Allegro from ‘Spring’

Note from the composer

A less well-known fact about these pieces is that as well as the music, ‘The Four Seasons’ consists of a set of sonnets: one for each season. It is unclear whether or not Vivaldi wrote these himself–or even whether they were written before or after the music–but they are clearly designed as a part of the work and contain allusions to elements that appear in the music: the dog who barks in the second movement of ‘Spring’; the birds that sing; the languorous heat of Summer. The relevant lines of the sonnet for this movement are written out above the relevant bars – knowing what each phrase is designed to represent adds a whole new dimension to the music!

Listen

Tamsin Dearnley plays the advanced arrangement of Allegro from Vivaldi’s ‘Spring.’