his method books. So here it is," Mike says and continues, "I have been lucky to have Caterina by my side each step of the way as I try to unravel the mysteries of what he puts on the page. These method books will give every mandolinist the opportunity to open these doors to their own playing and also give them insight into  the mandolin playing of the time, which in my opinion was much more advanced in many ways than what must of us are doing today.

Mike has learned to appreciate the music, "I have found that by learning just a few of Calace's preludes, it has opened up incredible possibilities that I hope will find their way into my own composing and improvising one day. I had heard some of this music many years ago but unfortunately I didn't really appreciate it at first."

After coming to Wuppertal, Germany and hearing some of Caterina's students play it and then giving it a try, Mike said, "....Wait a minute... there is some incredible stuff in here."

"It's especially exciting for me to get back to my Italian roots too, and to think about my grandparents living very near to Naples during the time that Calace was performing, writing and building instruments too. I love this historical connection that I feel," Mike says.

"I am very proud of this translation. Big big credit must go to Amy Burcham for her tireless efforts translating the written text on each page, but also in cleaning up much of the original scanned manuscript which was full of marks and bent staves. She did a wonderful job of all of this. But also of course to have had Caterina by our sides helping us understand what his intent was from a musical  angle. This was very important part of creating what we feel to be very accurate translations," Mike states.

The translation was published late in 2010. By coincidence, it was 100 years after the original. "We didn't even realize it until we were almost going to the first pressing. Amazing isn't it!" Mike says, and Caterina joins in, "Yes, this coincidence is really funny, isn´t it?"

Read the review

Caterina's website

Mike's website